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Lending a Hand in Hungary

Jul 16, 2015 | Feature Story

It is dusk by the time volunteers arrive at a busy square in central Budapest. With them, they carry hot food and fresh water – nothing short of a lifeline for the tired and hungry refugee families who are there to meet them. Little children are at first shy to accept the plates and spoons. However, when parents encourage them their faces light up, and they reach out for the meal eagerly.

“Tastes good,” nods one young Afghan mother, visibly grateful for her vegetarian dish after a long day of fasting during the holy month of Ramadan.

It takes just three minutes for the first 50 portions of food to disappear.

Here in Hungary, where around 70,000 asylum applications have been made so far in 2015 and 80 per cent of people arrive from conflict zones like Syria, many families roam the streets of Budapest in search of a place to rest. Some are on their way to designated reception centres within the country – others are waiting to move on to Western Europe.

Tonight’s group look lost and exhausted.

“We just want to survive,” says Afsar, a former construction worker and a father of four girls. He and his daughters arrived here from Afghanistan, after a perilous journey that took three months and all their savings. So far, they have survived on just bread, and Afsar is thankful for the hot food. “It has been a while since such a good thing has happened to us. I don’t know who these young girls and boys are, but they are good people, that’s for sure.”

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

Volunteers Judit and Ádám start distributing food for refugees on a busy square in Budapest. It takes just three minutes for the first 50 portions of food to disappear. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

Asfar, his wife and their four daughters eat food cooked by volunteers. They fled Afghanistan and endured a perilous three-month journey to Europe. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

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Ádám, a volunteer who used to be homeless, says it’s much better to go to sleep when you helped someone during the day. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

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Volunteers prepare 100 vegetarian meals which will be distributed to refugees on the streets of Budapest. ©UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

The food is cooked and distributed by ‘Food Not Bombs’, a group of enthusiastic Hungarian volunteers who decided to take matters into their own hands after learning about desperate families like Afsar’s who are wandering Budapest. Ingredients are donated by vendors at the city’s food markets and meals are prepared by activists in one of the popular ‘ruin pubs’ of the capital. The small group has been cooking for the poor of this city for years.

“We just could not stand by and watch as women and children suffer,” says Judit Marta, one of the volunteers. “We would like to show that it is not very difficult to help.”

Judit says it is rewarding to see how much happiness one can bring to another human being by simply offering a dish at the right moment. “These people have gone through a lot, so some of them are surprised that we help without asking anything in return,” she adds.

“We would like to show that it is not very difficult to help.”

But ‘Food not bombs’ is just one of many groups in Hungary coming to the aid of asylum-seekers.

On Facebook, people are collecting food, water and clothes, and near the Serbian border, in the city of Szeged, residents offer food, blankets, toys, or even a lift in their vehicles for people stuck at the railway station when the last train pulls out. The local municipality is also helping with free wireless internet and mobile toilets.

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For many Afghan families this has been their first proper dinner in days. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

Little refugee children are at first shy to accept the plates and spoons, but when parents encourage them they reach out for the meal eagerly. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

It is dusk by the time volunteers arrive at a busy square in Budapest. The food they carry is a lifeline for the tired and hungry refugees who are there to meet them. ©UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

Volunteers carry the food they have cooked to the centre of Budapest, where they will distribute it to exhausted asylum-seekers. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

Groups of compassionate Hungarian citizens cook and distribute food during the night to desperate asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who sleep rough around Budapest’s railway stations. They organize themselves on social media to coordinate efforts and involve as many people as they can. This comes at a time when a record number of refugees arrive to the country and the government does everything it can to discourage them to enter the EU through Hungary. (This include running a xenophobic billboard campaign; erecting a fence on the Serbian border, threatening to suspend Dublin transfers). But solidarity prevails as young people want to show that their country is much more hospitable as one would think reading international headlines.

A moment of joy and relief for an Afghan family after receiving food from Hungarian activists. © UNHCR/Andras D. Hajdú

This spontaneous goodwill and solidarity to help refugees has taken many by surprise, including the authorities.

Recently, UNHCR expressed strong concern over the Hungarian Government’s efforts to paint refugees as a threat to the country and launched its own poster campaign so that locals can learn more about refugees who find a home in Hungary and contribute to the country.

As night falls over the square, most people finish their food and begin to leave. Sixteen-year-old Tariq is among them. He arrived alone from Afghanistan and fears that he may have to return one day. Tonight, he will stay in Fót, on the edge of Budapest, in an institution where Hungary houses and educates unaccompanied children.

“All I want is a safe place to stay,” he says, quietly. “I don’t know whether it would be this country or some other place, but I am already grateful to Hungarians.”

“All I want is a safe place to stay.”

Ákos, who cooked today’s meal, knows how important positive action like this can be. “If there was war in my country, I would flee too,” he says. “Global problems can only be solved in unity.”

And his friend Ádám knows better than most.

“I was a homeless man standing at the other end of the queue,” he says. “Now I have place to stay and, trust me, it’s much better to go to sleep when you helped someone during the day.”

Story By: Balint Linder (Based in Budapest, Hungary)

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