Hi Everyone.
Allow me to direct your attention for a moment. Allow me please, to rotate your chair away from the seemingly unilateral rhetoric of division; of prejudice and of hate. Allow me to take the remote control and turn down the volume… I say this because sometimes it can feel as though those bellowing voices, those angry faces staring out from the screen; the ones which do their utmost to drown out all passive voices of reason, gentle words of unity, and kindly sentiments of peace, would have you believe that they and only they speak for all of human kind in 2025. Their angry noise makes me very sad.
However, on Monday, Liz and I were introduced to the people who run the NGO, Lesvos Solidarity, the organisation with whom we chose to volunteer. I won’t get into any of detail given to us by its architect whom we were so fortunate to meet (I have attached a couple of links where you can hear the remarkable story for yourself), because fortunately for us, their founder was due to visit the office that very day and it was from her that we were given an impromptu, vivid and emotional potted history of the organisation. This woman is Efi Latsoudi. She is a truly refreshing human being.
Winner of the UN Nansen Award, she set up Lesvos Solidarity in response to the largest refugee crisis since the Second World War of which the small island of Lesvos (due to its geographical location) continues to take more than its fair share of desperate souls. Not only is the island one of the most eastern territories of the EU but it sits only six miles or so from the coast of Turkey. In fact it occurred to me as our ferry was swinging round to the north after leaving the Athens port of Piraeus last Saturday, that its nose was pointing directly at Libya, then Egypt, Israel, Palestine, Syria and Turkey, as it navigated the unpredictable and turbulent waters of the Aegean Sea.
The days of Angela Merkel famous declaring, “Wir schaffen das”; that Germany, her Germany can manage this, “We can handle this”, seem a long time ago. She spoke those words in 2015 as Germany braced itself for an influx of refugees that numbered more than 1.5 million but now after a further seven years of unnecessary global austerity the far-right are purporting to have the same simple remedy from Berlin to Bordeaux, and from Barcelona to Bradford and guess what sector of our global society they are targeting as the fundamental cornerstone of their solution? Refugees, from anywhere east of Lesvos where brutal regimes think nothing of murdering raping and torturing anyone deemed a threat to their totalitarianism.
Since the time of the Pikpa and Moria camps, it is estimated that over 1.5 million refugees have passed through Lesvos. Pikpa was closed down in 2020, the same year as a fire destroyed the Moria camp. The refugees now live in a purpose built camp known as Mavrovouni.
This current refugee facility is tucked behind a headland on a stretch of coastline where the houses and streetlights of Turkey can easily be seen across the short stretch Aegean Sea. Lesvos Solidarity is one the primary NGOs who provide basic humanitarian assistance for these people as well as extending the same support to anyone on the island who find themselves in similar need. They are not by any measure a large organisation, and they do what they can to raise funds whilst at the same time, encouraging the refugees into the wider community. One such enterprise is named, “Safe Passage” which recycles dinghies and life jackets washed ashore or abandoned on the beaches after successful or unsuccessful attempts to cross the sea. I have been working at Safe Passage since Tuesday, cleaning the shredded dinghy and life jacket material under the supervision of Ali**. Lesvos Solidarity also asked if I could help individuals from the camp and the local community with mobility and physical function difficulties.
The football team’s coach happens to be the same extremely likeable individual to whom I am apprentice at Safe Passage and we have became good friends. He is a very (VERY) keen football fan in spite of the curious fact that his favourite English team is Arsenal. We have had many discussions about the very best and worst of Arsenal. His all-time favourite player is Patrick Vieira. Ali is 36 years old so wouldn’t remember the Arsenal teams of the seventies. He roared with laughter (in fact, we both did) as I firstly described, and then actually found an old advertisement for the Alan Ball football boots (see image!). When we finally stopped laughing, he took my phone into the next room in the Safe Passage workshop to show Hamza* who was busy sewing our cut-out panels of dinghies and life jackets into back packs and shoulder bags. The laughter next door went on for some time!
We shared anecdotes as we cut the odd shaped panels from the material which still carried the ominous stench of petrol. He told me of the challenges for him as a coach of a team of refugees of different religions, cultural backgrounds and languages. He described the understandable tendency for players to initially look to only pass the ball to their friends with whom they speak the same language, even when said pass is totally impossible! I told him about my experience of witnessing national pride on an irrational level. Welsh fans wearing tee-shirts that read “I support only two teams: Wales, and any team playing England!” He found this absolutely hilarious and disappeared next door once again to tell his friend operating the sewing machine.
