Discovering the wall

On Tuesday 25,  I visited the school La Sainte Union to continue with the 'Human Rights Lunch Club'

I prepared some questions about 'the separation wall' and some CADFA leaflets to show. The aim of  the session was to discover the history and the reasons about why they built the wall.
The students opened their computers and they started to search for some answers and at the same time we talked about the things that they were funding.

It was interesting to hear them talking about their feelings that the wall produced, because it is good not to  forget what is happening in Palestine. Some people expressed fear, or pain, horror, etc. and everybody  condemned the illegal construction.

At the next lunch club we will finish the questionnaire and continue enjoying and learning about Human Rights and Palestine.  I want to say 'thank you very much' to the students and I hope we will have a very interesting time together!

Emilio  Sanchez. 

1.Where is the wall? It is in the West Bank along the armistice line, also known as 'the green line' and also in Gaza.
2.When did they start to do it? The Palestine's wall began construction in 2002.
3.Who is building the Wall?
4.What do the Israelis say about the reason for building it?
5.And what do you think?
6.How long is the wall? When completed, the wall will be 700km long.
7.How high is the wall?  The wall is 8m high.
8.What's the reason for it being double the length?
9.What Human Rights have they broken?
10.What is the international community saying about it?

Stories from Abu Dis Girls

Hi from Palestine!

Isobel and I are the current EVS volunteers who are working in Abu Dis Girls school to build the twinning links with Camden and to help the girls improve their spoken English.
It has been a bit of a slow start to due to holidays, strikes and exams, but we are finally really enjoying getting to know our group of girls.
We have 13 girls from Grade 9 who have opted to join the 'English Club'. Their language ability varies but they are all very keen to learn.
Our first session was an introductory class, playing games with English words - to have fun and to establish their level - and asking them questions about what they would like to do in our sessions together. They are particularly interested in talking about the Palestinian situation and hearing from students in the UK. They also had lots of questions for us!

We have decided as a group to explore the different ways in which we can tell stories. We had a lesson talking about films. The girls learned about characters, settings, genres and plots and discussed Palestinian and English films. In another lesson we imagined that we were filmmakers. The girls thought up stories set in Palestine and learned words such as occupation, separation wall, army, demonstrations and prisons. We helped them create storyboards as if planning to make their films. Here are some photos of their sketches. Many have taken them home to carry on working on them.

One story was about a girl called Francisco who thought she was in love. She was very sad because everyday she went to school, longing for Mohammad to love her, but he did not. One day, 'A Happy and New Day', the girl went to school to discover Ahmed truly loved her and she realised that it was him she had loved all along. They walked home together, hand in hand. But on their way, they were both shot dead by the Israeli army. Ahmed and Francisco died happy.

 

A story of a married couple where the husband, Ahmed, is imprisoned. His Wife then takes revenge by killing an Israeli leader, but when Ahmed is finally released, he is shot dead.

 

The class.

 Damage to the classroom by the Israeli army.

Our next class is going to be about stories via the spoken word.The girls are bringing in something from home that is special to them. They will present about this to the class. We will send over some of their stories!

The girls look forward to hear stories from Camden!

School links

Youth links are really important because students are the future.

So CADFA works in a lot of schools. LSU, William Eills Parliament Hill Camden School for Girls, Regent High School, Haverstock, Hampstead, Acland Burghley. These schools are Twinned (a special kind of link) with schools in Abu Dis, Palestine. They have set up blogs so that they can communicate with each other. We are really excited to go into the schools. 
We are EVS (European Voluntary Service) volunteers from Spain and Germany. EVS volunteers from Palestine and volunteers who have been to Palestine go into schools too. CADFA organises visits to London for school students and teachers from Abu Dis. When they are here they go into schools as well and do lots of activities with the students here. 

We have been enjoying getting to know Camden. Camden is a vibrant and multicultual place. One of it’s highlights is Camden Market where you can buy almost anything! Here you will find a statue of the famous signer Amy Winehouse. The house where she lived is just down the road from the CADFA office in Kentish Town, another part of Camden. If you want to bump into celebrities  then  the place to go is definitely Primrose Hill, a quieter area near Regent’s Park. Famous people also lived here in the past. Charles Dickens wrote his book Oliver Twist in his house in Camden, which is now a museum. Camden also has lots of drama schools and theatres. Camden isn’t just full of people- London Zoo is also here.

Yesterday we went to Parliament Hill. When we looked one way we could see the whole of London, when we looked the other way it felt like we were in the middle of the countryside! The area around there is lovely and Emilio is definitely making plans to live there at some point in his life!