Logbooks

Logbook 1 

11 November 2019

Today I started my volunteer work/internship at Vluchtelingenwerk. It was a very exciting day with lots of new information and insights. The day started with a small introduction of the organization.

The organization

In order to understand the structure of the volunteer work I will be doing for the coming 7 weeks, it is important to explain the structure of the organization. The municipalities Grave, Cuijk and Mill are collided and operate as one municipality under the name “Land van Cuijk”. Sociom is the social work organization within the Land van Cuijk and has different departments. One of them is Vluchtelingenwerk. On Mondays I will be volunteering in Grave and on Tuesdays I will be volunteering in Cuijk. Vluchtelingenwerk Grave is only open on Mondays and Wednesdays. The people who work for Vluchtelingenwerk work a couple of days a week in all three the municipalities. Throughout my logbooks I will be referring to my volunteer work as Vluchtelingenwerk. 

The employees

Furthermore, I was introduced to the volunteers, the interns and the coordinator/team leader of Vluchtelingenwerk Grave as well.

The volunteers are MF, SL and DA. Maarten has volunteered at Vluchtelingenwerk for 10 years now. Selham and Dalia were once refugees themselves. They both have lived in the Netherlands for 4 years now and speak Arabic fluently. They started volunteering at Vluchtelingenwerk a couple of months ago. Vluchtelingenwerk has provided aid to them when they first came to the Netherlands. However the organization did not have any Arabic speaking people working for them so they had to hire a translator whenever they needed. Thanks to Selham and Dalia, hiring translators is not necessary anymore. 

IB and LW are interns at Vluchtelingenwerk. They are both in the third year of their Social Work studies. 

Lastly, the head of the department of Vluchtelingenwerk Grave is RD. He is the team leader of the department in Grave and he is also the coordinator and social worker. He is also the project manager of Pharos and Aan de slag. 

A typical Monday

Mondays start with a spreekuur for the refugees who get help from all the people working on Mondays, with a variety of questions. For example: getting a new account for internet banking and paying bills for the dentist or healthcare. This spreekuur was a true eye-opener when it comes down to all the responsibilities the employees of Vluchtelingenwerk have. They help everyone with every little question and do this in a very concise way. They think of all the small details and what was really apparent was that they take action immediately. So whenever someone needs to be called or mailed, they do this at the spot and do not leave it for later. Every detail is also being put in the file of the refugee and information is directly forwarded to other departments. After the spreekuur we went to the asylum seeker centre (asielzoekercentrum) where the afternoon was filled with the execution of the project: “Aan de slag”. 

Project: Aan de slag

In order to make the participation of asylum seekers in society more accessible, Vluchtelingenwerk has come up with the project: Aan de slag. This project aims to connect asylum seekers to volunteer work in order to familiarize them with Dutch society and work ethics. The voluntary work is in one of the three municipalities in the Land van Cuijk. This way the professionals of Vluchtelingenwerk provide the asylum seekers with a participatory role in the local neighbourhood. To bond with people and help avoid prejudices.

Every Monday afternoon from 2 till 4 the employees and volunteers of Vluchtelingenwerk make their way to the asylum seeker centre (AZC). At the security reception, before you enter the centre, you need to identify yourself an register as a visitor. This was my first time at an AZC so it was very exciting for me. 

As we entered the AZC, we went over to the building where the COA is situated and where you can find the main reception. In the same building, there is a small office where Vluchtelingenwerk can have some people over for the Aan de slag project. There is the opportunity for the asylum seekers to walk in and get informed about the volunteer work which is available for the coming week. The asylum seekers are not obliged to accept the work or by any means participate in this project. However, when they enter the office, the people state that they are bored and that they want to do something to get through their days. This means that the people are actually willing to do some work and to get out of the centre. 

