'Tis the Season

Celebrating my birthday in Germany back in
simpler times. You can just make out the
gingerbread house and part of the
Christmas tree in the background.

Yesterday it snowed. And as I watched a steady stream of fluffy flakes land on our windows, it confirmed that this is my favorite time of the year. 

The fact that my birthday is on December 24 is certainly part of it; it’s like the whole month of December is my personal winter party.

The bulk of my love for this time of year, however, is Christmas. It turns the world into a magical place where many of us are on our best behavior, with the most generous of intentions.

When we moved to Germany in 2015, the holidays reached a different level of importance. Wave after wave of refugees poured through Hamburg, with only the bags in their hands and the clothes on their backs.

The Hauptbahnhof was bustling with new arrivals and volunteers bearing winter gear, food, and water. It was heartening to see, but heartbreaking to think how many of these people had been torn away from families and friends, and would never see home again.

Two years later, I’m entering the holiday season in a different city. The “refugee crisis” seems to be all-but-declared over. 

Except it isn’t.

A few months ago, I began looking for volunteer opportunities to help the thousands of refugees trying to start over here in Munich. That’s when I came across the Intereuropean Human Aid Association (IHA) website, and learned that not only have people been streaming into the Mediterranean in 2015-level numbers over the past few months, the closure of many countries’ borders means these refugees have no place to go.

It seemed unthinkable that tens of thousands of people were being abandoned in the public consciousness because their plight was deemed “old news.” So, I responded to IHA’s request for volunteers. Two meetings and one strategic communications plan later, I’m proud to be part of the team.

Photo of a camp in Greece in February 2017.
This summer and fall, more than 200 additional refugees
were arriving at Greek camps every day.

To put it simply, IHA provides rapid response to refugee needs. When they began two years ago, that meant mobilizing supplies and transport of those supplies to refugees in camps around Greece and several other countries.

Today, women, children, and families have been surviving in what were supposed to be temporary camps. This makeshift housing is now overcrowded, off the grid, and out of sight of the government officials who need to decide the fate of the people within.

That means IHA—a grassroots organization with only one administrative lead, a couple of field coordinators, and a volunteer team of board members and camp volunteers—is also now providing ongoing onsite help for these poor souls left in limbo.

I don’t want this post to go all “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”, but I did want to balance the frivolity of my upcoming Christmas posts with the reality of what this winter will be for tens of thousands of people.

This is the season of giving—to our family, to our friends, and to strangers who are in need. I wish our awareness and empathy could be this universal year-round, but I take comfort in the fact that there are people out there who consistently look beyond politics and fear-mongering to find ways to help their fellow human beings.

And I’m looking forward to helping them get the word out, and make a positive difference.