Palestinian Refugee Camp, Part II: Bourj Al-Barajneh

I had a group of six boys in my class, ranging in age from ten to twelve. One of the boys, a small kid named Hammod, spoke English the best. He was in fifth grade and probably spoke English at a second or third grade level. I would soon realize that was pretty good for most of the boys in the camp. Hammod, which I would later learn is a nickname for someone named Mohammad, would soon become my translator for the rest of the class. This is because three of the other boys spoke English at about a kindergarten level or worse and the other two boys spoke no English at all. I was supposed to be teaching them conversational English and was told to “make it fun” for them to learn. Along with the language barrier was the issue that these boys are really wound up and rambunctious. They have absolutely nowhere to let their energy out, as there are no open spaces anywhere in Bourj Al-Barajneh, the Palestinian refugee camp we were at in southern Beirut. I quickly realized that this wasn’t going to be easy. Prior to coming to Lebanon, I envisioned the Palestinian refugee camps to be actual camps, as in, tents and squatters living in open fields. It’s not that at all. The camps are actually very densely populated ghettos within urban areas of the city. Many of these camps were created back in 1948 when Israel declared itself a state and most Palestinians fled their homes in Palestine to avoid being killed by the war that had started. Many were just plain run out of their homes. These camps have had over 60 years to build up and become so dense that there are now no streets in the camps, only a labyrinth of alleyways. Some of the alleyways are no more than an arm’s width across. Buildings are made of concrete and cinder block construction, stacked 3 or 4 stories high on top of each other. Some of the construction is makeshift. Addition after addition of construction added onto the next until there was no room left or they had reached the Lebanese Government’s imposed height limits. United Nations’ estimates put the population of this camp between 15,000 to 18,000 people, all jammed into about 2/3rds of a square mile. Some other estimates have put the population up over 20,000. Not only are there no open spaces in the camp, there’s not an alleyway that has a straight line of sight for more than thirty yards. There are no horizons here, literally and figuratively. There are more than a dozen of these camps throughout Lebanon with approximately 409,000 refugees in them or about 10% or Lebanon’s population. I started the class off with having the boys take turns at reading pages from a children’s book called “The Polar Bear and the Snow Cloud”. It’s meant for really little kids who are just learning to speak. It’s the kind of book with one or two large font sentences one page and a big illustrated picture opposing it. I wasn’t sure whether any of them were going to know what a snow cloud was, let alone a polar bear, but then again, I knew they weren’t going to figure out what a “Cat in a Hat” was or a “Lorax” for that matter. So, since I didn’t want them to learn how to speak in Dr. Seuss riddles and I was curious about the polar bear myself, we went with the Snow Cloud book. I initially tried reading the book to them, but that fell apart really quick. I realized that if you did not keep their attention focused at all times, you would lose them and the room would devolve into a rumble. So I had them take turns. I’m pretty sure Hammod was the only one who had any comprehension of what was going on in this little tale of arctic antics. The other three who only spoke a little English could say the words but when I asked them what the story was about, I could tell they didn’t know what most of the words meant. The two that did not speak English just looked at the pictures when their turns came then passed the book along. After a while, someone came into the room and told me to take attendance. I took out a piece of paper and had the boys write their names in English on it. That went surprisingly well. They all wanted me to write my name too, so I obliged. A few minutes later we were done with the story and I was having trouble keeping them in their seats. Rough housing would break out with no warning whatsoever. I decided that we’d had enough reading for the day, handed out paper and colored pencils and told the boys to draw something from the story. Since they didn’t really understand the story, this didn’t work, so I eventually told them just to draw anything they wanted. Off they went, sketching away. It was the first time they were all engaged. I watched Hammod as he drew what looked like a small, stone house with smoke coming out of a chimney. He added a tree and a detailed sun over head. Then he added a plane with a star on its wings and tail. Lastly he added bombs dropping from the plane and two people on the ground. One was lying on the ground near the house bleeding and the other was near the tree crying.