I joined a couple of the intake conversations. It starts off by doing some basic administration to register the people. What I like about this project is, that Vluchtelingenwerk first asks what their experiences are when we look at the country of origin. What work they used to do and if they have any degrees. According to that information the people are recommended to do specific volunteer work such as working with the elderly of with teenagers. Though, the asylum seekers are also free to choose from a chart of possibilities which are summed up as a “menu card”. 

When there is a suitable option for the asylum seeker, the people who offer the volunteer work are being called right away, to check if they need anyone for the coming week. The asylum seekers are informed about where they need to be and at what time and how they can get there. 

Recommendations

As I sat there in the office where the people could come over for project Aan de slag, a couple of issues caught my attention. I was asked what my opinion was and if I had any recommendations by RD, IB and LW and I said that I had written a couple of things down.

First and foremost, the menu cards with all the options are in Dutch, while none of the asylum seekers can read nor speak Dutch. I recommended that it would be a good option to write one in English as well. Moreover, during the intake, Vluchtelingenwerk checks if there is any room for a volunteer by calling the providers of volunteer work at the spot. This happens in front of the asylum seeker, after they have had a conversations about what they would like to do etc. So when the intake takes place, Vluchtelingenwerk is not even sure if they can place them somewhere. 

That is why I came up with a plan. A central medium, which could be through phone, through WhatsApp or through mail, where the providers of volunteer work can contact people from Vluchtelingenwerk a week beforehand. So they can come up with an overview of how many people they need a day and according to that information, Vluchtelingenwerk can more easily match asylum seekers to volunteer work. Without having to call and check each time. 

RD, IB and LW thought this was a  very good idea and stated that they would consider to implement this as a solution. 

My experiences of my first day were very positive. I have seen how hard the people work in order to make everything go as smooth as possible for the asylum seekers. At first I was a bit hesitant because I did not know how I could take on a role within the organizations. But during the Aan de slag project, my colleagues asked for my opinion and they appreciated a new perspective. On the other hand, seeing people who had to flee their country and try to make the best of their stay in the Netherlands, really broke my heart a little bit. The most basic needs which are so easy for us to arrange are so much harder for them because they do not speak the language. The asylum seekers need so much help but are so eager to learn about everything and you can see that they are so thankful and grateful for everything and for the help they are receiving from Vluchtelingenwerk. This opened my eyes in terms of being grateful for all the little things I am blessed with in my life.

Logbook 2 

12 November 2019

The headquarters of Sociom is located in Cuijk. I was introduced to the head of Vluchtelingenwerk, Hoa. She introduced me to RC who is a social worker, who is in charge of the participation of the elderly of foreign descent who live in Cuijk. 

Hoa asked if I could help RC and HU out who are both in charge of the Wereldbol Huiskamerbijeenkomsten. This project has nothing to do with Vluchtelingenwerk, so this is part of the social work department of Sociom. Hoa thought that I would suit this project and asked if I would like to help out. I like a challenge and since I have never participated in these kind of projects, I immediately said yes. This means that I would have to do something out of my comfort zone and that is exactly the aim of my voluntary work.

When it comes down to the project, RC and Hubriet want to make sure that the elderly foreign women, who are over the age of 65, have something to do during their days. These women experience not a lot of social contacts and are not vital enough to participate in any sports. The municipality supports Sociom with these projects and finances them. The aim of this project is to bring women from Turkish and Moroccan backgrouns together, on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10 to 2 so that they can do different sorts of activities together. There is a reason why it is aimed at Turkish and Moroccan women for now, because this is the target audience which does not participate in society at all. Women from different ethnic backgrounds do this a bit more, for example women from the Moluccan Islands.

Sociom divides the types of activities in three categories: healthy living, staying up to date and physical exercise.  Healthy living consists of healthy eating habits and training the brain and the memory. Staying up to date regards to the news and technology. And physical exercise is self-explanatory. 

My role within this project is to help organize the activities and take care of the intakes. 

