Mud Puppets for Mud Kids
Human Poverty: Who Can Tolerate Poverty in the Informal Refugee Tent Camps?
Displaced people are the most vulnerable groups in any society.
And the most vulnerable among the most vulnerable are children. The hunger, misery, poverty, helplessness and fear that the most vulnerable are condemned to suffer reflects the value of “the Human” allocated by a society in a certain geographic area, usually a country. That value can be determined, not by examining the standard of living of the middle classes but, rather, by looking at the opportunities and facilities that can be accessed by the lowest class. The higher the gap between classes, the less value is attributed to the Human.
Children living in rural tent camps lack the opportunities and choices to live even a very basic and ‘tolerable’ life. They cannot access clean water, food, health or education. From the suffering and associated aggressive behaviour of these children, it is possible to get a sense of the intolerable level of deprivation in which they are living. For example, we have witnessed many times how children became frustrated and angry when they realized, after several attempts to eat them, that the toys we bring them are inedible.
Who is the Puppet Festival for?
A puppet festival came to İzmir this year. Within the scope of the 11th İzmir International Puppet Festival workshops, puppet shows and puppet competitions between elementary schools were organized. The target audience of the festival were the people who live in the city center and who have sufficient opportunities and choices to live a tolerable life and to adequately participate in the social life of their community.
Currently, some organisations prefer to provide children who have already enough opportunities and choices with even more opportunities. Since we wanted to do something different, we visited one of the informal tent camps in Izmir on the 11th of March, together with the Papelito Puppet Theater and the Support for Refugees Children Initiative. Brane Solce, who founded the puppet theatre in question, and Sanja Fidler, partner of the theatre, were also unaware of the situation in the camps. So they thought they could organize puppet-making workshops with children after the puppet show.
Mud Puppets on the Stage
When we reached the tent area, the first ten minutes were spent trying to find a less muddy area where we could do the puppet show and hold the workshop. Is the putrid smell of cow and sheep dung mixed with the damp air in any way comparable to the clean areas in the city? Can we compare children in those camps with city children?
These children were going to be seeing a puppet show for the first time in their lives. They watched quietly as Brane struggled to set up the stage. Shyly, the children waited on the sidelines, not daring to stand in front of the stage. We laid a white sheet on the ground so that their muddy clothes would not get muddier. But as we saw them trying to get comfortable with their muddy feet, we just gave up any thoughts of hygiene. They held back, reluctant to sit in front of the stage, until we told them they would be able to see better from the front.
When the puppet show started, babies cradled in the arms of their sisters became frightened and started to cry. This response to a new situation gave us a clear indication of the suffering they had undergone. Brane Solce’s puppet show, with its music and sound effects, did sometimes make the children laugh, but the overall reaction was one of astonishment. We saw how the children over the age of 10 had aged prematurely, how they were distracted from the puppet show because they were having to look after their younger brothers and sisters, how their parents sat by the tents watching the show, the occasional laughter, the strangeness behind the smiles…
The workshop that wasn’t
The idea had been to hold a workshop after the puppet show, but we had to change its format on the fly, partly because the children had never used scissors before and partly because there were no adequate facilities. Brane cut flying rabbits out of the coloured paper we had intended to distribute to the children and grownups.
It was difficult for the children to keep calm. They jostled to get to the paper flying rabbits. The adults tried to help, but they could not prevent the children from crowding round us. We had brought sweets, but decided not to distribute them, to avoid further confusion.
Forced Farewell and Tears
Brena and Sanja were scheduled to put on puppet shows in İzmir city centre, so we had to leave. We waved to the children as we headed back to the car. Most of them were angry, and stared at us hopelessly. They only waved goodbye because their parents insisted. The forced farewell continued until our car disappeared from view.
Sanja could no longer hold back her tears when we asked her about her observations and impressions of the puppet show, tent camp and refugee kids. We tried to explain that the situation is not related to the so-called “refugee crisis”, that the living conditions of those people can not be contextualized, but that there were, are and will be millions of people in such devastating poverty. As tears poured from her eyes, Sanja repeated that the children were not like children, they looked older, they had become older.
In conclusion?
We are aware that we cannot fight poverty single-handed. But we must do all we can to improve the living conditions of the poorest in our society. We are aware that if we simply blame humanity, the state or evil from outside, we are wasting time while our own humanity decays.
We are aware that well-intentioned macro-thinkers and political actors, focused on big targets that transcend their own capacities, despise our actions as apolitical. Benevolent but worthless. Everyone is responsible for their own actions and thoughts, and we believe that instead of thinking at a macro level and just pretending to do something, we should simply do what we can. We will carry on this kind of action, and with a clear conscience. Because the poverty of people in the rural areas of İzmir — especially the children — is not only intolerable to them, it is intolerable to us.
Why did we describe all of this? Because poverty is going to get worse unless we prioritize the needs of the lowest classes. It does not matter how nice, stylish, multicultural, versatile, or well-intentioned an event or programme is, it will be of dubious moral value if the priority is to provide more opportunities for those who have many opportunities already. That is our message.
#whereishome #evimizneresi
