My friend has that look on his face again. Germany is on the cusp of taking home the cup, but he's buried in his smartphone with a far-away grin. It's a look I know well—the universal, blissful look that accompanies text-messages from someone who is more than just friends.
Germany nets their goal in extra time, and the commentator yells in Hebrew, because we are stealing the satellite signal from Israel. It is a techincal process of tilting the dish gently to the west. Rapid-fire popping of fireworks erupts from the neighbourhood across the valley.
“Haitham,” I say. “Who're you talking to.”
He blinks and smiles at me—all the answer I need—then dips back into his private text-message world.
Haitham is from Dara'a, like most Syrians living in Irbid. Comparatively, he is doing well. Syrians and Jordanians alike are able to apply for “volunteer” positions with local NGOs; counter to some understandings of the term volunteer, though, these temporary contracts come with stipends which net above the local average salary. They last for three to six months, typically, with no possibility of extension. Syrian volunteers can apply at other agencies, but the positions are highly competitive and “wasta”—the Arabic word for social and familial connections—reputedly play a large role in securing a volunteer post. It is unsurprising; there are fat binders of application forms in the office.
We have had a small celebration, because Haitham is one of the lucky few—he has successfully transitioned into another opportunity. Financial security for another three to six months.
“Do you ever get to see your girlfriend, Haitham?” I ask later, as we are walking home.
“Not this month. It's Ramadan. We're fasting.” He smiles and winks.
“How did you meet her?”
He gets a far away look—another one, he's replete with far-away looks—“I had first arrived here. I was walking in the street. It was a new place, I got lost. I saw her, and thought 'I should ask her for directions,' and we were talking...” he shrugs. “Now here we are.”
I don't ask him what happens next. We both know there's no answer to that.
“And Leila? How are things with Leila?” Haitham is convinced—or pretends to be convinced—that I am infatuated with a mutual friend. Also a volunteer at an NGO, she works a second job in the evening. He asked me why I thought she works so hard. “She's saving money to go back to school. Because of the war, she had to stop her degree at the University of Damascus. She wants to finish.”
These sorts stories are common. Whether it is a desperate son betting on asylum in Europe in order to support his family here, or would-be business owners hunting for trustworthy Jordanian partners—or even women looking for local husbands—people universally are struggling to reconnect loose threads of life.
It is not a surprising thing, when written out: people strive to live their lives, whatever circumstances they find themselves in. What is surprising is that some practioners and policy-makers seem to forget this simple fact. “Refugees” aren't influxes or mass flows, they are people—people with ambitions for the future, with dreams of romance, with insatiable desire to learn and grow and better themselves. People who largely know what is best for them, and will work towards securing that. The “refugee regime” might provide a daily caloric intake and proper heating in the winter, but the legal protections it guarantees—as laid out in the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees—fail spectacularly to recognize these other social and personal needs.
Perhaps the most distilled site of this failure is the refugee camp. For these brave, creative individuals, the camp represents the greatest terror—greater even than return to Syria. The camp is the symbol-made-corporeal of a stripping away of what dignity they have managed to preserve here. “I want to visit my mother in Saudi Arabia,” one friend says. “But if I leave and return, they will send me to Azraq.”
Germany nets their goal in extra time, and the commentator yells in Hebrew, because we are stealing the satellite signal from Israel. It is a techincal process of tilting the dish gently to the west. Rapid-fire popping of fireworks erupts from the neighbourhood across the valley.
“Haitham,” I say. “Who're you talking to.”
He blinks and smiles at me—all the answer I need—then dips back into his private text-message world.
Haitham is from Dara'a, like most Syrians living in Irbid. Comparatively, he is doing well. Syrians and Jordanians alike are able to apply for “volunteer” positions with local NGOs; counter to some understandings of the term volunteer, though, these temporary contracts come with stipends which net above the local average salary. They last for three to six months, typically, with no possibility of extension. Syrian volunteers can apply at other agencies, but the positions are highly competitive and “wasta”—the Arabic word for social and familial connections—reputedly play a large role in securing a volunteer post. It is unsurprising; there are fat binders of application forms in the office.
We have had a small celebration, because Haitham is one of the lucky few—he has successfully transitioned into another opportunity. Financial security for another three to six months.
“Do you ever get to see your girlfriend, Haitham?” I ask later, as we are walking home.
“Not this month. It's Ramadan. We're fasting.” He smiles and winks.
“How did you meet her?”
He gets a far away look—another one, he's replete with far-away looks—“I had first arrived here. I was walking in the street. It was a new place, I got lost. I saw her, and thought 'I should ask her for directions,' and we were talking...” he shrugs. “Now here we are.”
I don't ask him what happens next. We both know there's no answer to that.
“And Leila? How are things with Leila?” Haitham is convinced—or pretends to be convinced—that I am infatuated with a mutual friend. Also a volunteer at an NGO, she works a second job in the evening. He asked me why I thought she works so hard. “She's saving money to go back to school. Because of the war, she had to stop her degree at the University of Damascus. She wants to finish.”
These sorts stories are common. Whether it is a desperate son betting on asylum in Europe in order to support his family here, or would-be business owners hunting for trustworthy Jordanian partners—or even women looking for local husbands—people universally are struggling to reconnect loose threads of life.
It is not a surprising thing, when written out: people strive to live their lives, whatever circumstances they find themselves in. What is surprising is that some practioners and policy-makers seem to forget this simple fact. “Refugees” aren't influxes or mass flows, they are people—people with ambitions for the future, with dreams of romance, with insatiable desire to learn and grow and better themselves. People who largely know what is best for them, and will work towards securing that. The “refugee regime” might provide a daily caloric intake and proper heating in the winter, but the legal protections it guarantees—as laid out in the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees—fail spectacularly to recognize these other social and personal needs.
Perhaps the most distilled site of this failure is the refugee camp. For these brave, creative individuals, the camp represents the greatest terror—greater even than return to Syria. The camp is the symbol-made-corporeal of a stripping away of what dignity they have managed to preserve here. “I want to visit my mother in Saudi Arabia,” one friend says. “But if I leave and return, they will send me to Azraq.”