Gilles calls for a whirlwind tour of Rome Projects

First stop was to visit the location for the new 'Friendship Center' which is still on the drawing board.  The Episcopal Church runs a daytime center where the refugees are welcome from 8:30am to 2:30 where they offer guitar, sewing, language classes, movies, a 'job board' and other services.  LDS Charities has the idea of extending these services for the refugees, and managed by a missionary couple from 2:30 to 5:30pm every week-day.  

Annika is showing us the 'job board'....There is a growing phenomenon where the refugees contact potential employees through an agency.  Once they sign on the dotted line, they are basically enslaved, sometimes not paid for their work.  If they try to quit they are threatened and told they will never find work in Italy again... She only puts up employment opportunities where they contact the employer directly and with whom she knows are trustworthy.

The next stop was with Casa Scalabrini.  This meeting was for Gilles to meet the director.  Gioccino is a professor of theology and runs this camp in his 'spare' time.  We have already done one project with this partner and there are two more on the drawing board.

The camp is housed in an old villa.  It's in great need of renovation and improvement.  Casa Scalabrini takes people who are semi-autonomous and teaches them how to become fully autonomous.   The residents buy their own food and cook and clean for themselves.  The camp requires them to pay rent:  50euros/month.  The idea is to teach them that bills come regularly and must be paid!

This artist lives at the Villa.  He is a talented sculptor.  His clay sculptures are amazing.  He is from Nigeria, came over on a boat from Libya and landed at Lampedusa.  I'm sure there is much to his story, but with his talent he is able to capture the feelings and emotions that he experienced.

In the front courtyard of the old Villa.

We then took public transportation to our next meeting which was with INTERSOS.  Here we are at the Intersos Center with the Director of Migration, Cesare Fermi as well as Luka (who drove the van as well as cooks and does many other jobs!)

With INTERSOS we went in their van to pick up the vulnerable residents at Baobab and there was the trusty MEDU van, doing their great work.  Here is Gilles and Tom with the Medu cultural mediator.

We continue to support MEDU for the 2018 year, in their medical van, their psych center in Rome, and their operations in Sicily.

Inside the Baobab camp we had a nice discussion with Roberto and Rosaria about their camp.  We met of course inside the tent that LDS Charities donated!

I love how the humanitarian services network.  When vulnerable people show up at the Baobab camp, they call INTERSOS who drives the van to pick them up and take them to the center where they get a shower and a bed as well as dinner and breakfast.  This particular evening we picked up 3 women aged 19 to 22 and one baby.  These women came from Eritrea via Libya, the boat to Sicily and were in transit through Rome.

After our pick-up at the Baobab camp, we arrived back at the Intersos camp.  These boys were a bit reluctant to take a photo, but the Intersos team convinced them it was okay.

Two of the girls from Eritrea and their baby girl.  I can't even begin to imagine what they have just been through and what is ahead for them.

A nice rice dinner was provided and we were invited to join them.  The food is donated, but the Intersos team has to do the cooking!  Intersos provides a safe place for vulnerable people to have a meal, a shower, a bed.  They never know how many will show up each night.  Just depends.  One night there were 18 young men!   Everyone that stays here is just passing through on their way north, so in most cases they are here for only a couple of days at the most.  Even while at the Baobab camp, we thought more were coming with us but they informed us they were going on the bus to Ventimiglia that very night.