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Paulo Chiyulo, UN Refugee Agency, Senior Field Clerk in Luau, Angola helping his people return home after 27 years of war.
Suitcases hold many memories for refugees. But in a project funded by the UN Refugee Agency in Johannesburg, South Africa, they are being used to help refugee children and teenagers to talk about bad memories they find hard to share, and to focus on good memories they can build on.
“I remember when I left my country, there were many people waiting at the bus and there was a pile of suitcases. My suitcase reminds me of that time when we were all pushing to get on the bus and we were afraid and we wanted to get away because of the war.”
“I am going to Namibia to look for my father. I want you to keep my suitcase and give it to my sister in Ethiopia if I do not come back.”
“This suitcase is a good memory. I want to keep it for my children so they will know what I have done and where I have been with this suitcase, my life.”
“I am going to always take this suitcase with me. I want to go to Australia, and I will take this suitcase for my interview because it tells my story.”
“We made these suitcases for some of the people out there. There are people out there who live large – they don’t know how poor people, like refugees, live. They don’t know – they got to know.”
All of these children and teenagers are in South Africa without their families, and are living in two flats owned by the Jesuit Refugee Service, a UN Refugee Agency partner NGO. They go to school nearby. Two years ago, they met a researcher involved in a program on xenophobia. Out of that meeting have come a series of workshops to help the children tell the stories of their journeys that forced them to leave home for safety in South Africa.
To do this, they went on a great suitcase hunt! They found old suitcases all over Johannesburg and Pretoria, then began telling their stories using the suitcases as a medium. Today they are beautiful, detailed, extraordinary records of the young refugees’ lives. The objects and writing inside create a record of the children’s lives in their own countries, and decorations outside tell the story of their lives now in South Africa.
The suitcases have been exhibited in Durban, Pretoria and Johannesburg. They have also appeared in newspapers and on radio, helping to make people aware of both the great trauma refugee children often experience, and also their courage and strength.
The children are still meeting on a regular basis, to create objects to put inside their suitcases. And a recent weekend retreat enabled them to work individually and in groups with child psychologists to help them deal with their bad memories from war and fleeing.
Every year, people across the world use World Refugee Day as a focus for raising funds in their community. And at the same time they spread a little understanding about the reality of being a refugee. In 2004,World Refugee Day is on Sunday June 20th.The theme this year will be "A place to call home: Rebuilding lives in peace and dignity." If you would like to enlist your friends, family, neighbours, colleagues or wider community in raising money to help refugees struggling to rebuild their lives, we would love to hear from you. To find out more, please go to www.unhcr.org and click on our special events link to visit our World Refugee Day pages. Alternatively, please contact UNHCR Canada Tel: 1-877-232-0909
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TOP: One of the posters from the 2004 WRD Poster campaign. Two more posters are shown below. © UNHCR
Paulo Chiyulo, UN Refugee Agency, Senior Field Clerk in Luau, Angola helping his people return home after 27 years of war.
Q: You joined the UN Refugee Agency last year. Why did you apply for the job?
A: I had been working for another NGO, and I thought the UN Refugee Agency would give me the opportunity to learn more. Now I am learning every day.
Q: You were a refugee yourself. What was that like?
A: Yes, one day we heard the UNITA forces were going to attack and everyone left. It is really hard to leave your home for another country. It is really painful whenever you are pointed out and called an Angolan or a refugee. I know how hard it is, which enables me to help refugees who are returning.
Q: What is the hardest part of your job?
A: When you don’t have enough to help people. For example,we don’t have enough transport to take people home if they live more than 20km from Luau. We have many things they need like food, kitchen sets, tents, blankets and plastic sheeting. But there are other things they need and it’s hard to explain to someone that they may have to wait.
Q: What do you most enjoy?
A: Working everyday in close contact with people who are returning, helping other Angolans coming home, is wonderful.
Photo Caption: Paulo Chiyulo © UNHCR/S.HOPPER
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For more of the latest news on the situation in Angola, visit the Angola Country page on the UNHCR's International website.
