LHI Looks Back on 2023

by Brigid Rowlings, LHI Communications Director

LHI’s COO Walker, Director of Monitoring and Evaluation Jaron, and Founder and Director Hayley distributed aid to survivors of the earthquakes that devastated Turkey and Syria in February.

Looking back over the past year, we cannot believe all you have helped us to do! Here are the highlights!

The LHI Community Center in Serres, Greece

LHI’s Director of Monitoring and Evaluation Jaron and founder of our Utah programs Carlissa lent some elbow grease to improvement projects at the LHI Community Center in Serres.

It was a year of continued growth and innovation at the LHI Community Center, which is located near two refugee camps in Serres, Greece. The LHI Greece team was thrilled to receive new computers for the education program and new shelving for the community center’s aid warehouse. After talking with the women who attend programs at the Female Friendly Space, the team also adjusted the way we distribute clothing, school supplies, baby items and other aid. Instead of handing out parcels, the team instead created “free shops” where beneficiaries can select their own items. This small change not only provides people with a sense of dignity, but also brings a lot of excitement and joy.

The LHI Greece team set up a free shop where parents could shop for baby items including these handmade teddy bears.

utah programs

LHI team members and volunteers loaded this container of aid for Jordan in October.

Our Utah team prepared and shipped 18 containers of material aid to places like Bangladesh, where thousands of Rohingya refugees living in a large refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar were impacted by a fire in March, Afghanistan, where 6.6 million people have been internally displaced by conflict and natural disasters, and Gaza, where over 80% of the population has been displaced. The team also sent 7 shipments to the US/Mexico border to help shelters there provide warm clothing, hygiene products, and baby kits to migrants.

The US Office for Refugee Resettlement provides local resettlement agencies with a list of items that must be in apartments of resettled refugees. If the items aren't donated, they must be purchased from the family's small stipend. LHI's Utah team relies on donations from you to keep our warehouse stocked so that we can provide all the items resettled refugees need!

The Welcome Program has grown so much that we had to expand our warehouse! So far this year, LHI volunteers have set up 285 apartments for refugees resettling in Utah. And, in addition to our long-standing partnerships with the International Rescue Committee and Catholic Community Services, LHI is now working with Cache Refugee and Immigrant Connection to make sure that resettled refugees in Logan, Utah come home to an apartment furnished with everything they need.

ukraine

The battery powered incubators you helped us provide put to good use at Bashtanka Hospital in Mykolaiv, Ukraine.

Last year, we asked you to help us get Ukrainians through a cold and uncertain winter and you responded! We were able to provide generators, battery powered infant incubators, sleeping bags and long underwear throughout Ukraine. Our teams in Ukraine have also been able to get consistent material, medical and psychological aid to frontline communities all year long.

LHI's Ukraine country director Serhii (center) organized LHI's response to the dam collapse, including finding this truck which pumped thousands of tons of water out of homes and businesses.

When the Kakhovka Dam in Kherson province ruptured in June, our teams responded not only by helping those displaced from their homes, but also by pumping thousands of tons of water out of homes and businesses. 

Moldova

Participants in the Story Time Project performed some of the Ukranian folk tales they had read for family and friends!

Looking back on all the work our Moldova team has done with Ukrainian refugees, it is hard to believe that our community center in Balti and our Storytime Project are not even a year old! Both programs provide social emotional support activities for participants and keep Ukrainian language and culture alive.

Children at the LHI Community Center in Balti participate in a yoga class, part of the social emotional supports offered to Ukrainian refugees.

jordan

LHI Founder and Director Hayley Smith toured one of the modular classrooms LHI was able to build for Syrian refugee children in Jordan.

In Jordan, it’s all about kids and kids! The first set of kids are the Syrian refugee children who have benefitted from the 3 modular classrooms we built this year. Because Jordanian schools are already at capacity, building classrooms means that Syrian children can attend school. 

This family turned the 2 milk goats they received from LHI into a herd of 25 in just 2 years!

The second set of kids are the 1,200 Shami milk goats we have distributed to Syrian refugee families. The families who benefited had been goat herders in Syria, but had to leave their herds behind when they fled civil war. Having milk goats allows these families to improve their family’s nutrition and move towards self-sufficiency as they sell milk and grow their herd. One family we visited this year had turned the two milk goats they received two years ago into 25! The income they earned from goat milk and goat products allowed them to leave the refugee camp and rent a home. 

emergency response

LHI's COO Walker distributed aid to an earthquake survivor in Turkey.

LHI specializes in responding to emergency situations quickly, talking to the people impacted, and finding out what they most need. In February, we were able to assist both Turkish and Syrian people impacted by earthquakes by providing medical and psychological first aid, hygiene kits, and food packages. 

LHI responded to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza quickly, finding partners on the ground to help us source aid and get it to civilians who need it in Gaza.