By the time Hammod was done with his picture the other boys were in full Battle Royale with each other. I asked them to sit down but the rumble continued until one stopped and grabbed his backpack and said, “Go?!” then ran out the door. The others followed suit. As the last boy left, a big kid named Omar, who was one of the quieter boys that did not speak any English, he handed me his picture. It was a fancy, colorful version of my name. And with a smile and a wave goodbye, he ran out the door after the others. I was supposed to have taught the boys for an hour. I looked at my watch. It had been about thirty five minutes. I shrugged and figured, not bad for the first day. I had about an hour break before the next group of children would arrive, so I walked outside and looked up at the callous sun trying to bleed its way through the hot, city haze and a tangle of haphazardly hung electrical wires. Men with armfuls of produce and women in hijab headscarves bustled their way past and down the maze of alleyways. I found out about this volunteering opportunity through some people I met at the American University of Beirut (AUB). It was a program that had started up last year with the purpose of trying to increase the mental wellbeing of the children in one of the Lebanon’s larger Palestinian refugee camps. The program came in the wake of a study done in 2002 by a professor at AUB that included the surveying of almost 600 children that lived in the camp. Questions on the survey ranged from how often the children felt afraid to how much hope they had for their future. Needless to say, the results were pretty grim. The survey results showed that there was a fair amount of violence in the camps, both external and domestic. Almost 45% of the children were not in any type of educational institution. 27% of the children worked full time and 18% of the children were working for more than 40 hours a week. All of the children who worked earned less than $50 for that week’s work. (Keep in mind, Beirut is almost as expensive as a US city). Unemployment in the camp was about 60%, mainly due to Lebanese law prohibiting Palestinians from working in any but the most menial of jobs. 20% of the boys had been in at least one fist fight in the past month and 78% had been exposed to a criminal assault in the past month. 42% had a death in the family in the past year, 67% had a family member hospitalized in the past year and 94% of the camp’s residents, both children and adults, stated that they did not trust their neighbors. 33% of the children surveyed were, what the mental health professionals assisting in the program called, “in need of a psychiatric referral to a doctor”. Keep in mind that this survey took place in 2002-2003. In 2006, Israel bombed Beirut and the southern suburbs where this camp is located. 2007 saw more political violence erupt in Beirut, so chances are that things have only gotten worse for these kids since the survey was taken. The AUB program, which was called “Qaderoon” which means “We are capable” was trying to address some of the larger mental health issues that the children of the camp faced, such as anger management, violence, depression and emotional distress. Teaching English was just a small part of the larger goals of this project. Though, in a way, it was a very important one. Since the Palestinian refugees are not given the status of citizenship in Lebanon, they are restricted from working in many professions; are not allowed to own land, have no right to vote and the children are not allowed to go to public schools. Health care is very limited as well since they are not entitled to any public assistance nor can they afford any kind of health care. So who tries to pick up the slack? The United Nations and a bunch of Non Profit Organizations, Non Government Organizations. The classrooms we were using to teach English in for the Qaderoon project were borrowed from the school that is owned and run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). When the children reach 14 years old, they will be given a test to see if they can continue on with their education. One part of the test measures their competency in English. If the children don’t pass the test, they don’t get to continue with their education. And if their hopes of becoming fluent in English were resting on my teaching abilities, the future was grim indeed. By now a few of the other volunteers had congregated outside the front of the school for the break. Ali, a quiet young man who grew up and lived in Bourj Al-Barajneh Refugee Camp and was volunteering as a mentor to the kids in the program, came up and asked if we would like a tour of the camp. He didn’t have to ask us twice. Off we went, following Ali down the unimaginably confusing maze of alleyways. More than once I found myself wondering how we’d ever find our way out, let alone back to the school, if we got separated. Ali walked along like you or I would stroll down Main Street of our home towns. He seemed to know everyone and pointed out things along the way. The camp was not just a cluster of people living together. It was its own city, its own community. Inside the camp were vegetable sellers, butchers, clothes shops, tailors, food stands. It was amazing how they had built their own support system in there. Ali brought us by his father’s fish store where his dad cleaned and sold all sorts of fish from a wheel chair. On the outskirts of the camp was a small Palestinian cemetery with hardly any space in between graves. The infrastructure of the camp was mind boggling. A main water line would enter the camp’s edge and terminate in a 6 foot long stand pipe that had several small spigots on it. Each of these spigots would have a garden hose sized plastic tube attached to it and run down the alleyway, randomly, to an apartment.

The electrical was the same way. There would be a large, rusted fuse box with no cover on it, near the entrance to the camp and a billion small wires running in a tangled mess to each building.

There were stretches of alleyway that had what appeared to be a net overhead that was actually a tangle of electrical wiring and water hoses.

