Lots of Photos, One Outcry

    In January last year, I participated in a volunteer project in Calais, a city in northern France. The project, facilitated by the organization, aimed to help irregular migrants trying to reach the UK by maintaining their family connections through a phone service while also providing support for their medical and humanitarian needs. Since this experience was emotionally challenging for me, I needed a long time to process and reflect before writing about it in detail.

    The first thing I noticed upon arriving in the city was the abundance of barbed wire everywhere. I do not wish to cast blame on the local population, but I was told by the project coordinator that these barriers were primarily intended to prevent irregular migrants from setting up tent camps randomly. This city is already internationally known for the "Jungle," an informal settlement of makeshift shelters and tents where many migrants live—often referred to as the Jungle of Calais

    From the very beginning, we were strictly instructed not to take photos while working. However, I strongly believe that what I witnessed should be seen by everyone, independent of individuals or institutions. After all, I am neither a professional photographer nor an investigative journalist. I am simply someone who believes that every person has the right to live in humane conditions, with dignity. The idea of turning a blind eye to these people and their living conditions deeply saddens me. I believe this issue needs to be discussed more. That is why I feel it is both a necessity and a human responsibility to share what I have seen.

   We reached pre-determined locations, which were regularly visited by the organization i had voluntered for, each week, in two separate teams. The first team provided medical assistance and offered hot beverages. I was assigned to the second team, which focused on maintaining family connections. Within our team, we formed two different groups. One group, working alongside a volunteer interpreter, engaged with people to provide them with information about their needs and assisted those who had lost contact with their families in submitting requests to locate them. To do this, we set up seating areas and play spaces where they could also charge their phones, trying to bring a sense of warmth to the biting cold of Calais. Additionally, we had another group responsible for compiling a list of individuals who wanted to call their families and loved ones, ensuring that the phones reached the right people at the right time.

    I must say that even for us, the working conditions were quite challenging. Calais is an extremely cold place, so before heading to our assigned locations, we received an informative email advising us to bring clothing that would keep us warm, as well as shoes that would protect us from both the rain and the cold. However, despite wearing three layers of socks and high-quality winter boots, I started feeling pain in my toes from the cold after just an hour. I feel ashamed to complain about this, but I write these lines so that you can truly feel the pain of the person in the picture.

For this person in the picture—and for the others—our team leader took immediate action to provide the necessary clothing and footwear.

    On the first day, I stayed alongside our interpreter. He was a volunteer from northern Iraq who had legally obtained refugee status and could speak nine languages. That day, we assisted a man from one of the tent camps in the area who had lost contact with his wife during their journey and wanted to submit a request to locate his family members. He explained that due to his family’s opposition to their marriage, as well as the threats and risks of honor-related violence, he and his wife had fled in search of a safe life. However, he lost his last connection with her at the Turkish border and had not heard from her since. Having lived in Germany for a while, he was also fluent in German.

The organization targeted a different location each day, which meant that we visited a new place daily. On our first day, the location we visited was a well-known spot where everyone was aware of the organization's scheduled arrival. I was able to capture a few snapshots of the living conditions of the people struggling to survive near this area.

On the second day, we were once again assigned to an open-air location in two separate teams. Due to the extreme cold, our team leader asked us to inform people that a nearby gymnasium had been opened for them to spend the night.

Some accepted our offer to drive them there, while others chose to stay outside in groups. Some refused to leave their tents and the few belongings they had. Unfortunately, when I say "tents," I don’t mean ones designed for harsh winter conditions. Some had created makeshift shelters using plastic sheets they had found, while others tried to repair old, torn tents to carve out a space for themselves.

    The closest thing to an actual tent that I saw, I leave for you to imagine…

Some had managed to find small shelters. As a team, we walked through these wooded areas, informing those under 18 that they had a legal right to accommodation in France. However, most were determined to reach the UK.

Since we could not change their minds, we showed them how to find their exact location using their phones, explained the importance of monitoring wave heights before setting out to sea, and introduced them to an app that could help with this. We also left informational papers with emergency numbers in case they encountered life-threatening situations at sea.

