Clowns: a Study on Intention and Outcome
Well intentioned people, well intentioned efforts - they give me pause. It's a cynical part of myself, and I often wish I would open myself up to see people for what they hoped to do or express, rather than what was the result. a
This past week was my first at Ritsona camp, and the corner of camp where I do most of my work feels like the corner where the social Main Street of camp and the entrance to the residential area meet. On my first day, myself and another volunteer who arrived the day before I did were taken through an induction information meeting and sensitivity training. Induction was largely what you would expect, an organizational lay of the land of the camp and the NGO. Sensitivity training was a list of do's and don'ts, with the lines written in bold being things previous volunteers had done.
This past week was my first at Ritsona camp, and the corner of camp where I do most of my work feels like the corner where the social Main Street of camp and the entrance to the residential area meet. On my first day, myself and another volunteer who arrived the day before I did were taken through an induction information meeting and sensitivity training. Induction was largely what you would expect, an organizational lay of the land of the camp and the NGO. Sensitivity training was a list of do's and don'ts, with the lines written in bold being things previous volunteers had done.
(Still reeling from this - among the standouts were number 8. Do not begin a romantic or sexual relationship with a camp resident and number 14. Do not encourage veiled residents of camp to remove their headscarves, or offer your opinion on their choice to be veiled.)
After the training, I was given a walking tour of the camp and shown how to perform preschool outreach, an important part of my day where I walk through the residences to collect preschool age children for school. In the lull between English and preschool classes, we waited in the play area in our NGO's courtyard. Because this weekend is Greek Orthodox Easter, the public schools most children in the camp attend are closed for a two-week holiday, and the grassroots NGOs operating in the camp are coming up with activities to keep them busy.
I stood with my colleague in the courtyard, and watched as some very loud and enthusiastic clowns walked around the camp, engaging with children and working some classic slapstick for a laugh. As they drew more attention, they formed a circle in front of the school isoboxes (picture large, portable storage containers with electricity and heating/air) and began some acts, tricks, and songs to a crowd of enraptured children. Really, they were quite entertaining. They had a firm grip on making comedy land across language barriers, and after a while, had drawn quite a crowd.
Now here is where I wished I could have just seen this crowd of happy children, and been nothing but pleased. Unfortunately, it dawned on me that many children in that crowd looked to be about three or four years old, exactly the age of the class that I was supposed to be assisting in the preschool isobox in 10 minutes. When class began, only three of the twelve registered children knocked on the door. A fourth was dragged screaming from the clowns by his mother, but the preschool teacher told her that for today it was alright for him to skip class, as the by the time we had calmed him, the hour long session would have been nearly over.
As the day went on and the two-year-old class had equally low attendance, the full-time preschool teacher began to ask around who the clowns were with. It turns out the clown troop had made contact with another NGO in camp that runs the Child and Youth friendly spaces the day before they showed up in camp. With (at least) five grassroots NGOs, two large international organisations, and two state agencies operating overlapping and intersecting programs and services in a camp, I do not feel less than 24 hours notice is enough time to plan and implement quality programming with minimal negative impact. Now I don't want to suggest that the clown troop should not have come at all. It is hard to argue with the laughter coming from their performance circle. And anyone who has worked with children understands the value of bouts of pure, silly, imaginative, fun. What I do think is an unfortunate and avoidable outcome of their arrival in camp was an interruption of preschool and educational services. Don't get me wrong, it is wonderful that these people take time from their own lives to tour refugee camps to inspire joy and laughter, however, if the goal of NGO services directed at children is to rebuild a fragment of the childhood they've lost in conflict and the process of migration, then we must carefully ask what aspects of childhood we are trying to recover.
The best thing you can do for a child who has had their life whipped around is unfortunately not clown shows and skipping school, but rather a sense of security through strength and routine. As I type this, I know how I sound. It's wonderful to be the fun adult in a child's life, but it's not always the most responsible approach. And the thing that makes me okay with this critique is this: had the clowns just asked two days earlier, or set up their performance in another part of camp, or done their performance later in the day, or or or... it would have been possible for both the preschool, the supplementary educational programming, the child friendly space activities, and the clown performance to happen all on the same day. Should have, would have, could have doesn't do much good now, but it instills a desire in myself to to mediate the positivity of my intentions with humility.
