A Dance journey...

I was in NYC for a week dealing with some personal stuff and a good freind of mine got me a ticket to see a dance performance in a high school in Manhatten. Since i didnt have my video camera with me i decided to just take photos and make a video out of it later...so this is my first attempt at stop motion video!
Check it!

A Dance journey.... from KaliShakti on Vimeo.

Calais, France

I was in Calais, France for a few days this week at the invitation of Nouri who is an Afghan migrant and a survivor of the Schiphol Fire that burnt down a refugee detention center in Holland 3 years ago killing 11 migrants.
He took me there to show the situation of migrants that try to get to the UK from Europe. Mostly of Arab, Eritrean, Sudanese, Afghan and Kurdish descent; these migrants are fleeing a devastated life in the hope for a better one and in the process many end up shredded to pieces or frozen to death!
Calais, France is the port of departure in France where the trucks, cars and buses get on the ferries to cross to Dover, UK. It is also the place where the Euro-rail goes inside the Channel Tunnel. The Channel is a 50 km undersea rail tunnel linking UK to France for those who dont know!! This gives the migrants 2 different ways to get to the UK. Jump on top of the train before it gets inside the tunnel or hide inside or under the trucks which then gets ferried across!! The truck journeys are longer (some last 12-15 hours) and more dangerous but the train is much more harder to get into.
I met a lot of people; all men; living in filthy make shift tents by the port or in plastic tents in the bushes around the highway right before the ferry crossing. Around the highways live mostly Afghan and Kurdish refugees inside bushes and brambles that they call "the jungle". It is strewn with litter; bottles filled with urine, dirty clothes and mudstreaked shoes all over the place.
Nouri had lived in the refugee camp Sangatte in Calais for 9 months; 7 years ago; and tried to cross the border many times. He finally succeded to cross once but the UK police in Dover found him; put him in jail for 6 months in Birmingham and sent him back to France who then sent him back to Holland which is where he had initially applied for asylum.
We used this story to get into the jungle and the ports. The migrants all wanted to know why the hell we were there; and why was i there with a camera!!! They told me they were allergic to journalists because; "first come the journalists and second the police". Twice they told me to put the camera away and later apologised after speaking with Nouri since i was his guest there and it was rude and unhospitable for them to speak to me like that. After they realised i wasnt a journalist they asked me to come back again soon if i wanted..
The camps were divided up into various nationalities and races but they all came together during meal times. 2 times/day a French organisation would bring food by the ports and all the men came out from the jungles to eat. It was quite a sight.
A lot of young people; many were 15-18. We got talking to a young Afghan boy who told us in a non chalant way how he had sat inside a freezer truck that morning for 6 hours. "The oxygen in the truck finished and i was choking", he said "when some freinds opened the door by chance and when they saw me all blue they rushed me to the hospital where i was given electric shock"..."now i am fine again, i will eat, sleep a little and try to find a safer way" he said laughing!!
I was in the jungle sitting around the fire with some Afghans when another young boy walked up. He said something in Pashto and everyone burst out laughing. Someone translated "He just walked 100 kms. Some crazy truck driver told him he would take him to the UK and took him to Belgium instead; so he had to walk back from Belgium". They all cracked up laughing again. The young boy had a packet of biscuit and looked at me; "I am so tired, i am going to sleep. The bastard truck driver must have thought it was funny or something", he said as he waved goodnight!!!
2 Eritrean men i spoke to told me that had walked through Sudan and Libya; got on the ferry to Italy and then proceeded to walk to Calais. They had tried to get to UK 3 times but had gotten caught all 3 times.
Everyone was living outdoors. It was freezing cold and they all huddled by the fire which burnt all day and night. Sleeping in my hotel room at night with the smell of the fire in my hair was a constant reminder of the privilage i had! A warm room!!!
The men were asking me if i knew how to get to the UK. I told them that it was horrible in the UK and maybe they should stay right there in France instead and try to build thier lives slowly but they all said the same thing. "Noone gives us work here in France. Noone wants us here. Atleast in the UK we have a big group of our people; our communities; they help us with work and find a place a live. And none of us speak French."
I met a Palestinian man and an English woman there. They were engaged to be married but since the Palestinian man had no documents, birth certificate, passports etc.. there was no way she could take him to the UK. He had tried 5 times in 2 weeks to get to the UK but got caught all 5 times. As they finished talking to us; they walked away with thier suitcases to try one more time that day. The Palestinian man gave me a packet of tissue as a gift before he walked away!!!! "Our people dont let guests leave without a gift" he said while i was trying to convince him that i didnt need anything!!
I managed to film about 40 mins and take some photos when i thought it was ok..since it was my first time there i couldnt impose with the camera. But the people made me promise that i would come back soon and stay with them in the camp if they were still there. "We have a clean and special tent for you since you are a woman" they told me.
The French government does nothing for the migrants. They had a refugee camp nearby in Sangatte which they closed down about 5 years ago. When the police catch them they just bring them back and let them free in the streets again. There were a total of about 800-1000 refugees in Calais when i was there. All with no clean clothes, no home, no warmth, no money and desparate.
"I know what we do is dangerous,"said a man as he described how he hangs on underneath the trucks for hours,"a lot of people die. But what can we do? We have no choice".

