Refugee scholars conduct a Seminar

Last month, refugees who have received scholarships from Howard Buffet, decided to give something back and very gracefully show what they have come to learn in the last year and a half. Their time was ready and the forum was chosen. All I had to do was wait and see it unfold.

The seminar, devised to share knowledge previously and currently being learned in universities and institutes in respect to developing management skills, began with a confident energy. Immediately following Quranic verses customary to Yemen, and opening speeches from the scholars and the community leaders themselves, the scholars emphasized the significance of being prepared. With a boyscout attitude, the young men demonstrated how obstacles standing in the way of poverty, survival and success could be better overcome by clearly identifying the already present strengths and weaknesses while communicating the importance of identifying opportunities along with threats i.e. to have a look at the glass of water as half-full and not just half-empty.

The stages in the creation of the seminar itself were revealed to the participants in order to demonstrate an example of a successful project come into fruition. The scholars humanistically and realistically described how amongst them there was a shared sentiment to give something back to the community in which they live, therefore a brainstorming session first had to happen in order to put their ideas to paper. By bringing knowledge from a previous training session, they then conducted a community based approach to discover whether the seminar would profit members of the Kharaz camp community or not. After it was indeed deemed advantageous, a proposal was created, and it was presented to the associate education officer at UNHCR i.e. me, to collectively assess the feasibility of completing such a project. As a final step, the scholars then sought sponsorship for the event from various sources, as they continued to refine their participation for the seminar. The scholars then skilfully incorporated psychological issues into the aforementioned example by advocating the importance of using organizational behaviour skills whenever developing a collaborative project. The importance for better communication skills in the camp was expressed, thankfully underscoring the need for respectable conduct and above all patience, when dealing with international staff. After two days of presenting knowledge acquired, as well as learning from the members of the Kharaz community, and even sharing a few laughs, the seminar came to a close with donations and certificates to all participants attending and involved in the successful completion of the seminar.

Isolated people

I have just come back from the Kharaz Refugee Camp in southern Yemen, located about 150 km from Aden, where my office & apartment are. In this camp there are roughly 11,000 refugees there, 5% being non-Somali, but from day to day they leave and others come making it impossible to register accurately. In Kharaz, the conditions are harsh, and much harsher than any location in this country for refugees. The isolated dryland an hour and a half away from the city makes it very difficult to have the very basics to survive; no sanitary water produces diseases, infertile land creates impossible agricultural chances which then introduces famine and dependency on international aid. The possibilities for economic progress, sustainability & local integration in turn become almost nil.

My job however, doesn't directly concern itself with the aforementioned issues. It is however, dramatically affected by them. If children have no food, then they cannot focus in or even find the energy to walk to school. If they have no clean water, then they will often get sick. If they have no income, then they will leave school and beg or wash cars in near by villages, and so on. These obstacles have to be tacled by my colleagues as I liaise with local governments and NGOs to try to improve educational conditions & standards.

Last week I visited the locations where any and almost all educational activity occurs. It seemed that much work has already been done, yet even more work still has to be done. This means that I, as the only one working in Education for the UNHCR in Yemen, have quite a bit to do. This means that my time here (6 months) won't produce many results unless I stay longer. This means that many more posts will come...

What am I doing in Yemen?

Well, I’m an associative education officer for the UNHCR in Yemen. I visit refugee camps to assess their impoverished conditions, extreme needs and underestimated concerns. Then I try to improve their situations. Unfortunately I’m limited to an educational capacity, but since that job alone could keep me in Yemen for a lifetime, I’m more than happy to be here. I try to focus on two camps in southern Yemen and have an office in Aden; a lovely coastal city.

What I must do in more detail is to: -ensure that refugee children participate in suitable education programmes, in appropriate facilities. -go to and host meetings with the ministry of education and various government officials, deans of Universities, head masters of schools, UNICEF, World Food Programme, and other OP/IPs, to discuss vocational training programmes, curriculum development, self reliance activities, etc. -encourage women and girls’ enrolment in schools and literacy courses. -closely monitor the implementation of a Scholarship programme for refugees to study at University, though many end up dropping out due to various obstacles (abuse, pregnancy, resettlement, etc.). -support non-formal education, hire teachers and so on…

Apart from my job I enjoy going to the fish market and buying fish which I then bring to a restaurant to have cooked for me. I pass the time smoking tobaccoless sheeshah, sitting on busy streets drinking tea & coffee, playing chess and speaking Arabic with locals. They all think I’m Syrian or Lebanese based on my looks, then assume my Arabic has just got rusty over the years of international postings. I don’t correct them, it's safer that way...مع السلامة