In October, we arrived in Egypt and got right to work finding the right partners to help us get aid to the over one million people displaced in the Gaza Strip. We established a partnership with the Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA) who helped us get food and medicine into Gaza.

We Couldn’t Have Done It Without You!

Whether you are an LHI volunteer or a donor, whether you’ve tied blankets or assembled hygiene kits for a service project, or whether you are a partner or a grant provider, you are a part of our team. Thank you for your support this year. We look forward to working together again in 2024 to meet needs around the world. No politics. Simply humanitarian.

The LHI Difference: Humanitarian Aid From Person to Person

by Brigid Rowlings, LHI Communications Director

Edu, LHI’s Director of Field Operations in Moldova, distributes toys to Ukrainian refugee children.

Yesterday morning, I was busy getting the kids ready for school. As usual, I had one AirPod in so that I could catch Morning Edition while also fielding breakfast requests and packing snack bags. My ears perked up when I heard the intro to a story about how the Turkish city of Sanliurfa is using lessons learned from welcoming Syrian refugees to assist people displaced by the earthquakes.

As I listened, the words of an interviewee, Ali Altin, who runs a distribution center in Sanliurfa, caught my attention. He observed that Syrian war refugees and earthquake survivors share this similarity: “Families who have never wanted for anything before in their lives are suddenly in need of a single diaper, and you can sense they don’t know how to tell you what they need and are almost apologetic for asking.”

This statement brought me back to a voice memo Edu, LHI’s Director of Field Operations in Moldova, sent me a few weeks back about why he thinks it is important that he is there, on the ground, when aid is distributed. And, since Edu took a good deal of time to send me the voice memo, I’ll let him take the lead in telling you why LHI’s practice of having team members at humanitarian aid distributions as often as possible is so important.

Edu often opens boxes of aid with beneficiaries. This gives him an opportunity to talk with people and to better understand their situation and their needs.

Being present at distributions brings humanity and dignity to a moment that is quite delicate.

Edu told me, “I think that asking for humanitarian aid, asking for help is something that can be humiliating. It makes people feel vulnerable and nobody likes it. So that is the starting point. And I think if I am there, wearing LHI gear, representing the organization, it brings some humanity to this process, and makes the beneficiaries feel better because they know it's from human to human.”

Edu also shared that some NGOs unload boxes of aid and leave. He said that the effect of this is that: “they don’t even know refugees faces. This could be quite undignifying for them, for the people who receive the support, and that is unfortunately how it works usually. They just load a truck with stuff, send it to the village where there is need, unload it, and that is it. People don’t even know where these things come from, who donated, and probably they get a feeling that the donors don’t care much about them. 

When I take part in a distribution, people can say thank you to me. That brings a bit of dignity and humanity in the process- in this moment that is quite delicate.

Refugees remember more about LHI. There is a person who makes the moment more memorable. It makes it a nicer experience.”

Edu spent some time playing with Ukrainian children sheltering in the dorms at university in Chisinau, Moldova. Edu got the idea to set up a playroom when he saw the children playing in the narrow corridors during an aid distribution.

Meeting beneficiaries helps LHI to get to know them, to better understand their needs, and to help them get the aid and services they are not able to get anywhere else.

Edu told me that when he is present at distributions, “I get to know the real situation. I get to see where the refugees live and what are their needs. I get to talk to them. I get to listen to them. I could not have such a grasp on their lives if I were not there.”

Edu’s presence at one distribution led to one of LHI’s coolest projects in Moldova. He said: “When I distributed aid to a university [that shelters Ukrainian refugees in its dormitories], I saw the kids playing in the corridor and then I had the idea that maybe we could set up a playroom for these kids. That has been one of the most successful projects so far in Moldova, and that idea just sparked during a distribution.”

LHI founder and director Hayley Smith talks with a woman during a distribution of aid to earthquake survivors in Turkey.

LHI’s COO Walker echoed Edu’s sentiments recently in a staff meeting when he reflected on his recent visit to earthquake survivors in Turkey. He told us about a Syrian refugee he met who’d first lost three of her children in Syria because of the civil war, and had now lost six more children in the earthquake. She and other women and children were sleeping on the floor in a mosque. What they needed were mattresses so that they could get off of the cold, hard floor. Because of this conversation, LHI was able to provide the people sleeping in the mosque that small, but much needed, comfort.

LHI’s Walker, Jaron, and Hayley recently traveled through Turkey to personally distribute aid to earthquake survivors.

Walker also told us that he spent some time playing with the children who were sheltering at the mosque. He said, “There is not much for [earthquake survivors] to do.” Many people are not working because they’ve been displaced from their homes, or because their workplaces have been destroyed, or because supply chains have been greatly disrupted. Children are not in school because buildings are damaged or teachers have been killed or displaced. In light of this, Walker said, “It feels very valuable to play with the kids and engage them.”

