Are your eyes real?

‘So let me get this clear: you are British, living in Morocco and you have flown here today from Sweden……. Now how do you explain these Israeli stamps in your passport? Who is your father? What is his father’s name?’ 

This was my arrival in Beirut in the wee hours of the morning. As a result of the ‘tension’ between Israel and Lebanon I have to explain my passport stamps each time I land in either place!

I had left 7 degrees in Stockholm and landed in 25 degrees in Beirut. After some sleep I went off to see the American University of Beirut: A huge campus which stretches all the way down to the ocean. Many of the buildings are beautiful and old having survived the war in the 70’ and 80’s. It is a very calm and peaceful place to walk around. Not something you can say about most of Beirut.

The city has been largely rebuilt since the wars making you feel you could be in any calm city in the middle east and then you turn a corner and there is a building where the outside wall is completely pocked with bullet holes.  Walking around the streets of Beirut you see a large police and army presence. It makes sense when you think of their history and the constant threat of terror attacks. The worst part for me is that men regularly stop their cars and try talking to you in Arabic or Lebanese French (which is in fact the same as French but just with an accent making it harder for me to understand). I thought that these were taxi drivers trying to make a fare but on talking to my Lebanese colleague about this they are just men, just driving, just trying their luck with women. This swiftly put an end to me walking around Beirut!!

A lot of people ask me what I actually do. The reality is that I spend most of my time in an office or in meetings trying to counteract the madness and writing reports and emails.

The rest of the time I am in the field and frustrated that people are forced to live in poverty and forced to flee war and wishing that there was less bureaucracy and more that we could actually do to help.

This trip was no different.

I traveled up in to the mountains, to Lebanon Mountain no less. I went to visit our center for unaccompanied and separated Syria children. Our center currently hosts 36 permanent children and many more who join for the day who do still have parents who are residing in the nearby areas. We want it to be more but for this we need more staff and space.

The youngest is a 14 month old baby who came to us at 8 months old. The oldest are young teens. On arrival we are greeted with hugs, giggles and questions. The main preoccupation was the color of my eyes:

‘Why are they so blue?’

‘ What’s wrong with them?’

‘ Are they real?’

‘What is wrong with your hair? Why is it so crazy??’

Standard stuff!

The staff that run then center are amazing. We have a mixture of Syrian’s and Lebanese working together. One of the reasons is so the children hear their own language. Arabic may be spoken all over the Arab world but in each country there is a different dialect.

The children receive education, balanced meals, play games, do art, get to play outside if it is not raining and most of all get hugs and love. One of the most important services we provide to these children is psycho social support. Many of them have been through more than most adults in Europe will go through in their lifetimes.

During the visit nine year old twins were telling me about their experience before their parents fled to Lebanon. They had lived in an area of Syria which has a heavy ISIS presence. They told me that if you behead someone you should do it from behind as it is the most painful way to do it. This they had learnt from having seen it with their own eyes. I do not know how many other things they have been told or have seen.

The next day I went from mountains to Valley, travelling to the Beqaa valley which borders with Syria. My taxi driver was clearly thrilled at driving through winding roads in the mountains as he drove far too fast, overtaking trucks on blind bends whilst talking on his phone, all of this magic was accompanied by loud Arabic music.

 The only two saving graces were that I could smoke and the amazing views of the mountains and valleys we were rattling through. We turned one bend to see the most beautiful view for as far as the eyes could see.

Finally we reach the Beqaa Valley, the driving was no less erratic but as there were no mountain edges to fall off I was a little calmer.  If I thought that there was a big military presence in Beirut it was nothing in comparison to the Beqaa Valley.

There is also a heavy Hezbollah presence in this area. Many residents of the valley support both Assad and Hezbollah, for many reasons but one I hear repeatedly is because they keep ISIS out.

There are many posters up in the street of both martyrs who have lost their lives in war or of Assad being celebrated.

However, the thing that is most apparent is the refugee tents, everywhere. I am seen a number of refugee camps in my time but this is something different. After the influx of Palestinian refugees and the civil war, Lebanon now refuses to acknowledge refugee camps; therefore there are no formal camps anywhere in Lebanon. This is not to say that refugees cannot stay here in tented accommodation, it just cannot be called a refugee camp and it is limited in how many numbers in each area. Normally no more than 50 tents in one place.

Seeing the conditions these people are living in is heart breaking. Having fled war, starvation and atrocities committed by ISIS and others they now live in tents. Many of these tents have limited or no furniture.  This is no exaggeration. I visited so many tents which were just empty rooms. The families had to sleep on the floor just with blankets.

Many families have no income source so the husbands have returned to Syria in the hope to be able to send some income to their families. One ladies husband had gone back 3 years ago and has not been seen since.

All of the children are malnourished. You can tell by their stunted growth and their brittle hair, let alone their frames. I am handed a 2 month old baby. An absolutely beautiful little boy but whom is so tiny. It is hard to imagine what future this little boy has.

Later in the camp there are some urgent mutterings in Arabic, I understand ‘English speaking’, ‘baby’, yala yala – come.

We enter a tent where there is a girl who can be no older than 13 or 14 on the tent floor. She had given birth to a baby boy two days earlier, in this shitty dirty tent. The little boy is put in my arms. I sit with my colleague to talk to the mother or the child who has become a mother who looks very unwell.

Her wedding was arranged for her in Syria in the midst of the war. Her husband got her to Lebanon and then went back to Syria. She gave birth in the tent with the help of the other women as she is not officially registered in Lebanon and therefore is not eligible for medical treatment or any other support. The greatest fear for the unregistered is that if they go to the hospital they will be returned to Syria.

She refuses any help, worried that she will be returned to Syria. She then begs me to take her child, until one of the elder women points out I have no wedding ring….. 

This is just a peek into the world of the Beqaa valley. There are over a million Syrians living like this, which is known of at least.

Like Palestinians they have become statistics, not people.

I wish that instead of building walls and fences we were more excepting and welcoming.

I wish that children were not giving birth and that babies were not arriving in this horrible world right now.

I normally try and end my blog with some banter but I am all out today!