Unfortunatelly things like this keep on happening. As much as the actors on site try to cross coordinate their activities, to ensure the best delivery of the most needed services (hopefully in a structured way, which - sadly - sometimes is not the case) in a way were there is no cross over of activities, there are instances in which a in theory good addition (even if temporary) to the camps life simply backfires. Like the clown situation which you describe. Nothing bad in the fun, generally a great idea, but clearly lack of planning and putting further thought into it, and sort of looking at the bigger picture took it's toll on the preschool attendance. As well as impacted the other areas in camp (e.g. Flourish, Education area in general). And lesson from this is that LHR that was supposed to facilitate their stay clearly dropped the ball on this one.
ReplyDeleteTo add to this, in Ritsona there is one major gap, that everybody knows about but nobody is addressing - the lack of services/activities for children between the age of 6 and 15. Besides Greek School, these kids are left on their own for the majority of the day. Now granted, some organizations are talking about starting programs for the formentioned kids, however most are looking at it as a summer activity rather than year round, not to mention some organizations that are bringing politics to camp, and somewhat "blackmailing" the Site Management Support team, by insisting on fulfilling their demands, or else "we will not provide all these amazing services, for which we have donations".
So question that comes to my mind is - how do we install a sense of structure of non preschool aged kids and young adolescents?
I appreciate your insight, and am relieved that my reading of the layout after only a week is not so far off the mark.
DeleteAs to your point regarding the tension and ‘politics’ between NGOs and SMS: I don’t feel I have enough information to comment here specifically, but can offer a more macro reading of what this schism is indicative of (focus of my MSc). I struggle with the entire concept of the third sector, particularly as gap-fillers for services that, in my mind, the state is responsible for. Of course, in the reality of globalized and neoliberal international relations, the responsibility of the state continually shrinks and blurs. There is an unfortunate cycle, in which states are, for a multitude of reasons (incapable, unwilling, compromised by other relationships, bureaucratically stalled, financially strapped, etc etc etc), to address a social need. NGOs on on many scales step in to fill the gap and address needs on every scale, from community to international. As states shrink, the load on NGOs grows. However, the model of an NGO (reliant on donations, volunteers, high turnover in staff, inherent white savior complex), is unsustainable and has troubling implications as the wealth gap widens on a global scale. So the cycle of shrinking the state and placing more burden on the third sector compromises the ability of both parties to meet needs, and of course the vulnerable bear the brunt of this. With the extremely wealthy funding philanthropy and services, and in extension taking responsibility for social policy provision…. It does not inspire confidence in me.
The solution? Who knows if there is one, we are definitely very deep on the downward spiral, but a huge step in the right direction would be for countries who can afford to do more, to step up. Norway, for example, has the resources and historical experience to welcome many more refugees than they have set their quota at, largely without making a dent in the Sovereign Pension Fund.
As for the question about the children aged 6-15 - again there is likely no single answer, and I don't feel after a week I have a full enough lay of the land to recommend anything concrete. I know the organization I am with is looking to begin regular after school programming, but unfortunately any project run by a volunteer, grassroots organization has a hard time creating and reinforcing structure when volunteers come and go, and have a time limit on how long they can lend their efforts. Your observation (from within the camp, I’m assuming) that some NGOs are withholding funded projects, is deeply upsetting to hear. It begs the question, who are these organisations trying to serve? What is their mission, and how does withholding services aid that mission?
Thank you for reading, I appreciate your comments!
Hej Astrid,
DeleteFirst of all thank you for your reply. As the blog itself I found it extremly interesting to read your thoughts. So I hope you keep up both the blog and the comments :)
Regarding the macro of the politics that I fully understand. In fact you're not far off at all. It was at a point here in Greece that the Greek government was seriously considering "kicking" out all the foreign or small NGO's with the intent of covering all the services itself. Their grand scheme was that there would be one greek NGO/GO that would be able to handle all services in camp. Now reading your thoughts on that it makes sense. However, only in an idealistic theory driven world. Non of which exists. If you look at all the Greek entities in Ritsona, and how they became to be there, or how they didn't (ex. Greek preschool) you'll see how faaaaaaaaaaaaar Greece is from living up to the idealistic world. Greece at this point in time simply cannot allow itself to remove the NGO's. Well they could but question would be why? To regain the illusive feel of power, or to actually help the residents by providing professional and quality controled care?
Back to politics, what still baffles me are the in camp politics - not related to the higher level of state politics. It's disgusting in my humble opinion, that there are people/organizations that bring politics to a refugee camp, and play their background games - to gain "power" and "respect".
And finally indeed, good questions. And I shall leave them as such, as I have my opinions about these organizations, yet I shall keep them to myself... at least for now ;)