Run for your life
NUMBER ELEVEN

Running away from home: some projects - Run Around Quiz - Quiz Answers - How to do the quiz - Follow-up - Our addresses

Reiza is fourteen years old. She was born in Afghanistan, but had to leave when fighting and bombing hit her village, and her father was taken away by soldiers.

Her family walked for three weeks to reach the border with Pakistan. Reiza remembers it as a long, frightening journey, travelling always by night. Since then she's been living with her mother, brothers and 15,000 other refugees in a special settlement in Pakistan. The refugees get help with food, education and health services, but Reiza walks for 3 hours a day to fetch water and firewood. Reiza's family hopes to return to Afghanistan one day, but they're nor sure when this will be. There are more than 19 million refugees in our world today. Like Reiza they all have one thing in common. They have been forced to leave behind their homes and friends to seek safety in another country. Why have they run for their lives? And where are they now?

Running away from home

1. Using large sheets of paper, ask participants in groups of 3 or 4 to draw a 'HOME' and inside it write down all the things that word makes them think of.

2. Now ask people to think of all the reasons people might lose their homes, or be forced to leave their home. Write these around the outside of 'HOME'.

2. Read Reiza's story. Imagine that you heard suddenly that your life would be in danger unless you left the country immediately. You have time to pick just three things from your home before you go. What would you take? How would you feel about leaving everything behind?

1. What is the largest cause of refugees in the world?
(a) famine and environmental disasters (b) wars and conflict (c) music by the Pet Shop Boys

2. Which of these famous people is/was a refugee?
(a) Mother Teresa (b) Albert Einstein (c) Zig and Zag

3. What do you call someone who has fled war or persecution, but no left the country?
(a) an internally displaced person (b) Derek (c) a domestic refugee

4. What percentage of refugees seek safety in Europe?
(a) 57% (b) 28% (c) 5%

5. In 1992, 24,065 people applied for refugee status in Britain. How many got it?
(a) all of them (b) 32% (c) 3.2%

6. Who or what are Kurds?
(a) what Miss Muffett was eating when the spider arrived (b) an ethnic group in the Middle East (c) a group of refugees from Somalia

7. Refugee camps aim to provide 10 litres of water per person each day. How much water do we need each day to survive?
(a) 5 litres (b) 10 litres (c) 20 litres

8. What hides in the grass, weighs anything from 150g to several kilos, and is the biggest threat to refugees trying to go home?
(a) the mamba snake (b) a landmine (c) a lion trap

9. What do the letters UNHCR stand for?
(a) United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (b) Universal Housing Campaign for Refugees (c) Unpleasant Nations Hoping to Control Refugees

10. What do most refugees want more than anything else?
(a) a McChicken Sandwich (b) to live in a rich country (c) to go home

Run around - some ideas on how to answer the quiz questions

You need a large room with lots of space. Write A, B and C onto three pieces of paper, and place these well apart at one end of the room. These correspond to the three choices for each question. Divide into two teams, positioned at the other end of the room. Explain you will read out quiz questions with three possible answers. Teams should decide which they think is correct, and, when you shout 'GO', they run to either A. B or C. If you shout 'RUN AROUND', they have 10 seconds to change their answer, before you shout 'STOP'. The whole team doesn't have to go to the same answer. Keep a score chart. The team with the most points at the end of the game has successfully reached the refugee camp.

 

Quiz ANSWERS

1 (b) The vast majority of refugees are fleeing some form of conflict. Others might be fleeing political or ethnic persecution. People fleeing environmental or economic problems are not refugees, according to the United Nations definition.

2 (b) The great scientist Albert Einstein was a refugee from Nazi Germany. Mother Teresa went to India of her own accord, whilst Zig and Zag are aliens of a different kind.

3 (a) There are at least 25 million internally displaced people in the world. The might be fleeing similar problems as refugees, but they are not automatically entitled to the same protection from the United Nations.

4 (c) Only 5% of refugees try to find asylum in Europe. In fact more than 8 out of 10 refugees are fleeing from one poor country to another. Whilst we worry about relatively small numbers, poor countries like Malawi are playing host to millions.

5 (c) Only 3.2% were granted full refugee status, but another 43.9% were given 'exceptional leave to remain'. This lets them stay in the country temporarily, but doesn't give them same rights as refugees. The rest (53.9%) were refused.

6 (b) About 20 million Kurds have their homeland in the mountains joining Iraq, Iran and Turkey. Around 420,000 of these are now refugees, having fled ethnic violence.

7 (a) We need 5 litres of water each day to survive, whilst an average family in Britain or Ireland is likely to use 1000 litres a day. Because refugee camps are often in inhospitable areas, water may have to be delivered by lorry.

8 (b) An estimated 800 people are killed by landmines every month in poor countries of the South. 75% of survivors need at least one amputation. Until roads and fields can be cleared of mines, it it too dangerous for many refugees to return home.

9 (a) The United Nations High Commission for Refugees was set up in 1951. It aims to provide aid and support to refugees, and to seek long term solutions to help them return home or settle permanently in another place.

10 (c) Most refugees are clear that as soon as it is safe, they'd like to go home. For some, however, it may be a long time before they will be able to. In the meantime, is there anything we can do to help them feel at home in our country?

Now follow that - questions to ask after the quiz

After the quiz, divide into little buzz groups and ask yourselves:
1. Did you find out anything new or surprising from the quiz?
2. Write your own description of what you think a 'refugee' is. How does it differ from the official definition below?
3. If you had fled your home because of war or persecution, what support would you hope to get
(a) from governments and international organisations, and (b) from people like us.

The United Nations describes a refugee as anyone who 'has left their own country and is unable to return, owing to as well- founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.'

For ideas of how to support refugees and displaced people, get involved in the CAFOD Refugee Campaign. Christian Aid's Sudan Campaign also has information on refugees.

Youth Topics is mailed free to youth group leaders. Produced three times a year, it provides a global perspective on topical issues with starter exercises to use with young people. For your free copies contact one of the agencies below.

CAFOD Youth Topics

 
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