Good to hear about HelpRefugees and to have you here in Greece
@Alex_Levene good to learn about the work of HelpRefugees, I have not come across them so far but will look for more information and will try to contact their team in Greece to see what they are doing. I am very much in favour of refugee self-organisation or projects involving the solidarity movement and refugees in horizontal relationships (althoug I am aware that this is not always easy to achieve) but I can see and understand that some of the more formal orgs are also being organised in a way that allows quite a lof of self-organisation or self-management in practice and are doing a lot of great work on the ground. I have seen this already with some organisations working in the camps around Greece.
It will be great also to have you here in Greece! Please let me know when this happens and I will arrange to meet you with our group in order to share our experiences and other valuable information.
Dear @Noemi thanks for the encouraging words and suggestions! I know about the great work of âRefugeesWorkâ initiative as we collaborate with them through FairCoop on a global level. I am not sure they know about our local call center project in Thessaloniki, but I am glad that this article and your comment gave the opportunity for this âconnectionâ. I hope more people continue to share their inspiring stories in order to keep discovering common paths and shared visions.
because of the involvement of refugees themselves - it is so empowering to be able to do something to improve your life, to have work, to have a life, an income and to be part of a community
because of the âamplificationâ factor - you put a lot of energy in connecting different initiatives and projects and that is what we need to create general and global change
@ybe thanks for your kind words, i agree with what you are saying about these two factors and this is what i tried to highlight in my article! Your traumatour project also seems super interesting and it is very exciting to see that more people are planning to visit Thessaloniki with their projects in the future! I am in contact with people working in alternative health and spiritual health projects here in Greece so I could put you in contact with them, if you are interested.
Your plans sound great, letâs speak again closer to the time that you come and see which groups/places/people you are interested in meeting here related to your project. Your services could be very beneficial to refugees so we can get you in contact with groups working with refugees or the social solidarity clinic of Thessaloniki which is another great initiative working on a community voluntary basis.
This is a fascinating project. Â I have alerted a close friend, an American journalist who has done important radio and print reporting on the refugees in Greece, to come have a look at this topic becfause of this specific project and because of the networking going on in this conversation.
One question: by âsolidarityâ do you mean a formal association or something more loosely arranged through a kind of self-identification?
It is a beautiful way of reaching out to the world and letting people know how , living in a confined environment(camps) can be challenging.If we are  our brothers and sisters keepers, then we will make out time from our very busy schedule to donate and help millions in those camps. He cared enough to share this story, so please yâall, return the favor by giving whch will go a long way of changing a life. " sharing is caring", Giving is transforming and investing in other peoples lives.The best investment, is in the life of another human being. Thanks for sharing
Hey @johncoate and @Gentlewest, I just saw these last messages of yours and I am sorry I havenât replied earlier. @johncoate Solidarity can arise in many ways and forms, and both formal associations and informal collectives have offered amazing solidarity solutions in many ways. For me what matters is not formality or non-formality, but  the level of participation and the style of governance. In our case, the R2R call center is an informal collective, supported by the open global cooperative ecosystem of FairCoop on the global level, which is also a self-organised project with a global community involved. @Gentlewest thank you for the nice words, I couldnât agree more.
I would like to have some more contacts in Thessaloniki; I still have room in my agenda (december) to help a couple of organisations
f.ex with trauma info sessions for the helpers (basic trauma information, interventions and exercises) or by helping develop on ongoing 'how-to-cope-with-trauma-practice, orâŚ
@christinsa I enjoyed reading your article. FB suggested this competition when I shared it. http://innovateforrefugees.mitefarab.org/en/site/index
I thought maybe volunteers and refugees can work on developing solutions for problems they are facing together, and participate with a chance to win.