It’s always disturbing to come back here and back into this universe. Through customs at the airport with its billboards phone or Dior, waiting for his bag among some European clusters, journalists and oil investors, leaving the major luxury hotels in the city and roll over tens of kilometers in large plains, to find the most remote camps, the refugees themselves with the same clothes, shaved or long hair, the time seems to have stopped them. Even the recycling center where the Yazidis live has not changed, the gates acting bed with crows and staging, it’s almost beautiful, as if an artist had put his leg at work. The same decor, the same newspaper, the same abandonment.
Viyan picked me up at the airport. He is Kurdish, pharmacist and founder of the Kurdistan Medical Charity Foundation. Dilnaz my friend’s daughter, the princess, had introduced me as a man of the field very reliable, dedicated. The grandfather Viyan was tortured to death by Turkish Armenians because it housed in 1915 in Turkey. His father then escaped to Baghdad, it was a very close family friend of the princess. Viyan was educated in Ukraine, and he puts his time, his energy, his entire life to serving refugees, whatever their origin, their religion, their language, whether Syrian, the Yazidis, Christians, refugees Salaheddin, Ramadi, Falluja, the Sunni, the Shabak and persimmons. Two hundred volunteer doctors and nurses working with him. We had a few exchanges before my arrival in September, our collaboration with patients was successful and we are pleased at the prospect of continuing to work together.
Compared to last summer where NGOs were not present, we feel a desire to put in place a real organization. Public gardens Erbil have been emptied. The night is too cold, and the recent massive influx of refugees from Kirkuk and Kobané have resulted in the opening of old plants, the development of caves or abandoned malls. UN trying to unite all the humanitarian organizations and UNHCR provides each family kits of blankets and clothing, water, diapers and food. In tents, each family maintains its space. The shoes remain at the entrance and walk in socks on the tarp placed on the ground, the picture of the Virgin Mary with a rosary hanging on the foot screws of the bulb, the teapot is always ready on the small stove land mattresses are stacked with folded blankets near a wooden crate containing rice, eggplant and tomatoes, the richest have a radio. At the entrance of these buildings with between 400 and 1500 individuals, one or two prefabricated possible to register new arrivals, and Kurdish and foreign volunteers meet the physical necessities. According to the religion of refugees, we can also meet a priest, imam, etc. The authorities are trying to poach doctors from hospitals in the city, themselves also clogged. So some care is provided, particularly among the elderly and children. For the rest, we must wait …
In the surrounding plains and neighboring villages is even worse. Near déchèteries or herds of black sheep camps are secured by barbed wire and peshmergues. Epidemics heat last summer resulted in many deaths, and the image of the camps, cemeteries are overloaded. Tractors return the land around the camps to enlarge because it took hundreds of host families that arrived last week. Simply in the province of Duhok, 3 hours drive north of Erbil, there 17 camps for 850,000 residents, it leaves an idea of the percentage of care actually charged and the number of refugees in all three provinces Kurdistan. With their fifty seats, tents furnished by UNICEF are trying to avoid breaking the school with children. But the despair of these families as children themselves already seem old. Sometimes we see them play, improvising games balls from mud and making holes in the ground. Teenagers carry water, offer waxing your shoes, beg you to give them work. From Mosul, Baghdad, Aleppo … parents are teachers, architects, shoemakers, restorers of objects of art, cooks. We read in their eyes the shame of becoming a beggar overnight.
There is an explosion of pregnancies in the camps, “attacks like everywhere, people have nothing to do,” is the refrain yes, but in the camps is different. When you’ve lost everything, you’re reduced to a beast waiting as time passes, or that life stops, desperation sometimes leads to the worst crimes. In these times, it used to have something like poetry. In the back of this scene, you find yourself in Baudelaire, and these pretty girls rounded belly are living proof; they age laugh, live their first carnal pleasures or to spend their time on the benches of our universities, but their faces are frozen. The only medical camp cabin has a small refrigerator lock with some antibiotics, gynecological gloves, some pads contraceptive pills and condoms, the valve does not work, dirt and dust are such that you wonder resistant infections .