It is very important that the activities suit the categories but are also enjoyable for the elderly women. This afternoon I joined a meeting at an external location where I spoke to women from different backgrounds but mainly to the Turkish women, since they don’t speak Dutch very well and I am fluent in Turkish. During the meeting we explained what the project will consist of and that we really want to hear the preferences of the women regarding to the activities. Since the women are of age, we also tried to plan in intakes at their homes so we could register them as participants and we could do a bit more explaining and brainstorming about how we want to organize the entire project. We have already planned in an intake at one woman’s house for next week Tuesday so that was a success.

The activities will be organized at the mosque. The mosque rents a part of the building to third parties. The idea of the project is that the elderly women will be picked up from their homes to the mosque and afterwards they will be dropped off at home as well. 

I started brainstorming immediately so I came up with a first draft of activities and showed this to RC.

RC is of course more experienced with this target audience so she suggested that we have to implement the religious aspect as well. She mentioned that the gathering of these women has to have a religious purpose as well. So I suggested that we would start off with reciting verse from the Quran or to pray together. She thought this was a good idea. In order to train the memory of the women she also suggested to memorize certain verses of the Quran together with the women to fulfil the religious aspect and link it to train their brains as well. 

Furthermore, RC already contacted a sports instructor who is specialized in training elderly people. After the physical exercise there will be time for a fun activity and a lunch. I made a time table for the Tuesdays and Thursdays which you can find below:

Time	Tuesday	Time	Thursday
10.00- 10.30	Coffee and tea service.Reciting and memorising QuranA small prayer to start the day.	10.00 – 10.30	Coffee and tea service.Reciting and memorising QuranA small prayer to start the day.
10.30 – 12.45	Sports activities and memory games.	10.30 – 12.30	Memory games and an activity such as:KnittingGardeningPainting Making a piece of artMaking flower pieces
12.45 – 13.30	Lunch.	12.30 – 14.00	Lunch and cleaning up.
13.30 – 14.00	Cleaning up and coffee and tea service

It is important that the women really participate during these activities. For example the lunch will not be made ready for them but it will be a group activity. We also came up with a registration plan so the women who will participate are letting the organizers know if they need to be picked up or not. The communication could go through WhatsApp or through the family members of the women but this needs a bit more focus from our side.

After the introduction of the Wereldbol project I went on a house visit together with IB and Imaan both social workers at Vluchtelingenwerk. Imaan is Syrian and is also the translator. We visited a Syrian 65 year old man who recently got a house in Cuijk. It was basically a “spreekuur” but since the man is not able to walk, an appointment was made at his home. He also received a scoot mobile from municipality and IB and Imaan took care of some administration. It was the first time I was at the house of an asylum seeker and I have seen a bit more of their living conditions. Because of Monday’s spreekuur I was aware that they received a certain amount of money from the municipality to furbish their houses. And it was nice to see how they pulled it off with such little money. 

Logbook 3 

18 November 2019

On Mondays there is a spreekuur and today I could help out as well and I felt really proud actually. I functioned as a translator because we have a Turkish family who got their house last week. The head of the family Mr. Y came over and I helped translate everything between him and IB. We filed for childcare, arranged an internet contract for him and I translated a lot of letters from the housing corporation, the municipality and the tax office. He was very thankful and he asked if I could help him again in the future and I assured him I would do my best for him if he would stop by on Mondays.

After the spreekuur we had a small break and we went over to the AZC.  During the Aan de slag project I did the intakes together with LW. Two people who were set up with voluntary work last week came by and said that they wanted to go again so that is a very positive outcome. And we arranged that for them. I changed the menus from Dutch to English and set up 3 more people to voluntary work for next week. This week we had one woman who applied for voluntary work as well and that is great because  we did not have any female participants.