Frequently, we’d feel water dripping on us or run through the spray of a split hose. Once in a while we’d have the stench of sewage from an inadequate plumbing system. Many of the camps buildings had no plumbing and people often share bathrooms with their neighbors. I have no idea how things did not flood, burn down or electrocute someone. We passed by the United Nations Hospital/clinic that was in the camp, run by the same agency (UNRWA). It was packed with old folks, mothers and little kids. There were a lot of elderly people in the camp, many who appeared to just be waiting. Maybe to just hear that their grandchildren might get a home before they themselves passed out of this misery. Just waiting as some have for over 60 years now. Soon it was time to head back to the school and start our next session. I wasn’t really confident that the next class was going to go any smoother than the first, but when I walked into my classroom, I noticed something quite surprising: all the students were seated, quiet and waiting for class to begin. How was this possible? I thought. Then it hit me: they were girls. It was the complete opposite of the morning class. The girls, all six of them, were well behaved and most spoke English well. A couple spoke English at just about their 5th or 6th grade level. We constructively worked our way through a few stories, taking turns reading and going over vocabulary and pronunciation. At the end of the session they asked if they could leave. The class ended and I actually felt like I taught them something. The other volunteers had the same situation. We would learn that due to funding issues with the UNRWA and lack of space, the children go to school on a split schedule and are separated by gender. Girls go to school for 3 or 4 hours in the morning and boys go for 3 or 4 hours in the afternoon. And for some unknown reason, this schedule flip flops every month. So we were getting the boys for an hour before they went to school and then the girls shortly after they were dismissed from school. My fears would be confirmed the next month when we would get the boys after they had just finished school: totally uncontrollable. We tried all sorts of different ideas to engage them in learning. We abandoned the books altogether and just let them draw. We tried letting them draw with chalk on the black board. Nothing really worked that well and the classes would keep getting bigger and bigger as more volunteers dropped out or only stayed to teach the girls. I handed out 3 boxes of chalk one day and when I asked for them back, no one had any. Moments later the hallway erupted into a chalk throwing fight amongst the boys! One day we resorted to just playing soccer in the hallway. At times I would have to tell the really rowdy boys to leave the classroom and go home. One boy in particular begged me to let him stay and when I gave in he kissed my hand. Even still, he was back at it five minutes later. Meanwhile, the girls trudged on doing their work. They were so sweet and wanted to know all about the characters in the children’s books. “What’s a polar bear?”, “What’s a caribou?!!” At home, I would find worksheets online, print them out and have them fill the sheets out in class. Many of the websites are geared towards teaching English as a second language; however, much of the vocabulary is irrelevant to their lives, such as “lawn mower” and “bungee jumping”. Living conditions for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are considered to be the worst in the Middle East. Other countries, such as Syria and Jordan have a large number of Palestinian refugees as well (Jordan has an estimated 500,000), but the refugees in these countries are allowed to work. Even Saddam Hussein gave Palestinian refugees in Iraq better living conditions than they have in Lebanon, though I’m sure his motives were political and not out of the kindness of his heart. Initially, some of the wealthier Palestinians that were displaced bought land, houses and apartments in Lebanon, while the poorer refugees went into the camps. The Lebanese government then changed the property ownership laws and established a “No Inheritance” clause for Palestinians. This meant that the Palestinians could not pass their property down to their children. When the original Palestinian owner died, the family was sent to the camps and the state took ownership of their house. While over the past few decades many in Lebanon are quick to say that they support the Palestinians in their plight, history has shown things a bit different. In 1982, during Lebanon’s civil war, Israel invaded and occupied much of the southern half of Lebanon. Not only did Israel lay siege to the Palestinian refugee camps, but some of Lebanon’s Christian militias took this opportunity to march into camps and slaughter Palestinians. Three years after Israel withdrew, The “Amal”, a Syrian backed Shiite militia laid siege to the camps in southern Beirut again, killing men, women and children. They even went as far as burning humanitarian aid food shipments that were heading into the camp. Amazingly, a man who was a refugee at the time had a video camera and recorded much of these travesties that went on inside the camp. Sadly, things do not look like they’re going to get any better in the future since without the economic resources for income, the education that might come with citizenship or public health care, nothing here is going to change. Even the United Nations agency UNRWA which funds and runs the clinics and schools in the camps is known for being a bureaucratic nightmare. For the children in Bourj Al-Barajneh, school is finishing up for the summer break. Already the children are asking if the Qaderoon program will start up again in the fall, saying how much they enjoyed it this past year. Depending on funding, it’s uncertain. But for now, in celebration of the success that Qaderoon was, the children and their mentors from the camps have put on a little performance/variety show at the school. I went back down to the camp to see it and though it was all in Arabic it was still nice to watch. There was a skit going on with about 6 kids in it and the parents were all laughing. I just sat there soaking it in when I heard this little voice behind me say in English, “Do you understand what’s going on?” I turned to see it was one of the girls from my class. I told her I had no idea. She said, “Don’t worry, I’ll translate for you”.