On the truck, we validated purchase at Le Mans last week and had to be put in place to enter the territory permissions. By Patrick Jouan who worked at the RATP, we chose a model 8m long with 4 cabins + convertible infirmary care and pharmacy. It’s little, but it’s a start … I think I was a little, even very stressed at the idea that the truck is stopped at the exit of the boat in Turkey, or before entering the territory Kurdish. And two jokers carried me and continue to bring me luck: Consul General Frederic Tissot and Princess.
Official appointments were held with the Governor of Duhok, the adviser to the Prime Minister Barzani, the Ministry of Health. I could enter the “passport” of the truck, and it will have a number plate on the way to the Kurdish territory. We Viyan registered on the registration and pass as owner of the truck. The truck will take the boat these days in Marseille to Mersin, and an official team will go retrieve it off the boat in Turkey. All development work, installation of water and its disposal, electricity, insulation, air conditioning, heating, stretchers, cabinets … will ultimately be made here. In France, the waiting times were too long for companies who manage ambulances to wait six months to install our clinic standards. And costs ranged around 20,000 euros. With Azad who runs a manufacturing plant, we have a team of professionals operating framed by an architect who works with the state. It has already drawn up plans gracefully. Our ten workers are refugees: Syrians, Kurds, Yezidis, Christians, and they are so happy to contribute in exchange for some treatments and medications that some even offered to work for free. And the final price in comparison to Paris, we will not exceed the $ 8,000 all inclusive. I also expect the price of the boat, customs before returning to Kurdistan, many details, so many details to create a small hospital of 20m2.
Gynaecology Without Borders offers the installation of a cabin with a gynecological examination table, delivery sets and technical equipment. With UMAF we will also have to supply some medicines pharmacy.
It was also necessary to meet the staff ready to work every day for four months. Staff will be employed. We recruited a Kurdish driver, a Syrian worker, nurse Aleppo. Three full-time doctors will join the team: a gynecologist, a general practitioner and my dear Abdelkarim with which our paths crossed for the 3rd time!
Abdelkarim is a native of Dara who worked in the Jordanian Syrian refugee camps in 2013, I often croisais when I was with the Moroccan military Zaatari. It is a plump sixty years man, with an ocean of sweetness and sadness in his eyes, and as a physician would like to have for our children. He treats so many children with listening, attention and professionalism unique. And last September, chance that I came across him in a Yezidi sanctuary Lalesh installing my acupuncture consultation. He was sheltered under the trees, it was 50 degrees that day, and dozens of families were clustered around him. It was great to see a familiar face in a sacred place, a refuge against Daech. And yesterday in Erbil, we still came face to face with the Department of Health! Not having a valid passport, he went on his own to Kobané treat children, and he returned to Kurdistan illegally. In fact, the authorities have stuck him a warning and he has the right to practice without a contract. And we were overjoyed with Viyan when he agreed to work in our mobile clinic.
It is in times like these: warm smile Duhok Governor ready to open its doors, the knowing look of Abdelkarim, discreet kindness of the princess, Viyan solidarity and warmth of its people, support Henri-Jean gynecology, UMAF for drugs, Mylène and its decisive role in helloasso, Azad to isolate the clinic, Rene and Simon for parliamentary reserve Olivier for his confidence, Fabienne for his support for the most hours later, Patrick for his collaboration, Rachel, Valerie, Xavier Benedict, for his hands … Laurence, which clings to the hope that everything is still possible, even at the scale of an ant. At night, close your eyes the quiet heart, because each in its own way, brings beauty to the world.
Elise Boghossian
* Organic Express
• 2001: Mission to the casualties of the war in Nagorno-Karabakh • 2002: creation of the humanitarian association Shennong & Avicenna • 2011 defended his thesis in Chinese medicine in Nanjing • 2013: Missions to Syrian refugees • 2014: September , contact mission in Iraq Yezidis and Christians refugees in November, back in Iraq for a humanitarian project bus.
With the purchase of a bus and planning clinic in the Shennong & Avicenna association can provide emergency care for the management of pain and Yezidi Christian refugees in Iraq. A goal painkiller 7000 consultations by spring 2015. To help finance the project:
www.helloasso.com/associations/shennong-avicenne/collectes/aidez-nous-a-la-creation-d-un-dispensaire-mobile-anti-douleur