Reflection

To start with, I am a very curious person. I would like to know details and all the information but especially when you work with refugees, it’s not an option to be curious. You just have to be helpful. When Mr. Y came in and RD asked me if I could translate, I said: “Sure”. Not a problem for me at all. But in the back of my mind I thought that it perhaps would be a problem for Mr. Y. Since he is a political refugee from Turkey. I thought that it could go three ways. Either he is Kurdish and is not fond of the Turkish people nor the government, he is prosecuted because of the coupe in 2015 and people who stand with Gülen will be arrested or three he is a well-educated professor or journalist who is anti-Erdogan. Even though I am open minded, it still forms a boundary between Mr. Y and myself. Nevertheless I helped him as well as I could. It struck to me how easily I help people even if they may have contradicting political views than the ones I do, as long as they are nice to me. I think this is a good thing, but it is also very weird for me. I never thought of any political preferences or opinions and now I am working with people who have dealt with this their entire lives. The weird part of it is the complexity of all situations going on in Turkey. When we are in a conversation, everything is fine, we laugh with each other and help each other. But when we look at the country we could have totally different ideologies. The question which strikes to me is: how could I help someone who basically wants negativity for my home country, the country where my family lives? 

I think that is pretty hard to answer. But as long as I am a part of Vluchtelingenwerk, or a teacher in the near future I have to switch between my professional side and personal side and not interfere the two.

Logbook 4

19 November 2019

Today was quite a laid back day. In the afternoon I went to the house of an elderly Turkish woman to register her for the Wereldbol project. A couple of other ladies were there too and they all wanted to register as well. It’s quite funny because they are all my grandmother’s girlfriends and I have known them all my life. I learned that working with elderly people is not really my thing because they are not as assertive as younger people which is logical and not a problem. But I really like it when you can go into dialogue with people and when people give you feedback or actually say what their preferences are. It’s a good thing that I figured this out as well. Good learning moment.

Logbook 5 

25 November 2019

I am starting to become more independent at Vluchtelingenwerk. As mentioned before, Monday mornings are filled with the spreekuur. Today I started with welcoming and helping clients myself. My first client was a Syrian man and SL, the volunteer and translator, helped me out with the communication. 

A man who needed to file a declaration for his insurance came to the spreekuur and I started to help him. He had a very long conversation with SL before I could even begin to help him. What happened next surprised me a little because SL told me in Dutch: don’t worry, it’s not you, it’s him. When I asked him what he meant he said that the man who just came in had some serious trust issues and that he was concerned about his declaration because he didn’t know me. I must admit that I found it hard to believe that he didn’t trust me, but I soon came to the realisation that it must be hard for refugees to trust new people. I assumed that the man would be Muslim as well because he was Syrian and I found it weird that he didn’t trust me since I am clearly Muslim as well. I decided not to say anything to SL about this because I didn’t want to make assumptions. 

I asked SL if he could ask the man if he would give me just one chance. If I would mess it up, I would never offer to help him again as long as he just gave me a chance. The man agreed but didn’t look at me at all. Filing a declaration is not very hard, especially when you have the VGZ app. Within 30 minutes we were done. I could have done it in 5 but it was taking a bit longer due to the trust issues. 

Reflection

Situations like this really open my eyes and make it clear for me that I should not take anything personal ever. Of course I could just say that I would not help the man and send him to a co-worker of mine, but I figured that this would not be beneficial for the man on the long term. The fact that the man lives in Grave now, does not mean that he will live in Grave forever. I wanted to stimulate him in being more open to other people helping him even though he did not want to be helped by me. Just because he will have to encounter with other people as well and not only the people he already knows. 

Logbook 6 26 November 2019

Today I spent the day in Cuijk to work on my recommendations for the Pharos project.

I wrote the menus in English and I wrote a press release for the local newspaper of Grave. After I wrote the piece, I informed by calling the local newspaper if it was possible to post my piece into next week’s newspaper. They were fine with it and would check it before publishing and they would let me know.

Down below you can see what I wrote, in Dutch.

‘Meedoen vanaf dag één’. Dat was het uitgangspunt van het Pharos project: `Aan de slag`, waarbij nieuwkomers worden aangespoord om mee te doen met vrijwilligersactiviteiten buiten het azc.

