June 20th as you may know is World Refugee Day. Prior to the last couple years, few may have had an understanding of what leads people miles from their homes, to give up everything and start anew. However due to recent events in Syria, the refugee issue has now been in the forefront of our news sources.  The United Nations Refugee Agency reports that over 65.3 million individuals are currently displaced from their homes, increasing at drastically high rates.  That is 1 out of every 113 global citizens that are unable to estranged from their homelands.

Who are the people who find themselves in this situation? They are doctors, and teachers, and lawyers, and grandparents.  Anyone fleeing from war torn, violence stricken, abuse filled pasts willing to give up everything to find a safe foundation to begin to rebuild.

Where do they end up? Refugees can be found globally, living in urban cities or more likely refugee camps.  Many organizations like the UN provide basic infrastructure and programs to support the more established camps worldwide.  At the sites you can find thousands of individuals living alongside each other with not more than the clothes on their backs and the food purchased through stamps.

In writing this, I had a flash to a time over 12 years ago in a little town outside Mbarara, Uganda where I had my first exposure to such a camp. The wave of grieve and solemnness was so thick I remember struggling to get out of the car to engage with the community we came to support.  It was immobilizing.  And that was their reality.

This evening I attended an event sponsored by World Relief Seattle, an organization that supports displaced individuals migration to the US by supplying their basic needs, introducing American culture, and providing a community to help make the transition easier. A statistic mentioned during the presentation pointed out that under 1,900 Syrians have been permitted to take refuge in the United States, a mere tenth the size of one of the hundreds of refugee camps set up worldwide.

My goal is writing about this today is not advocate for or against an open door policy as I am no expert in the matter, but I would like to remind ourselves the importance of supporting each other across international borders. In a time where certain political leaders are ranting messages based in fear and hate, let’s do our piece to counteract that message and share why it’s important for people to stand up for each other regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or any other qualifier one can be discriminated against. The best way is to start talking about it.

A good place to start is to watch the documentary Salam Neighbor.