Taking toys to Al-Jarahiyya

Emdad’s Lebanon Diary

Day 1 A sane human would never wander in desperation into the home of a complete stranger with outstretched arms unless that abode is a sanctuary safer than their own.

I arrived at my hotel gone 4am. The Adhan call to the early morning Fajr was reverberating around the city, so it was way too late to eat anything. I decided to take up the option to fast.

After some rest the Human Relief Foundation deployment team visited the local mall to pick up toys for distribution to 321 children at the big Beqaa Valley Al-Jarahiyya camp in the Marj region. Such is the congestion in the camp, that hosts around 200 families, that there are often eight families living in a single tent.

Roughly one third of the population here in Lebanon are Syrian refugees. That’s the equivalent of 25 million refugees moving to the UK. The impact has been phenomenally challenging, to say the least, and among countless issues there’s a lot of tension and racism.

Arsal hosts the main camps in the valley where we were working. The people staying in camps have to pay rent, so the situation is pretty grim. To keep going day to day, some refugees receive vouchers, others beg – and there are quite a few who are enterprising, selling refuse plastic and tissues for a meagre income.

We delivered food packs, sweets, toys, essentials and broke our Ramadan fast with our hosts. It was a real eye opener, and it was clear the members of the team were awash with emotion.

We rest up and get ready for day two, which will be even more intense – but the team is up for any challenge right now.

•To donate to Emdad’s contribution to the Human Relief Foundation Lebanon Ramadan Appeal 2019, go to:
https://www.muslimgiving.org/number7
emdad #thewanderinglondoner

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