Vrijwilligerswerk samen met Nederlanders is dé manier om kennis te maken met Nederland. Tijdens het werk bouwen nieuwkomers een sociaal netwerk op, leren zij hoe het hier werkt en leren zij Nederlands in de praktijk. Bovendien zorgt vrijwilligerswerk voor een dagritme en het leveren van een zinvolle bijdrage. Het geeft nieuwkomers iets om naar uit te kijken, iets waarmee ze even hun zorgen opzij kunnen zetten. Dat is goed voor hun activatie, participatie en dus voor hun welzijn en gezondheid.

Om deze laagdrempelige manier van participatie in een nieuwe maatschappij te bevorderen is Sociom hard op zoek naar aanbod van vrijwilligerswerk binnen Grave. De methode is simpel, Sociom Grave koppelt wekelijks bewoners van het azc aan vrijwilligerswerk. Om de toeleiding van nieuwkomers naar vrijwilligerswerk bij maatschappelijke organisaties te bevorderen, is een goede lokale samenwerking essentieel. Een samenwerking waarin iedereen verantwoordelijkheden draagt die naadloos aansluiten bij de behoeftes van zowel de vrijwilligers als de aanbieders.

De 130 vrijwilligers die zich hebben aangemeld willen heel graag aan de slag. Met de middelen die Sociom momenteel tot beschikking heeft, moet er helaas een groot deel van dat aantal mensen teleurgesteld worden. De oorzaak? Te weinig aanbod. Hier wilt Sociom zo spoedig mogelijk verandering in brengen. 

De bereidheid vanuit de nieuwkomers is er zeker. Wilt u ook partner van Sociom worden binnen het ‘Aan de slag’ project? Meld u dan snel aan via aandeslag@sociom.nl. U krijgt dan een aanmeldingsformulier toegestuurd waarbij alle relevante gegevens vergaard zullen worden. Na aanmelding wordt er contact met u opgenomen en kan in de toekomst het aanbod wekelijks worden doorgegeven via hetzelfde emailadres. 

Samen altijd in de buurt.

Logbook 7

2 December 2019

Today I started off with the spreekuur and I spent the entire morning to get everything settled for A, who is turning 18 very soon. This means that he needs to file for an independent insurance, because he will become an adult legally. Furthermore, I will have to help him to get “zorgverzekering” and “studiefinanciering”. It was very easy for me to help him because I had to do it for myself in the past as well. I made sure that A was paying close attention when I was applying for zorgverzekering and studiefinanciering, since these are organizations which he will be in contact later on in his life as well. 

Apart from applying for governmental issues, it has become clear to me that refugees need lots of help with different organizations as well. This is not a problem at all, but this does mean that the tasks of the volunteer also have influence on the other parts of the refugees. For example, A told me that he wanted to get his driver’s license as soon as possible. I told him that I could help him and we looked at instructors online. I made an entire list with options for him and printed this out. I told him to discuss it with his parents and then make a decision. 

Reflection

During my time at Vluchtelingenwerk I must say that I did not learn to draw a line when it comes down to help refugees. It becomes very clear to me that they come to the office for a wide range of questions. I had a conversation with RD about this because I was not aware how I had to divide my time and my attention, since there were a couple of people asking questions which were not related to the government. RD said that we basically help them with everything in the broadest sense. All because they are absolutely not capable enough to organize or research things on their own.

Logbook 8 

3 December 2019

One of the responses we got for the Pharos project was of a primary school. I think this is very exciting news since the primary school allows not only children, but also parents to get familiar with refugees. The head of the school invited us over for a meeting and LW and I attended it together. 

We were welcomed very nicely and the head of the primary school told us that he really liked the idea. He showed great empathy on how tough it must be for people to spend their days just waiting and getting bored. That is why he wanted to participate during the Pharos project as well.

