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4
crammed into the bunks
of the people
sleeping or just lying down. I saw no-one doing anything constructive such as writing or holding a conversation. This was at about 10
o'clock in the morning. I had seen only a few people
wandering about ( there are 700 in the camp)
many of them looking through the chain link fence at the sea watching the world go by; others wandering aimlessly around the camp - but many of them, as I now discovered, seemed to be doing nothing other than lying on their bunks. Each family is allocated one bunk space (or two bunk spaces if it is a large family). Each bunk measures 4 foot by 6 foot.
In this space they must live, store their possessions and sleep. By western standards these conditions are unacceptable and by standards of the region they are uncomfortable. The bunks are three-tiered, with headroom of about 3 feet between each tier. Chi Ma Wan is not very full and so the top bunks were unoccupied. It was not the cramped spaces which appaled me as the apathy.
From there we visited the school that refugees took lessons in the
block.
50
much
I understood main Dining Hall but in which there is space
it appears there is now a block for education. I was able to look in on two classes. One
of these was being taken
by the Director of Education- International Social Services.
the library. There were some
wall, mostly half empty
.
a Dutch・ man employed by His classroom doubled as bookshelves against the Resources are scarce in the camps and the job of teaching and maintaining morale is put onto the teachers from the agencies. Initially refugees are keen to learn but rejection by resettlement countries means many of them give up. With additional resources maintaining interest might not be such a problem. The walls in
are paper thin and so actual learning is
taught in the next room can
room in
which the refugees
the school
difficult as what is being be heard very clearly in the are being taught.
Adjacent to this block is a workshop in which a handful of refugees were learning typing although the machines they were using were very old. Also in this room some refugees were using sewing machines. The school and this handful of refugees in the training block were the only really positive things I had seen so far in Chi Ma Wan. Training should be strongly encouraged -activity seemed to boost the morale of those I saw. Although I was just another visitor and probably one of several that week, they smiled at me and
happy to
explain what they were doing.
2) CHI MA WAN UPPER CAMP
were quite
Chi Ma Wan Upper Camp differed from the lower camps in
many 'respects. It and had windows, was more purpose in this! was because
workshop at
was
a
newer
were
was
the buildings
brick unlike those in the lower camp. There could see the people and from what I there was more to do. Our first stop
the far end of
which had camp,
the
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