FEATURE
“ You were cold and tired , sitting on the ground , waiting to find out if you had gotten an unlikely space in an emergency accommodation centre ” reads a poster pasted on a wall on a street in London . “ In Arabic I heard you mutter that if Assad hadn ’ t killed you , then Calais would .”
This extract is one of 267 heart-breaking exchanges between a volunteer aid worker and a stranded refugee in France . A project called Conversations From Calais has taken these conversations and plastered posters of them in over 50 cities across five continents in several languages . Mathilda Della Torre , a 24-year-old master ’ s student , started the project at the end of 2019 . She hopes that the project will rehumanise the refugee crisis and emphasise the hardships endured by so many people fleeing their home countries in search of safety in Europe . Conversations From Calais addresses the numerous issues that refugees and migrants face on a daily basis . So many previously unseen , silenced voices are reclaimed by retelling and sharing their conversations with volunteers . Another poster reads : “ You told me you are going to try to get to England tonight . You were silent for a moment , then you said that you came here to live , not to die . You asked if there was anywhere in the world where they would not try to kill you . I couldn ’ t answer ”. In 2019 , 2,758 boats attempted to cross the Channel illegally . According to the UK Home Office , over 3,500 people have ventured on the treacherous journey across the English Channel this year , with an additional 568 making the journey during the last weekend of May . On Tuesday , June 1 , six more boats carrying 132 people were discovered . Ms Della Torre and her mother visited a refugee camp in Calais in 2018 . At its peak , the camp which is best known as “ The Calais Jungle ,” hosted up to 10,000 refugees . The site was cleared by French police in 2016 , but with the number of failed asylum applications increasing and racism on the rise , migrants began gathering in the area again in the hopes of eventually crossing the Channel . “ The French police arrive early in the morning and take away a lot of their belongings ,” Della Torre explains . “ I felt the need to share what I see , hear and experience there . I felt so angry about how migrants were portrayed in the media , especially when arriving in the UK from Northern France , which is why I thought it was so important to share these narratives that I was witnessing .” Authorities are attempting to prevent migrants from entering the UK illegally with the evictions . Shortly after returning to the UK , Ms Della Torre boarded a train to Dover with a bucket of homemade glue and a poster printed with her own personal conversations with migrants , where she pasted her first ever poster . “ It felt liberating but also scary to put them up for anybody to read ,” she said . “ I knew that once they were up in the streets , they weren ’ t really mine anymore .”
The head of the Paris police force , Michel Cadot , told ‘ The National News ’ that a constant police presence would be deployed in order to “ prevent these camps from reforming .” He argues the evacuations were part of the state ’ s attempt to “ reclaim public space .” During his time as UK home secretary Sajid Javid , announced that “ The UK will work even closer with France in the fight to tackle illegal activities at the border and crime networks that endanger the lives of vulnerable people .” Despite the Conversations From Calais Instagram page having nearly 30,000 followers , Ms Della Torre is aware of the importance of continuing to reach new audiences . She said : “ We have a good social media presence but I ’ m very aware that it ’ s an echo chamber of people that I ’ ve created . This is why it ’ s so crucial to keep pasting posters on the street , to talk to people in real life and to find more ways to bring these conversations to different communities .”
Three years after the project was originally launched , Ms Della Torre considers its underlying values to have stayed consistent . She said , “ The core of it has never changed though , even from that first poster I put up . It ’ s always been a project that aims to re-humanise those affected by the refugee crisis by bearing witness to the thousands of displaced people stuck in Calais , trying to reach the UK , whose voices are so often silenced or ignored .” The project has brought mass attention to the migrant crisis . Ms Della Torre emphasises that mental health is a critical issue among refugee children , and that many of the minors had been kidnapped , tortured , or sexually abused both in their home country and on their journey to Europe .
When asked about future plans for the ‘ Conversations From Calais ’ project , Ms Della Torre simply replied , “ I hope I ’ m not working on this project anymore in 5 years , because that would mean that the situation in Calais is no longer taking place .” Her next focus will be to collaborate with schools and universities in order to educate as many people as possible about the situation .
“ It ’ s so crucial to talk to people in real life and to find more ways to bring these conversations to different communities . ”
@ mathildadellatorre
Founder of Conversations from Calais , Mathilda Della Torre
ISSUE 4 SLEUTH 29