We took an example of the menu with us so that the head of the school would know which organizations in the area were involved as well. It was a very concise conversation since LW and I were  eager on getting this done as soon as possible so that we could send over volunteers as soon as possible. We agreed on the amount of people needed every day, about the time the volunteers will spend at school and what their activities will be. It was a very nice conversation and when we got back to the office, we immediately changed the menus.

Logbook 9 

9 December 2019

I discovered a completely new organization today in “the Land van Cuijk” called: “Stichting Leergeld”. An Eritrean woman came to the office because she had gotten a warning from the school of her son because she did not pay the contribution to the school yet. However, she is not able to pay for it and she had to come with a solution. I did not know who to contact so RD recommended me to call Stichting Leergeld. As I called, I was redirected to the website where I had to fill out a form. It turned out that the woman had already filled out the form and that she did not receive a response yet. She mentioned this when I was already halfway filling out the form I thought she had never filled out. So I called stichting Leergeld again and they acknowledged the fact that the form was indeed already filled out and that the woman had to wait for a response. I mentioned that she had been waiting since October and that the bill was due. They redirected me to another department but they told me that she really needed to wait. I had two options, either I would hammer on the fact that their organization but I chose to call the school of her son and explain the entire situation. They were very understanding and they blocked the bill until stichting Leergeld would pay for it. It is very hard not to waste any time when there is such a huge language barrier. It is quite difficult to understand what the refugees have done or what they want. That makes me feel sorry for them because they often get redirected from one place to another simply because they don’t know the language. But second of all just because there are not so many organizations in their home country. A Syrian man told me today that back in their country, there is no such thing as mail or a postman.

Logbook 10

10 December 2019 

It was pretty silent the last two weeks around the “Wereldbol” project because the location where it would be organized was having some issues with the selected days. But everything was settled and since I was in Cuijk today, RC and I went to the Turkish mosque where the elderly ladies will be spending their Tuesdays and Thursdays. RC bought a traditional Moroccann couch, a “seddari” off of Marktplaats.nl and we installed it into the area where the Wereldbol project will take place. We also did some painting and we stored the decorations in the storage so they would be easily accessible. Furthermore we did some grocery shopping for the dry and canned ingredients the ladies can use during the first day.

Logbook 11 

16 December 2019

Today we had the usual spreekuur, but it was pretty calm and quite. In the building where the office of Vluchtelingenwerk is, there is also a center for youth. So I decided to help put up some extra Christmas decorations and other stuff since there would be a talent show tonight. In the office there was not a lot to do. I went to the azc later on in the afternoon to connect volunteers to the Pharos project. We went to the stores to buy the children some toys for Christmas as well. 

Logbook 12 

17 December 2019

Normally I volunteer in Cuijk on Tuesdays but I went to the Taalcafe today because I was really curious about how they encouraged refugees to improve their Dutch. The Taalcafe takes place in the library of Grave. 

Logbook 13

23 December 2019

Mister AH is a man who has visited me quite often during my time at Vluchtelingenwerk. He always has the same question about how many hours he has fulfilled for his language development. Because when refugees complete 600 hours of language training, they don’t have to go to school anymore. The refugees get a fund from DUO of 15.000 euros to spend on their language training courses. The refugees get to decide where and when they follow the courses, as long as they fulfil the hours or pass the exams. Because there is a chance that they don’t pass their exams. If they can prove that they did follow 600 hours of language training, they will not have to pay the fund back. But if they did not pass the exams or did not fulfil 600 hours, they will have to pay it all back. 

However DUO does not keep track of these hours. The language schools need to keep track of the hours the student has fulfilled and they have to pass the information on to DUO. Then DUO will make it appear on their list of fulfilled hours. If the language school is not professional enough to do so, there will be some miscommunication. This was the case with mister AH. I called all the language schools he attended. Some of the owners or managers of the language schools did not even speak Dutch. I think this is a very concerning issue since it becomes very easy to fraud with the 15.000 euros you can get from the government. 

Logbook 14

24 December 2019

Today I organized a little lunch because it was my last day at Vluchtelingenwerk.