Give Shelter, Save Lives

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Lisbeth Garassino, New York, New York, U.S.A

This past Friday I had a refugee event at my apartment to raise $200 for a family of refugees in Somalia.

The first time I saw the refugee problem firsthand was in Bosnia in 2006. I was volunteering in Sarajevo with the organization Builders for Peace. Najeb, our tour guide for the day, showed us a spot where enemy fighters hid up on a hill overlooking Sarajevo. A crowd of young boys ran up to us. They were shy at first and then clamored for attention and to take pictures with us. The boys wore shorts or a pair of boxers with no shoes. Najeb said that they were refugees living in the hills and they would remember this day, meeting us, for the rest of their lives.

I got involved with the UNHCR Gimme Shelter campaign because I think that those boys — and all people — deserve to have a safe place to live. For my refugee event, I sent out an invitation on Facebook to my friends with the details of my event: a party to raise money to provide one tent for a family of refugees. I asked that my friends show up and donate $10.00.

Before my event I decorated my apartment with information regarding the work that UNHCR does and the current situation in Somalia. Once my guests arrived, I played Ben Affleck’s short film about UNHCR’s work. Next we read refugee accounts of the current situation in Somalia. These can be found on the Give Them Shelter website and are powerful stories that really communicate what is going on.

When my guests first arrived, I asked them to wear a nametag with a number on it. After the refugee readings, I explained what these numbers meant. These were statistics of refugees, asylum seekers, and other displaced people in Somalia. To tie these numbers back to my guests, I gave statistics on where we live, Manhattan. I explained that the number of people of concern in Somalia is close to the same as the population of the burough of Manhattan. I said that if suddenly all of Manhattan were in this situation there would be an uproar, but since this is Somalia no one cares.

To finish the event, we had a raffle for three UNHCR T-shirts that I bought at UNIQLO. We raised over $200 for a tent, which is a home for a family of refugees in Somalia.