Refugee Rights Greece Project #52352

Habibi and Sport with Refugees (HSR)

by Soup and Socks e.V.

Project Report | Feb 7, 2022
2021 Summary and Happy (Belated)New Year!

By Maeve O'Gorman | Coordinator

Marathon of Afghanistan

Hello!

Happy Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Chinese New Year, Happy Springtime - for those of us for whom Spring (rightly!) starts on the 1st of February, and Happy Birthday, if you have celebrated any or all of these events since our last report.

This report comes to you slightly delayed due to an unforseen issue, which we have now resolved!

I have attached a lovely update below about how your support has helped us to grow and sustain HSR from September 2021 to January 2022. As is normal with the context we are working in, some of the details in the report already need further updates, which I present to you now!

Cash cards

Thankfully, people in the asylum process in Greek refugee camps have been reissued with cash cards, having been without any money for over 3 months. However, the long food lines remain, and have been used as the reason that the financial support (previously approximately €150 per month) provided through the cash cards has been slashed in half in most cases.

In addition to this, there are many people and families who have had their asylum cases accepted, but have been waiting in limbo for many months for their IDs and Refugee Passports to be issued. Once a case has been accepted, people are no longer eligible for any support - food, financial or otherwise.

This means that people are continuing to seek out employment which is insecure and underpaid.

Community Coordinator

The HSR Coordination team has been a two-person job up to now. Given our growth and plans for 2022, we are now recruiting for a Community Coordinator. This will be someone from the refugee and asylum seeking community. Being a community-led project has thus far meant listening to the needs of the community, providing activities which are demanded, through the expertise of community teachers. However, it is so important to us that we continue to always improve on exemplifying our values through action. Recruiting a Community Coordinator is just one of these actions, and we are really excited to have someone with new expertise and experience join our team.

Expansion - The Moveable Gym project

We have begun offering sports activities in Ioannina, as well as in Habibi.Works in Katsikas. The majority of refugees living in the city are unaccompanied minors. Some live in accomodation in the city, while others are housed in remote locations on the outskirts of the city, with very little public transport options. Given this, we are now searching for funding to start our Moveable Gym project. This project is basically a van which is kitted out with gym equipment in the back, meaning we can bring the gym to people in remote locations, who cannot access our regular classes. If you have any interest in supporting this project, or know someone that does!

We just keep going!

In between all this, we had a women only climbing competition, an Under 15s Football Competition and we took part in the Virtual Marathon of Afghanistan.

We have also lost some structural funding from some big actors who have pulled out of Greece due to a lack of income in 2021. This means that your support means more than ever, and is allowing us to continue growing and moving. Thank you so much!

Please, if you are not already, consider following us on Instagram and liking us on Facebook. If you are following us, consider sharing our page and telling your friends and family about the project, to help us grow our network. If you would like to keep up to date with all of our activities, please sign up to our monthly newsletter here!

We are #StrongerTogether !

From,

Maeve, Marta & all at HSR

Photo: Jon Garate

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Sep 9, 2021
Habibi and Sport with Refugees - New Beginnings

By Maeve O'Gorman | Coordinator

Partnership
This month is an exciting one for Habibi and Sport with Refugees. We have formalised and launched our official project partnerships with Yoga and Sport with Refugees, Habibi.Works and KOIZ Centre for Postcolonial Studies.

We are based on-site at Habibi.Works, an intercultural maker space in Katsikas, Greece. Habibi.Works provides a platform for education, empowerment and encounters for refugees and Greek locals in the North of Greece! The connections made in this space, and the support of members of KOIZ who were based at Habibi.Works for some months, fostered the growth of a small ad-hoc sports group, which has grown into the powerful community of athletes, teachers and friends that Habibi and Sport with Refugees is today. This growth has also been aided by the support of Yoga and Sport with Refugees, an incredible organisation which also has locations in Athens and Lesvos. Each of these partners came on board in quite an organic way, and each plays a vital role in increasing the impact and sustainability of the project.

We now have two full time coordinators, Maeve and Kirstine on the ground in Katsikas, working with teachers, assistants and students from the refugee and Greek community in Katsikas, the nearby city of Ioannina and surrounding areas. Maeve has a degree in International Development and has worked in the humanitarian and NGO sector in Ireland, Sierra Leone and Nepal. Kirstine has been working on sports projects with refugees in Lebanon and Greece, as well as coordinating the laundry service in the new refugee camp in Lesvos after the fire in Moria last year. Both are passionate sportswomen and are highly motivated to facilitate the success of Habibi and Sport with Refugees.

Future Plans

We are so grateful to you for trusting us and donating to our project. This Autumn, we will use money raised to winter-proof our climbing wall and gym so it can be used all year round; improve access to sport for women and girls; increase and improve our equipment for volleyball, football and running; support our teachers with upskilling and training opportunities.

Please follow us on Instagram @habibiandsportwithrefugees to keep up to date with all of our activities. We would really appreciate it if you could share our project with your network to ensure that we can continue to provide sustainable and high quality activities for all of our participants.

Thank you for all your support, we are #StrongerTogether

Links:

Instagram page

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