By Ljiljana Vasic | Director
Sofia is a four-year old girl from Syria. She reached the refugee Camp in Bujanovac with her 2-year old brother and Grandma four months ago. And she is one of 44 children who have arrived to this Camp over the last six months.
As she has been watching older children go to school (“big school”) and some of her peers going to preschool (“small school”) every day, Sofia has been asking our Psycho-Social Support Officer when she would be “good enough” to start going to the “Small school” almost every day. From July 1st, her biggest wish has come true – she started going to a preschool group with other young children from the Camp.
Sofia is just one of the many refugees from Syria and other Middle East countries, who have been entering Serbia in groups every day since March, in a rather bad shape – some with lice, some in a rather disturbed mental state, and some obviously having no money or any other resources. There have been also many children coming alone or with elderly relatives. Most of them have families already somewhere in EU and are trying to reach them somehow.
Sofia is no different – when she and her brother arrived with their Grandmother, they were all in a rather bad shape – her brother was having pneumonia, her Grandma was exhausted and seriously underweight, whilst all three of them were covered with lice. Sofia wanted to join other children in every single activity in the Camp, but had to be isolated till the doctors gave “all clear” report. Our Psycho-Social Support Officer was trying to help them by taking some clothes to them, toys and paint-books in her regular visits, but Sofia was feeling very lonely and constantly asked why she couldn’t join other children, why she was not good enough when she was always obeying her Grandma and our Officer.
The only psycho-social support available to Sofia and other children at the Camp is provided through your donations! Please, help us continue this assistance, so much needed by all the children coming to the Camp, staying for prolonged time whilst waiting to be allowed to go elsewhere and feeling all the anxiety of their families without understanding it.
In just two weeks (on July the 18th), GlobalGiving Foundation is organising a July Bonus Day when donations starting at $100 and up to $1,000 will be matched while $250,000 in matching funds remain. The higher the donation, the higher the match! Please, consider donating and helping us continue with the provision of psycho-social support for these children!
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
