It’s Sunday and we are relaxing at our apartment. Bethany is watching a movie with Ashley and me, Ian, and Payden are hanging out and looking up future ministry sites in Thailand. I’m going back to work at the camp tomorrow for the first time in a couple of days. Bethany has been really sick with a stomach bug this weekend and I have been staying back and helping take care of her. As weird as this sounds I’m kinda nervous about working at the camp again and here is why….
Last week I had the opportunity to work in a unique place in the camp. This magical place is called “clothing”. Every so often the organization we are working with tries to hand out free clothes to the refugees. They setup two big storage containers and build racks of clothing inside for them to look through. It’s a pretty simple system, you walk in and pick out one shirt, one jacket, one sweater, one pair of pants, one pair of underwear, and one pair of socks. Then you hand me your ticket and I mark off what you picked out and then bag your clothes and thank you for shopping with us. The ticket will be handed off to someone with a computer who will look up the refugees file and notate what clothes they picked out. This helps keep track of what they have in case they try to say they didn’t have a coat or pants later on. Everything our organization gives out is documented. This includes blankets, clothes, sleeping mats, etc. Resources are at a premium in the camp, so they can’t have anyone taking more resources than everyone else.
I have written blogs in the past about the hearts of the refugees and how big they are and doing something like handing out free clothes and returning the generosity to these people should inspire a blog about love and celebration, well this is not that blog. When I use the word “unique”, what I mean is that clothing is literally a world within another world. The camp and it’s 40+ nationalities is already an extremely unique place, but the shift in environment that is in those clothing containers is one like I have never experienced before. “Big problem! No good!”, “My friend, too big! No good.”, “No sizes, no good. Big problem.”, “You problem!”, and the complaints go on and on. Some people literally walk in complaining about the clothes before they even look at them. On top of all of that there’s the one item limit on each item.
The items are portioned out individually so there’s only enough for every person to have one. If someone took two shirts and not a sweater, that wouldn’t work because then someone doesn’t have a chance to get a shirt. This however doesn’t stop the refugees from trying to bargain with you and it doesn’t matter how well you explain it, it’s still not good enough for them. Once they realize you’re not going to budge they resort to other means of getting extra items. In the two days last week that I worked in clothing I stopped more “shoplifters” than in my almost three years of retail experience combined. This is a unique place that is filled with disappointment and desperation.
Those emotions are what fill the aggression in the refugees to points of confrontation. They actually have not done clothing in a while and when I asked why they don’t shut it down until people start appreciating the free clothes I was told the story of why they shut it down before. The other volunteer pointed out the fresh paint in the container and then told me to look closer at the brown spots that were still visible. “Those are burn spots.”, she says. Last time they did clothing they burned the containers. It’s hard to believe and take in after all the acts of kindness I have experienced, but it’s real and it got personal with me one morning.
It’s not uncommon for people to come up behind me at the back of the container trying to come in. Most of the time it’s just confused refugees who don’t know where to go, people trying to sneak into the other container to see if there’s a better selection (that’s not allowed by the way), or people trying to come back and exchange clothes they’ve picked out (also not allowed). Well one day I had three men walk up behind me, so I turned and told them they would have to walk around. They responded by saying they were given permission to come in, so I again said that they would have to go around and check in first. A translator then stepped in and responded by saying that they in fact did have permission to enter the container, but procedure is strict here so I again informed them they would need to go around and check in. The man closest to me then proceeds to take both hands and shove me backwards into a clothing rack that’s bolted to the side of the container. I bounced off of it back into him and wrapped my arm around his waist and pushed him back out of the container. I may be skinny, but I know how to bounce back from a hit. He then proceeds smacking me in the arm and shoulder has hard as he could and if the translator hadn’t stepped in I’m sure my face was next. At that moment one of the long term workers stepped in and firmly told them they needed to go around to the front before entering the container. I looked at the translator and said, “Thats what I was trying to tell them.” He nodded and apologized and lead them away.
Just to give you a better understanding of how things work at the camp in regards to police protection, when I first stuck my head out of the container to talk to the guys there was a cop standing no more than 12 feet away from us. When I stuck my head back out as they were walking away he was nowhere to be found. I was talking to our squad leader Davante later who was working in the container next to me and he told me that he turned around when he heard the commotion and then looked at the cop who was watching the pushing and the cop turned around and walked away so he wouldn’t have to deal with it. It’s sad, but just a realty of the camp.
But my nervousness isn’t from being shoved around and worried about my safety. I’ve actually already brushed that off. My nervousness is from having to be a bad guy who’s had to enforce restrictions on people who are already restricted in their lives. What made it harder was that I had spent three days before this working with the specific level that was scheduled to come in on my first day working there. Having to argue and deny people an extra pair of underwear that I had become friends with just a few days before was hard and all I was worried about then and still now is “What do they think of me?” I wonder if they understand that I only had a job to do or do they think I’m two faced? Will they still respect me at the gates when I’m asked to work them? I guess tomorrow I’ll find out.
