Do you know how fortunate you are to be reading this? Whether it's on a desktop/laptop or more likely a tablet or phone. I know how lucky I am to be able to write this. From the safety of my kitchen, in an apartment with lights, heat, four walls and a lock on the door. How lucky I am to be able to express my opinion publicly without fear of persecution. How lucky I am that I know where all my family and friends are, and I know that they are safe.
The so-called migrant crisis, called so by politicians and the media, is not a migrant crisis, it is a humanitarian crisis, it is a refugee crisis. Do you know why it is not a migrant crisis? Migrants have a choice. I myself chose to migrate to another country. I was not forced to flee, to abandon everything once my house had been caught in cross-fire, once the school down the street was hit by a mortar, once my non Islamic friend was beheaded just because he believed in a different God.
Do you know how lucky you are to be able to move freely throughout the world, where you're barely asked for a visa? As a UK citizen I can enter 173 countries without a visa (or receive one on arrival), if I was an Iraqi that number is 31, if I was Syrian it's not much better at 39. As a UK citizen, I can complete an ESTA and travel to the USA, I don't need to visit their embassy and apply, I don't need to go to a British embassy, I can just do it online. Do you understand how easy we have it?
Now imagine all these every day things that we take for granted, taken away. You can't guarantee your own safety let alone your immediate families, and forget about your friends. The beautiful thriving city you grew up in is being mortared on a daily basis. Have you seen pictures of Damascus before the civil war? It was beautiful, it was busy, it is one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world; evidence of large scale settlement from 2000 BC within the area of Damascus, in the wider Barada basin, back to 9000 BC. I know of people who had been prior to the war and would always say what an amazing city it was. Rebels are fighting the government, and you're in the cross fire, so what do you do...
Syria - before and after
You don't want to leave your country, the country you love, where you have a home, maybe you hope one day to be able to go back to your house. Maybe you move to your parents city, or the home of your brothers wifes second cousin, but after a few weeks/months the fight moves, the front lines change and you are no longer safe, so you move again. This continues until you realise you have to take your family somewhere you know they will be safe. Somewhere they can't be shelled, your kids can get an education in a school that still has all of its classrooms, all of its teachers.
I've seen these people, the ones that managed to get away. I've seen them in their trucks and their cars with all their family and everything they could carry crammed in. I've seen them in the UN camps outside of Erbil and near Zakho, both in Kurdistan, each camp being that little bit bigger every time I've gone past. My colleagues have seen them living in unfinished buildings and they're the lucky ones, the buildings might not have walls but at least they have a roof. The ones that aren't so lucky live under tarpaulins by the side of the road. Running water? Flushing toilets? Whats that, they'll ask you. These are the people that go where they can, they definitely can't afford to get to the coast and then on a boat to Europe.
So if you were in their situation, you were lucky enough to have a bit of money, what would you do? Would you move to another country (Kurdistan) that already has over a million refugees and enough of it's own problems, or would you strive for the western world hoping for a better life?
So this is why I'm writing, I'm asking you to put yourself in their shoes and stop being part of the problem, stop posting sensationalist propaganda on social media without checking it first, stop saying charity begins at home, you're right it does - but please tell me what was the last charitable thing YOU did. Open your eyes, hearts and minds. Look for the truth and perhaps seek to put yourselves in their place for just a moment. Ask yourself what you would do to protect your family, your children, your lives. We are all of this world, some seek to destroy it be separating everyone in to us and them and selfishly seeking to turn everyone to their small minded ways. Don’t let them, don’t let them turn you in to a sheep hitting like and share without a thought for what it really means.
Count your blessings and then go help someone less fortunate before you hit that next share.
Most Shocking Second a Day Video by Save The Children https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBQ-IoHfimQ - Everyone should watch this at least once.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_time_of_continuous_habitation
http://rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/01092014
Big thank you to my bestest for helping me find the words I needed to finish this.
