CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS – Lebanon 2017

volunteer lebanon

Project Amal ou Salam’s next workshops will be in Lebanon26-31 August.

We’ve become a lot more than just a programme. I think we’ve become a movement of people who share the same beliefs and share the same ideology. You’re always thinking what can I offer to Syria? I think Project Amal ou Salam is giving people a way to take their own expertise and give that to the kids. Which is so refreshing and rewarding.

(Nousha Kabawat, founder&director)

If you want to join our movement and work with our team and with the Children of Syria, apply by sending an email to projectamalousalam@gmail.com with your CV and a motivation letter. Make sure you tell us:

  • how you heard about us
  • why you want to volunteer with us
  • what you think you can bring to Project Amal ou Salam and our children

Deadline’s 15 July.

Twice a year, around 30 international volunteers gather from all over the world to join Project Amal ou Salam and the Children of Syria in working for peace.

We organise five volunteer-run workshops for kids aged 5 to 14: arts, music, photography, sports and health. Click here to learn more about our workshops.

Keep spreading the love! ♥

Guest post by volunteer Sana Amin

volunteering Project Amal ou Salam

I have not been able to stop thinking of the kids in the camp since I woke up this morning.

I have not been able to stop thinking about those special moments of impact.

The moment when the quiet introverted kid who hasn’t spoken a word all day is finally screaming with laughter and partaking in the activities with his friends.

The moment when the kid who has been sulking finally breaks into a smile.

The moment when the cheeky trouble-maker of the class is helping us clean up the garbage off the classroom floor.

The moment the girls finally agree to play with boys because in spite of it all, in the end, they are still only kids.

The moment one of the kids puts themselves in my arms and lifts up a bleeding finger or a bruised elbow asking me to fix it with a bandage and a kiss.

The moment one of the older kids is standing alone shyly at the edge of my classroom door waiting for me to be alone so she can tell me her coming-of-age problems.

The moment one of the kids leaves their group just to run over and give me a kiss.

The moment just before the goodbye when I see one of the kids looking around and I just somehow know they’re looking for me.

People always ask realistically what can be accomplished in just a week. It does not take a week to turn a life around. Or even a day. It takes one moment. That one moment of impact. One moment to change a life – ours and theirs.

And the moment I watch the volunteers pack up and get on the bus, dance on the bus ride back to the city.

I’m rather quiet on the bus ride back. I’m not the most memorable volunteer. Not the one who tells jokes or laughs or dances or is the life of the party.

I say it’s because I’m tired but it’s not. I’m just too overwhelmed with emotion; too grateful to be there with them; too thankful to them for being the people they are; too shy to say I love you.

I love you guys. I do…

Project Amal ou salam, the family we choose

Guest post by volunteer Alice Peck

Alice Peck

I’m sitting on a leafy balcony in the Rmeil area of Beirut, Lebanon. It is dusk and, apart from my flight here last night, this is the first time I have had alone since I landed in Amman just over one week ago – a time period that seems too short to contain all of the experiences, encounters, interactions, emotions that have just passed. There is a lot to say about Project Amal ou Salam, the resilience and hope of the Syrian children I met, the inspiring volunteers with whom I feel so honoured to have worked alongside, the work we did

I’m thinking about the final day of the workshops. It’s Wednesday, and we arrive mostly on time to a school in Irbid, northern Jordan, comprised of Syrian, Palestinian, and even Iraqi children who are refugees in the country. I’m a team leader with the Yellow Team along with two other volunteers, one of whom is an Arabic-speaker. Our role is to guide and support a group of 30 or so children, aged 7-8, through the day’s schedule of breakfast, Photography, Sports, Health, lunch, Art, Music, and the farewell assembly to conclude the day. Amal ou Salam workshops begin similarly at each school; Sousou, the ever energetic volunteer, clowns around entertaining while we assemble the children by age group on the playground, give out brightly coloured hats to assign teams, and gather each group around packed breakfast bags – made by volunteer Bashar and containing zaatar and cheese manoush, an apple and milk. Today is no different and yet, as we hand out breakfast, a little boy, Mohammed, tugs at my hand and mumbles something. Speaking frustratingly little Arabic, I take Mohammed’s hand and we walk over to Aya, another yellow team leader, who listens to Mohammed and translates that he doesn’t want breakfast, that his stomach hurts. A teacher joins us and explains that each day Mohammed experiences these digestive problems, complains of a stomach-ache and refuses to eat. The teacher implied that the trauma of leaving Syria as well as ongoing conflict at home have become physically manifested in Mohammed’s digestion system.

Mohammed’s complaints do not abate and, in the first workshop session of photography, his discomfort is clear as he bends forward, clutching his stomach. Despite our gentle encouragement, he does not participate in taking photographs, nor in face painting and, as we lead the children out for sports, he sits at the side, watching. I walk over to him and he takes my outstretched hand, walking with me to join the group, who are holding hands in a large circle on the playground. I look down at Mohammed and smile. He smiles back, giggles, before quickly dropping my hand and running off, laughing. I chase him, running around other kids, before I catch him and sweep him up into my arms, the two of us laughing. We join the large circle again and this time Mohammed stays put, holding my hand, smiling up at me. Throughout Sports Mohammed is engaged and involved – dancing alongside the others to music, impersonating an elephant’s lolloping trunk, roaring like a tiger, pulling hard at the tug-o-rope. His energy and participation continues throughout the day; in Art, he makes a beautiful and impressive roof in the “rebuild your town” activity, he loudly sings the Amal ou Salam song in Music and, at lunch, he eats his entire sandwich! Every time I glance over to check on Mohammed, my smile is returned by the biggest of his.

To see the transformation in Mohammed from the reluctant, pained, distant child of the morning to the smiling, energised, happy boy who fully participated in activities and meals was a powerful moment for me. It was a moment of appreciation for the work that Project Amal ou Salam does, and a visible realisation of the critical importance and value of play and love in response to the trauma of war, violence, and displacement – trauma which no child should ever be forced to encounter.

The day of workshops concludes – the children gather for a final rendition of our songs, the giving out of backpacks full of presents, and a farewell. Countless hugs are exchanged and after heartfelt goodbyes, the volunteers pile onto the bus for the 2+ hour ride back to Amman. In between singing and dancing on the “party bus,” I think about Mohammed and reflect on trauma and the multiple physical and emotional ways in which it can be experienced. I can’t begin to imagine what Mohammed has witnessed in fleeing Syria, and I don’t know how this might affect his life in the long term. Today, however, I both observed and felt a part of the tangible impact that Project Amal ou Salam has. Despite considerable volunteering in the past, as well as working in social justice, this feeling is new.

Reflecting on my week with PAouS in Jordan, it feels remarkable to assert, quite confidently, that the work we did makes a difference – a clichéd phrase that, of course, is subjective, varied, and difficult to measure. Yet the energy and passion that stems from the volunteers – who travelled from every corner of the world to be there: from Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Dubai, Egypt, Switzerland, USA, UK, Italy, Belgium, Bangladesh, and Canada – is a force of love and playfulness that fills every minute of each day’s workshops. We spend each day playing with the children of Syriahopeful, resilient, energetic, beautiful children – giving all our energy, attention, hope, and empathy to make each child feel loved and empowered to envision a future of hope and peace for themselves and for Syria.

The connection I feel to Amal ou Salam – the children, the vision, the volunteers – is profound and guarantees that I will return.