Today was the first day at “camp.” Wow, what an experience! I was more immediately affected when I arrived in Kosovo, but I think that was because NATO soldiers guarded the country and everywhere you looked there were tanks and guns and more tanks and more guns, you never really felt safe. At this camp, it is different. These refugees look as if they are just living their lives, unaware of the fact that they are refugees.
The camp itself is quite well kept. Each family is given materials to build a house – bamboo and wood, so that no one lives in tents or out in the open. They are well clothed and well groomed.
The morning started with a presentation/ community discussion at the Satellite Health Center in Camp 2. Cate, in the IRC’s Community Helath Program who is working with me on this project, is also working on an interesting project in trying to get the community to be more responsible about their health, and not just see the health center as a place to go in an emergency, but rather to integrate good health practices into their everyday lives.
We ate lunch in a little noodle shop in camp. Very strange, they have stores and a few restaurants/shops in the camps run by the refugees. It is rather questionable as to where the money comes from to buy the food for the stores and where the money comes from for the refugees to buy it from the stores. In any case, Cate and I had brought our lunch with us so we didn’t eat anything from the store; I would like to try to keep my stomach in as good shape as possible.
After lunch, we had arranged for a meeting for any and all artists who would be interested in teaching their craft to the youth. 35 people showed up, I was amazed!!! The group was mostly men, although a few of the older women showed up. The presentation to them was a real trial and error. It turned out that they are interested in passing on the tradition, and in fact have a cultural tradition committee in the camp. The leader of the committee was at the meeting, a real wheeler and dealer, but someone I think we can work with – a lot of this is going to be about local politics – which runs deep in these camps. First we introduced ourselves and then explained what it was we want to do – set up the program – and asked if the adults were interested in teaching their traditional art forms to the youth. They were, but were not sure if the youth would be receptive. We are meeting with the youth next week to talk to them about participating in this.
After a lot of discussion, we asked what were the types of art forms they would like to pass on. One of the women started to sing the “eyro” traditional folk songs that tell the history of these people – the Karenni. As she began, one of the older men in the room joined, it was a responsive love song – so beautiful! And the look on their faces was priceless – they were lost in the songs, as was everyone around them. Afterwards, another woman got up and started dancing one of the traditional dances – she looked about 90 years old and so frail I thought she would break, until she started moving.
The meeting ended with the decision to meet this coming Friday morning, at this point, they will have discussed this among themselves and identified the adults who would be interested in teaching the children. Also, they will have identified what forms of their traditional art forms they would like to teach.
We left the camps around three. I was drained, exhausted and empty!!
That evening, I had dinner with Michelle, the field director, Cate, and someone from the New York office. Off to bed at an early hour, we are leaving for camp tomorrow at 8am.