I was there for only 3 days this time. It has been a life changing experience for me. I hope to go back there soon and hopefully record these stories as much as i can.

In Struggle!!

Pooja
PS: More photos at my flickr... CALAIS FLICKR SET!!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kalishakti/sets/72157617963389879/

Fortress Europe

This has been quite a week. Fortress Europe indeed.
Ahmed Issa was deported on the 17th of September. He was the scapegoat for starting the terrible fire at Schiphol Oost detention center 4 years ago now. Ahmed suffered from 2nd degree burns himself and was in a coma, as soon as he came out of his coma he was questioned, detained and isolated by the Dutch state!! He was then in prison for 3 years while his case was going on. Recently at the Palace of Justice (some photos if you follow link) he was given a guilty verdict for having started the fire and sentenced to 18 months (which he had already done) but he wasnt blamed for the death of the people. Ahmed was then arrested that same evening by the immigration police for being illegal and about 10 days later sent back to Libya. A final "shut all mouths" by the Dutch goverment.
A little history for those who dont know:
There was a fire in the immigration detention centre at Schiphol airport near Amsterdam on the night of 26 /27 October 2005, killing 11 people and injuring 15. Approximatly 298 people were locked up in the cell complex. They had done nothing wrong. Thier only crime was to have no valid residence papers. An independent investigation was launched as authorities were accused of failing to follow fire regulations in the prison complex which concluded that the Ministry of Justice was responsible for the failings,which finally lead to the resignation of two ministers.
Despite the investigation the courts decided that a victim of the fire, Ahmed Isa was sentenced to 3 years prison for having thrown a cigarette bud on the ground which apparently was the cause of the fire. According to Ahmed, he smoked a cigarette while he was falling asleep and flicked it off on the floor ( didnt remember if it was out or still burning). He woke up to his feet on fire and ran trying to ring the alarm and get security. They were not there. All systems failed and finally when the guards did manage to get him out of his room they left the door open thus spreading the raging fire throughout the cell. They then proceeded to open the doors from the wrong side of the hall. While people in rooms closer to the fire were suffocating and burning. All the victims then died of Carbon Monoxide poisoning. Locked up in their rooms. With no way out. The fire service arrived after 25 minutes because the fire alarm did not work properly. The staff in the detention center were not trained to deal with a situation like this. The traumatised victims of the fire were then handcuffed and locked up in the infamous prison boat in Rotterdam for more than a month.

Imagine being charged as someone who started a fire that killed 11 people and then deported after almost 4 years of suffering.
And your only crime was that you had tried to escape a bad situation and wanted to make a better life for you and your family.

I have been documenting images and videos of this case for more than a year. About a year and half ago while vising the Schiphol Oost Detention Center for the first time i was recording with my camera when the guards came and tried to take my video and tape away. I hadnt recorded much but just the fact that the people talked to us from the cage was enough for them. Fortunatly i was with a long time activist and journalist who knew our rights and did not allow the police to touch my camera.
Here is the short clip i recorded.

The "jungle" in Calais was cleared out yesterday.
While the media focuses all its attention at Calais, people escaping the brutality of war and poverty elsewhere still have nothing.
This video was made in a deportation center in Lesvos, Greece.
There exist thousands more places like this in modern day Europe.

In Unity.
Pooja