So Liz and I went to watch the football training on Wednesday evening. It takes place on an eight a-side artificial turf pitch near the camp and Ali asked if I would be comfortable with introducing myself to the assembled players. I was totally okay with this, and Ali called the players together and they instinctively formed a large circle around him. He welcomed them to the training session and said, “We have someone new here this evening…” which was my prompt. I told the refugee footballers who I was, and where I came from. I explained what Liz and I were doing on Lesvos and something about my (now former) practice back in Lower Chapel. I made eye contact with as many as I could during this brief and informal introduction but many of the players looked nervous and stared down at the ground.
However, to my surprise (and that of Ali), when I finished, each player returned the courtesy, stating his name and his country of origin. It was strangely moving; hearing them speak their own names and the names of so many countries to which we currently associate civil war and unopposed Human Rights abuses, and yet all them had gathered for a game they so love to play. When the last player gave his name, we all clapped …it felt an entirely appropriate thing to do. One extremely thin individual then came forward and asked me to look at a problematic knee and after that, it was a near constant trickle. Another NGO, Movement On the Ground had two volunteers on hand to assist with the training and when necessary they would translate for me, as they spoke Arabic and Farsi as well as English and French. Movement On the Ground also provided the football boots and kit that the refugees were wearing.
The standard of football was mind-blowing. They were extremely fast and skilful but also whole-heartedly physical! They rarely get to play any actual matches. This football training is generally intended to give them some exercise, let off steam and give them something to look forward to. It was quite an experience. I have been asked to go back and have enthusiastically accepted, so Liz and I will attend football training again on Monday evening.
Liz has been very busy, oscillating between teaching and child care. The teaching should have begun with her shadowing the existing teacher but when she got called away at the last minute, Liz found herself teaching several English classes to a range of abilities on her very first day. Liz has really enjoyed teaching but I think the child care role has been even more rewarding.
In the town of Mytilini where we are based, Lesvos Solidarity has a designated house for mothers and infants. The babies are often the result of rape which is either part of the reason they fled their homeland in the first place or something that occurred on their journey. Either way, the young women are naturally deeply traumatized and psychotherapy is arranged by Lesvos Solidarity and Liz has been looking after the babies while their mothers are receiving this help.
We are being extremely well looked after. A Greek lady whose English vocabulary is about the same as my Greek, is a wonderful cook (nearly as good as Liz, I should add). We ate something the other day that left my tongue tingling for a good hour afterwards. Next day, I told the cook how much we enjoyed the meal and asked her what was on the menu for that evening. She said, “Curry”. I said, “We had that last night.” She said, “No, no, Rob. That wasn’t what we call curry!” Needles to say it was delicious and we could taste (and smell it) for the rest of the evening!
The island is beautiful but so far we’ve been too busy to venture outside of its main town of Mytilini. Mytilini isn’t particularly touristy, but it’s the administrative and commercial centre. It is ancient, unspoiled and unhurried. This weekend we hope to get around some other parts of the island. For a while I thought I felt a poem germinating, but
it’s not particularly easy
to harness thoughts of Mytilini
like sending Harry to his bedroom
if your name is Ma Houdini
or getting the balance of taste right
for a dish of fresh bikini
I mean choosing tasteful adjectives
for a yellow poker-dot linguini
I cannot find what possibly rhymes
and there’s not time to do this properly
I’m out of here to get a beer
and find the words for Mytilini
Okay, I’m nearly done so you can take back the remote control. But before you allow the global media back in, please hold on to this. Please, please know this as an untainted truth: those fears that the Donald Trumps and the Andrew Tates would seek to instil; those divisions that the Nigel Farages and the Tommy Robinsons would like to create are fabrications. Know that the ingredients for the most intense version of the furnace they describe, is being addressed right here on Lesvos, right now. And please know that the inhabitants here show respect and support for brothers and sisters holding a different version of the same scriptures, speaking a different language for the same words, and clad in a different pigment of the same skin, seeking no more than safe passage. They do this with love in their eyes and a smile in their voice. They do this because they remember that it is simply the chance of birth which dictates who is granted the most wealth, the most opportunities, the most safety and the most freedom. They do this because they haven’t forgotten how to. Perhaps sighting Efi Latsoudi and Lesvos Solidarity as role models is setting the bar a little high for the majority of us but I’m a great believer in reaching for the sky, because you just never know.
Love to you all from Lesvos,
Rob Kersley.
The present Mavrovouni Refugee Camp, Lesvos.
The Refugee Football team
Liz, preparing for the day’s lessons.
The Safe Passage workshop
My boss and football coach, Ali, cleaning the one of the salvaged dinghies prior to us cutting it into shape
The now infamous Alan Ball football boots
**Name has been changed.
