“My favourite planet by far is Earth, because we all live on it, and it has the air that we breath, the water that we drink, but we have to take care of it more.” She dreams of becoming an astronaut and speaks passionately about space. “I really miss my friends and especially my teacher,” Laila says. School has been closed in the past year due to COVID-19.
“Syria is my country, the place where I was born.” Laila and her family have lived in Zaatari camp since they arrived in Jordan. She doesn’t remember it now, but says her father speaks of how beautiful Homs was. Laila, 10, and her family left their home in Homs, Syria, when Laila was just one year old. he tells me that we will one day, when war is over.” “I ask my father when we will be able to go back to Syria. She dreams of becoming a judge, to create a more just world. When she’s not in school, Kawthar spends time in UNICEF’s Makani centres, where she is learning Arabic, English, and mathematics. I play with my younger siblings a lot,” she says. “But when I talk to them, I feel happy because they usually spoil me and give me happy nicknames.” Kawthar’s father works in construction, but the opportunities are limited and the family is struggling. She doesn’t remember her home but regularly talks to her uncles and grandparents, who still live there. Kawthar, age 10, is as old as the Syrian conflict. “I consider myself a lucky and happy girl, because I have a mom and a dad.” “The conflict taught me that we can only depend on ourselves.” “I’m always thinking two or three years into the future,” he says. Ammar’s dream is to start a company which provides vocational training to recent graduates like himself. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic he is currently unemployed.
GLOBAL HOPE INTERNATIONAL JORDAN ANDROID
After fleeing his home in rural Damascus in 2013, he completed high school in Jordan before being awarded a scholarship to study computer science, and is now a skilled Android app developer. “I want to start my own company but it’s difficult to know where to begin.”Īt 25 years old, Ammar has spent the majority of his youth as a refugee. “While I’m creating, I don’t think about all the other problems in my life. She took classes in embroidery and became one of almost 500 women to work as part of the project. Shortly after Yousef was born, Amal became part of SEP, a social enterprise to support refugees in Jordan through training and employment. “But we had to leave, and our lives completely changed.” Since finding safety in Jordan, she got married and had a son, Yousef, 4. “While I’m creating, I don’t think about all the other problems in my life.”Īmal, 33, left her home in Daraa, Syria, when fighting first broke out at the beginning of the conflict. “I had just graduated from art college, I wanted to become an artist,” she says. Like 52% of refugees, Ahmad has had to limit his own food intake to prioritise that of his children.
He’s grateful for the assistance from WFP but explains that it’s not enough. There are barely any jobs, my children are out of school, and we’re afraid for our health,” says Ahmad. “The pandemic has been really hard on everyone, especially in the camp. “It was not an easy decision, but I had to make it after seeing the fear in Omar’s eyes when bombs were falling.” In Jordan, Ahmad and his wife have made ends meet with their savings and jobs. “The pandemic has been really hard on everyone, especially in the camp.”Īhmad, 44, a Syrian refugee from Daraa, sought refuge in Jordan in 2013, with his wife and one-year-old son, Omar. The parents’ only wish now is to find a place where they can raise their kids in peace. He’s in the same bind as 82% of refugee households in Jordan that have reported reduced income since the start of the pandemic. When the pandemic hit, Khaled lost his job, “expenses started piling up, and now I can’t pay my bills,” he says. Their lives improved when they started receiving cash assistance from the World Food Programme ( WFP) in 2014. Khaled found a job but earned only enough to pay the rent. When they reached Jordan, their only belongings were the clothes they were wearing. In 2013, Khaled, 38, and his wife, 32, fled Aleppo to protect their children from war. “In the past, we could not afford canned food to feed the kids.”