Currently, there are almost 50 million children that have been forced to leave their country of origin. This has prompted different organisations such as Save the Children to establish various programs to help them during their migration. Some of these programmes focus on helping the children to have a better time while they wait for a decision on their refugee application.
Since 2019, I have been volunteering for one of these programs run by Save the Children in the Skåne region in Sweden. Through my participation I have been able to experience how these programmes can make a small but significant difference to children. In this text I would like to share some of my experiences and explain why I think it is important to volunteer.
The program focuses on helping the children have a more enjoyable time during their stay at the migration center. For this purpose we go to the centre twice a week for two hours each. During the time we spend there, we carry out various activities ranging from painting, playing with toys or just talking, trying our best to entertain the children. Most of the communication with the children is done with a mixture of different spoken languages, such as Swedish or Itañol (a mixture of Italian and Spanish), as the majority are from Eastern Europe or the Middle East. At the end of the activity we say goodbye to the children in the hope that we have made their stay a little better.
I believe that participation in these types of activities is important for several reasons. But most importantly these children deserve a good life. A life in which they can develop properly and reach their full potential, which could encourage them to go back and help change the reality in their home countries. And that is why we should give a day for volunteering.
