{"id":1205,"date":"2013-11-16T14:01:57","date_gmt":"2013-11-16T14:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/?p=1205"},"modified":"2024-04-19T19:24:14","modified_gmt":"2024-04-19T19:24:14","slug":"lambert-a-person-and-a-place-migrants-near-oujda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/?p=1205","title":{"rendered":"Lambert: a person and a place (migrants near Oujda)"},"content":{"rendered":"

You may have heard enough about migrants already, but we haven\u2019t even scratched the surface.\u00a0 After leaving Empire camp, we drive to another camp in the Oujda forest.\u00a0 As we get out of the trucks and load up with packages of blankets, people come running down the hill to help us.\u00a0 They stop to shake our hands.\u00a0 One young woman named Helen puts her arms around her body and shakes herself, smiling, to demonstrate: \u201cWe are dying from the cold!\u201d\u00a0 We carry the blankets to the edge of the camp, only to find the only people gathering are those who have helped us carry the blankets.\u00a0 Everyone else is out finding food for the community.
\n\"P1000535\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Lambert is the spokesperson for this community: the camp is named Lambert, after him.\u00a0 He has been in the forest for 13 years.\u00a0 When Karen asks, \u201cIs it ok if we pray with you?\u201d Lambert responds, \u201cPrayer is the most important thing.\u00a0 God comes first.\u201d\u00a0 The mood seems very different here, and I wonder whether the difference comes from Lambert\u2019s guidance, or simply the fact that the camp is largely empty, so the scurrying to acquire goods is also absent.\u00a0 Still, Helen is quick to say, \u201cWe need food and nylon.\u201d (Nylon is for the tent coverings.)\u00a0 Food will be coming next week, H\u00e9ry promises.
\n\"P1000534\"
\n<\/a>Karen asks the people of this camp to tell us their stories.\u00a0 Helen (in tan) shrugs: \u201cYou know our story; we told you last time.\u00a0 It\u2019s the same story.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I want these people to hear your story, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou tell them,\u201d says Helen.<\/p>\n

\u201cOK,” Karen says, \u201clet me ask you questions.\u00a0 How long have you been here?\u201d\u00a0 The answers trickle in: 1 year.\u00a0 2 years. \u00a08 months.\u00a0 4 months.<\/p>\n

Did you come up through Niger? Yes, everyone comes that way.<\/p>\n

Did everyone on your trip survive the desert?\u00a0 Yes, on our trip, everyone survived.\u00a0 But sometimes not everyone makes it and that is how it is.<\/p>\n

Did you come through Maghnia in Algeria? Yes.<\/p>\n

How did you come from Maghnia to here? We walked, says Lambert.\u00a0 \u201cWe trekked<\/i>,\u201d Helen specifies.\u00a0 \u201cA 3-4 hour trek.\u201d<\/p>\n

Are there any children here?\u00a0 Not now, but they are coming.\u00a0 Eight are coming.\u00a0 Everyone laughs; one young woman ducks over to stand by another as someone bats her on the stomach.\u00a0 Some of the babies who are coming do not show yet, but there are eight coming.
\n\"P1000532\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHave you heard there are new policies?\u201d Karen asks.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, we have heard,\u201d Lambert says.\u00a0 \u201cNow we are just waiting to see if they are true.\u201d<\/p>\n

Karen asks all the pregnant women if they will have their babies at the hospital.\u00a0 \u201cIt is very important \u2026\u00a0 You know there is no problem now with the hospital?\u201d<\/p>\n

Lambert talks about the difficulty migrants have getting medicine and medical treatment.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Doctors without Borders were here, they gave us medicine for free.\u00a0 Since they left, it is much harder.\u00a0 Some people attacked me and cut my hand and I went to the hospital to get a prescription and they gave me a prescription and then I had to go and get the medicine and it cost 50 Euros, 500 dirhams, and I had to get this medicine 4 times, and I am living here, there is no way to earn this money.\u201d
\n\"P1000531\"<\/a>
\nThe city of Oujda in the distance. (As Moroccans say of Spain: So near, so far, so impossible.)
\nJames has been talking to a man who made it all the way to Spain in 2006.\u00a0 He lived there for two years before he was caught one morning, crossing the street to buy cigarettes.\u00a0 They sent him back\u2014back to Morocco? or Algeria? or all the way back to his home country?\u2014and now he is trying to cross the border again.\u00a0 He has been in this camp for eight months, waiting for his chance to cross.<\/p>\n

Another man comes to talk to us down by the cars.\u00a0 \u201cI want to go back to my country.\u00a0 This is no way to live.\u00a0 My body is sound, my mind is sound, but there is no work.\u00a0 I go out at 5 a.m. to beg, and this is all I have received.\u201d\u00a0 He pulls a plastic yogurt drink out of one pocket and scrap of bread out of another.\u00a0 \u201cIt shames me, this life.\u00a0 I want to go back to my country and begin my life anew.\u201d\u00a0 He waves to us as we turn to get in the cars.<\/p>\n

Suddenly a voice is calling, \u201cJeremy, Jeremy,\u201d and then another man, wearing a red shirt and a black hat, comes running up to give Jem a farewell hug, his face alight with affection.\u00a0 This is so mysterious to me\u2014that this man, in the midst of his struggles, has affection to spare; that Jeremy seems to evoke that affection in so many people here; that he can accept a hug and return it so easily.\u00a0 A multifaceted gift, that hug, in the midst of such hardship.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You may have heard enough about migrants already, but we haven\u2019t even scratched the surface.\u00a0 After leaving Empire camp, we drive to another camp in the Oujda forest.\u00a0 As we get out of the trucks and load up with packages of blankets, people come running down the hill to help us.\u00a0 They stop to shake … Continue reading Lambert: a person and a place (migrants near Oujda)<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[8,3],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4JDdJ-jr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1205"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2871,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205\/revisions\/2871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}