Simple Acts

I spent the afternoon soaking up the sunshine at the Celebrating Sanctuary Fun Day in Queens Square. There were stalls and workshops and food and drink and some amazing music. We arrived to hear some Ghanaian drummers, followed by Polish and then Ethiopian dancers and finally a Middle Eastern band.

The fun day was one of a number of events to mark National Refugee Week, which started on Friday 12 June and runs until Monday 22 June. For those of you living in Bristol see here for details of all that's on offer. One thing that caught my eye was the Simple Acts campaign, which invites us to 'do something small to make life better for refugees and everyone else around you'. The list runs as follows:

Cook a dish from another country
Tell a child a story from another country
Watch a movie about refugees
Do a quiz on refugees
Say a little prayer for me
Read a book about exile
Sign off your emial with a note about refugees
Find five facts about refugees
Find out who you REALLY are
Visit a Refugee Week event
Smile :O)
Learn to say a few things in a new language
Have tea with a refugee
Share a song
Join a big action campaign in support of refugees
Share your sweets
Give a book about refugees as a present to someone
Define the word 'Refuge'
Take a picture of you and your pro-refugee banner
Play football with a refugee

The website states that if everyone does at least one of these acts then we can make a big difference to the way refugees are perceived in the UK.

Which simple act will you do this week?

When I was Hungry ...

On Thursday evening my elder daughter took part in a performance of At the Border, an oratorio composed as a sequel to Tippett's A Child of our Time, which she had performed at Easter.

The oratorio was composed by Richard Barnard and written by Peter Spafford, in collaboration with students from my daughter's school. It is, according to the programme, a piece about the effects of ethnic hatred and violence whose aim is to help the students, and the audience, to a better understanding of the plight of those who are forced to flee their homes as a result of war, political oppression or religious persecution.

I was moved by the performance which skillfully combined what I imagine to be the traditional oratorio form with children's songs, an electro-acoustic piece using sound recordings taken at Temple Meads station, a traditional English ballad and a Zimbabwean chorus. The script dealt sympathetically yet honestly with the reasons that force refugees to leave their homes and the reception they receive in the communities in which they seek refuge.

Back in my country, men with guns.

Here in my country, men with forms.

To flee with your life from a land of pain

To lose your life in a land of pain.

In no man's land I become no one,

Future barred as my past fades.

It made for uncomfortable listening but, here atleast, the tide turns when a refugee is offered a token of acceptance, a cauliflower from an allotment!

I can never grasp your way of life.

Yet it clings to my skin changing what is within.

Once there were two countries,

The one in my heart, the one where I live.

Now there are two countries in my heart.

We shall find peace.

We shall see the sky sparkling with diamonds.

I always enjoy listening to my daughters perform, even if they are 'only' one musician in an orchestra. I played the piano at school which, compared to the violin and viola my girls play, is generally a solitary instrument, and I have always envied them the experience of being part of a larger sound.

PS For Steve Broadway's account of the same performance see at the border.

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4 October 2007