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MIGRATION CRISIS: WORLD VISION AUSTRALIA FOCUSES ATTENTION ON DISPLACED PEOPLE WITH ‘BACKPACK CHALLENGE’

Refugee girl

DAVID ADAMS reports on how World Vision’s 40 Hour Famine is being adapted into a ‘Backpack Challenge’ this year to focus attention on the world’s migration crisis…

When then 15-year-old Saad Alkassab fled from Syria with his parents and three siblings in 2013, he didn’t even have the chance to pack a bag.

“It was really scary even though I had my family…” says the now 20-year-old. “We actually didn’t have a bag, we just fled with our clothes…[and] we didn’t even get the chance to tell anybody we were leaving.”

While there were many factors which led them to leave Syria, Mr Alkassab says that the arrest of his brother, a university student, had been key to their decision along with the ongoing uncertainly they faced living in the city of Homs, a place he describes as “hell on Earth”.

Refugee girl

THE BACKPACK CHALLENGE: How would you cope if you had to flee your home with just a backpack? PICTURE: World Vision Australia.

 

“It was really scary even though I had my family…We actually didn’t have a bag, we just fled with our clothes…[and] we didn’t even get the chance to tell anybody we were leaving.”

– Saad Alkassab

“You never know which area is going to be bombed or where the bomb’s going to go,” he says. “It was really fragile. All the suburbs were fragile and you just have to keep moving and keep swapping houses.”

It’s experiences like those of Mr Alkassab  – who spent time in Egypt before coming to Australia in mid-2014 on a humanitarian visa – which have led to a big change in World Vision Australia’s 40 Hour Famine this year.

Rebadged as the 40 Hour Famine Backpack Challenge, the event will see people living off the contents of their backpacks for a weekend – an experience which is aimed at giving them a taste of what it would be like if they suddenly had to leave their home – rather than simply forgoing food for 40 hours as has been the case in the past.

Charmaine Waduge, a spokesperson for World Vision Australia, says the new approach was directly inspired by the ongoing migration crisis around the world which has reached unprecedented levels with more than 65 million people now displaced from their homes – more than half of them children.

“Youth like to be engaged with news that they are currently being impacted by…” she says, noting that with news of the crisis continuing to flood social media and news bulletins – including the heart-breaking image of the lifeless body of three-year-old Syrian boy Alan Kurdi washed up on a Turkish beach in 2015 – “there was a certain urgency and a need to do something about the refugee crisis”.

“So we’ve decided to change the focus this year as a result…” Ms Waduge says. “It gives young people a chance to think about what their peers across the globe are going through.”

To be held over a weekend in mid-August, the event, which aims to raise $4.6 million (double the amount raised in last year’s event) to help displaced people affected by the crises in Syria and South Sudan, is expected to involve more than 50,000 students from across Australia.

While kids will take their backpack into the weekend with what they think they’ll need (and there’s a suggested list to help them choose essentials including water, a couple of cups of pre-cooked grains, duct tape and a sleeping bag as well as space for “one sentimental item from home”), there will also be a series of challenges along the way – delivered to them via phones or social media – aimed at further educating them about the sorts of obstacles a displaced person may face.

“So, it will be like ‘You’ve reached a checkpoint, you need to empty half the contents in your bag in order to make it to the next checkpoint’,” says Ms Waduge. “Or ‘You’ve run out of power and you may have to turn off the electricity’ and so on. So they’ll be able to have a bit of fun as a group but at the same time actually think about what’s affecting so many kids around the world.”

Mr Alkassab, who learnt English by watching Question Time in Australia’s Federal Parliament on TV after arriving in Australia, went on to be dux of his school in Melbourne and is now studying a Bachelor of Biomedicine at the University of Melbourne. He is one of three spokespeople who are sharing their experiences as a young person who was displaced from their home to help engage young people with the issues and promote the Backpack Challenge – the other two are Deng Adut, a former child soldier from South Sudan who is now a Sydney lawyer and NSW Australian of the Year and Farid Asghari who came to Australia on a boat as a 16-year-old from Afghanistan.

Mr Alkassab thinks the Backpack Challenge is a “great way” for young people to experience what its like for so many people around the world.

“I really try to push that education about what’s going on in the world,” he says, noting that in retrospect he wishes he had paid more attention to wider issues as a youth before the war in Syria.

Syrian refugees1 

UNPRECEDENTED CRISIS: More than 65 million people around the world are currently displaced from their homes. PICTURE: World Vision Australia.

“It’s really sad that not just people but countries aren’t able to stop what’s going on and I think one way [which] could potentially stop bloodshed, even in Syria, is about educating the young people….not just to stop it but to prevent any other place in the world from having the same issue.”

Mr Alkassab says while before the war, he took for granted simple things like being able to eat bread when he wanted to and didn’t understand what his father meant when he admonished him over wasting it and told him there may come a day when he would wish he could have just one piece of bread.

“I had never experienced hunger,” he says. “But then when we were under siege and there was barely any bread and I had to go through the whole suburb, searching for one piece of bread, I understand what he meant. I really want each and every young person to just understand that things won’t actually last if we don’t share them.”

Among those taking part in the Backpack Challenge will be 19-year-old Lisa Luce, who first took part in the 40 Hour Famine while in grade four in primary school and who went on to become a youth ambassador for World Vision Australia, a role which saw her travel to India with the organisation in a trip she describes as “life-changing”.

“We met sponsor children, former child labourers, farmers, school teachers, community leaders and were able to see first hand the incredible impact that World Vision is having on communities,” says Ms Luce, who now works as a youth representative for World Vision.

“The biggest thing that stood out to me was the way people worked together. We visited a number of villages in India and in all of them, there was an amazing sense of team work. I was reminded that it is when we work together that real change happens.”

While she’s looking forward to the new Backpack Challenge, she says she’s still working out what to pack but is hoping she doesn’t forget anything too important.

“I am excited to share the experience with thousands of other young people from around Australia, as we all try to live out of a backpack for 40 hours.”

The World Vision 40 Hour Famine Backpack Challenge runs from 11th to 13th August.

 

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