At that point, there wasn’t much else we could do except provide them with information that might help them navigate the thin line between life and death. They were determined to go.

These wooded areas were littered with the trash and abandoned belongings of those who had passed through before. Inside a small shack, a toy caught my eye…

    On the first day of our mission, we also visited a house that had been donated to an organization by its owners. It was a large house with a garden, accommodating around 9–10 people at a time. The organization provided temporary shelter and food for those in critical medical conditions. During our visit, the house sheltered a pregnant woman, a woman who had recently given birth, both with their husbands, and an extended family with a 5–6-year-old child. Before finding refuge there, they had struggled to survive in tents and makeshift shelters like so many others. The woman who had just given birth told us that, only two days after delivering her baby, she had attempted to cross the English Channel by boat. However, when her newborn turned completely blue from the cold (in her own words), they had no choice but to call for help and were rescued at sea. The 5–6-year-old child in the house was unable to speak. The family elders showed us photos of a severe head injury the child had sustained during their journey to France. They told us that since that incident, the child had not spoken a single word

    How long they would be able to stay in that house was uncertain. Yet, despite everything, they treated us with great kindness, as if we were their guests. I will not share any photos or infotmations of this house—both for their safety and to respect their privacy.

    On the second day of our mission, we visited a center where many people had at least found a warm place to sit during the day. This was a center run by another organization that provided meals and hygiene services for irregular migrants. Our organization was there to offer phone services to help maintain family connections.

The large waiting area in the center was decorated with portraits of faces. These faces belonged to individuals who had either once been in that room or might still be there. The reason for these portraits was that a volunteer artist regularly came to create them for any migrant who wished to have one.

I had a brief opportunity to speak with the artist. He was truly warm and friendly. Despite my limited French, he continued to reassure me about my language concerns while creating his art.

    On the last day of our mission, we went to a camp nicknamed "Unicorn." We arrived with our mission vehicle and began setting up seating, phone, and play areas. As soon as they saw us, a large crowd began gathering. Some came to charge their phones, others to ask for clothes or other urgent needs, and some simply wanted to play and chat with us. Before I arrived at the camp, I was informed that I would be acting as a translator for a person who only spoke Turkish and had been isolated due to the language barrier. When I reached the camp, my team leader pointed to the person I needed to speak with. When I greeted them with a simple "Merhaba, nasılsınız?" ("Hello, how are you?"), I saw a look of shock in his eyes. At first, he needed some time to respond and seemed to hesitate a lot. I wondered if he didn’t speak Turkish well or if maybe he didn’t trust me, or perhaps he was just hungry and tired. However, as the conversation continued, his speech became clearer, and I realized that he hadn't spoken to anyone in a long time. Based on the story he later shared with me, I suspected that he was traumatized.

This person had planned to go to the UK to provide a better life for their children, but while at the camp, he received the heartbreaking news that he had lost their son. His only goal was to reach the UK as soon as possible to create a good life for the rest of his family. I provided him with important information, like emergency contact numbers that could be useful on the road. I listened to the part of his story that he wanted to share. He specifically asked me to express his gratitude to the team and its leader. When we parted ways, he mentioned that if he made it to the UK, i had an another uncle there from now on.

Honestly, I didn’t do anything extraordinary. The only thing I did was talk to him. But life in Calais is so harsh, cold, and unforgiving that people are deeply grateful for even the smallest act of kindness, like a smile or a simple "hello."

Regardless of people's life stories, their rightness, wrongness, political opinions, I think that no human being deserves to live like this. Moreover, the majority of the people I saw seemed to be under the age of 18... Children who should be in school but cannot speak because of their traumas, children sitting close to each other and burning rubbish to keep warm, babies who should be sleeping in a warm bed but are about to die on a boat above the sea...

    Do you remember, the body of a small baby washed up on the shores of  Türkiye? That photo shook the world... Alan baby. Alan baby was only a topic of our agenda for a few weeks. Like Alan baby, many are still living in the same misery, still facing death... But this societal amnesia will swallow us all, first destroying our humanity, and then everything else. ( Alan Kurdi )

   

 Note: Some photos were taken by my volunteer friend J.