LHI’s Ukraine country director Serhii (he’s the one with the sunglasses on his head) recently traveled to Kherson where he met with volunteers who serve their community and affected villages at great risk to themselves. Meeting people and forming partnerships is how LHI gets its work done.

The relationships and partnerships that pave the way for LHI to do its work are forged on the ground.

Serhii, our Ukraine country director, puts this best. He told me:

“A partnership isn't built by phone calls, emails, or agreements. It is forged on dusty roads and in destroyed villages. [Before joining LHI], I was doing massive projects with dozens of teammates and thousands of beneficiaries, and it was easy to lose the sense of human connection. My job isn't about metric tons or quantity; that's about connecting the dots and ultimately bringing people together. That's why I travel with our fantastic partners, whenever possible, to the most affected areas. We drive, unload aid and sometimes seek shelter together.

Now I can see the hard work of our partners, share the team spirit and remind myself about the very essence of humanitarianism. We build hope, empower people, and come together as a big family.”

And I think Serhii hits the nail on the head: the essence of humanitarianism is seeing the humanity in our beneficiaries and partners and working together to provide the things people need to maintain or rebuild their sense of dignity and self-sufficiency.

If you’d like to learn more about our team , our work, and how you can help, please visit our website!

Q and A With Turkish-Born LHI Board Member Leslie Schick

LHI Founder and Director Hayley Smith spent a half hour with this family who now live in a tent city in the middle of Kahramanmaraş, Turkey, the epicenter of the earthquake. They lost their home and all of their belongings.

One of LHI’s board members, Leslie Schick, was born in Turkey and resides in Boston with her family. Last week, prior to our trip to Turkey, she shared her perspective on the devastating earthquake that has affected Turkey and Syria.

LHI: Can you describe how you’ve felt watching from afar as this tragic disaster has unfolded in your native country?

Leslie: It’s been hard to think of anything else or to concentrate on anything else. I’ve been obsessively following the news and social media, and talking to friends who are in Turkey. It’s a collective trauma and pain. The news cycle and people here [in the United States] have moved on, whereas it’s all feeling still very current. So that has been difficult to deal with. 

This man was happy to talk to the team from LHI, the first aid organization to come to his remote mountain village since the earthquake. His home was seriously damaged, and he now lives in a tent in his backyard with his family.

LHI: Conditions in Turkey were already pretty challenging even before the earthquakes, right?

Leslie: Yes, the economy has been steadily declining. The inflation rate is staggering, as is the rate of unemployment. And people are truly struggling to support themselves. In the case of many, they’re struggling just to put food on the table. This is also an area that houses a disproportionate number of Syrian refugees.

One of many destroyed homes the LHI team passed on our drive to Antakya. According to Reuters, “more than 160,000 buildings containing 520,000 apartments collapsed or were severely damaged in Turkey by the disaster, the worst in the country’s modern history.”

LHI: What challenges are Syrian and other refugees within the earthquake zone facing right now?

Leslie: Turkey hosts the largest number of registered refugees, or persons under protection, in the world. While that number was about 20,000, before 2011, it’s now in the 4 million range for Syrians, and between one and two million for other refugees, mostly from Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq. The most needed aid, for instance, tents, heaters, stoves, etc, is in very, very short supply, and Syrians, in general, are finding it much harder to source these things.

People whose homes had been destroyed by the earthquake talk to aid workers outside of their apartment buildings.

LHI: What are the most urgent needs right now?

Leslie: It’s hard to believe, but the most acute and urgent need now, two weeks on, remains basic shelter. I’m in a number of groups where everyone is requesting tents and none are to be found. And following the two new earthquakes today, Monday, February 20, this need has become even more acute. To quote a local mayor, he says, “Our citizens are demanding tents. No one can convince our citizens to re-enter their homes now. This issue has still not been resolved.” When there’s news of a supply of tents arriving, it’s always exhausted before most people can obtain one. Beyond that, sources of heat, such as wood or coal burning stoves, are needed. Mattresses, sleeping bags, food, clothes, and very importantly power banks or battery packs for phones, or other reliable ways for people to charge their phones, because phones remain the main and best way for people both to stay informed and to stay connected with their friends and relatives who have been dispersed.

 LHI: For those of us watching on the news and seeing the devastation and wanting to do something, what can we do to help?

Leslie: At the moment, the primary way to effectively help, I think, is by donating funds so that organizations on the ground can maximize their efforts. This is not currently a place for untrained volunteers or independent volunteers to think about going right now. Also the scale of devastation is such that only trained teams or teams connecting with organizations that are already on the ground can be effective. Also, Turkey is a country that produces clothing, food, and all necessities. Basic needs are locally available. So the main need is for funds to procure them. Tech needs, such as charging stations have to be fulfilled by specialized teams and are highly needed. Psychosocial support is needed and will in the future also be very much needed to help this population overcome their collective trauma and sense of loss.

Click here to learn more and support LHI’s relief efforts in Turkey.