What eating refugee rations for a week taught me.

Background:

Recently (from 17th-24th of June 2018) I undertook Act For Peace's 'Ration Challenge'. The challenge entailed spending an entire week eating only the rations that a typical Syrian refugee in a Jordan refugee camp would be given. I always feel my best when I am helping others and I have a huge passion for helping those less fortunate. I was more than keen to sign up for this challenge to raise some money for this wonderful organisation that helps provide refugees with access to food, education, hygiene supplies, medical attention and counselling. My heart goes out to refugees because they've been through so much, they've had to flee their homes and endure terrible circumstances to eventually end up in a refugee camp where they will be essentially stuck for an elongated period of time, the uncertainty of that situation must be almost unbearable.

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I learned so much from doing this challenge, and my awareness of the plight of refugees has grown enormously, it pulled on my heartstrings to learn the facts about what refugees go through and to experience a small taste of what that's like by living on the same small amount and limited variety of foods that they do for a week. While I was going through the challenge, I thought about what it would be like to live on this food for an AVERAGE of 17 YEARS **Note: this figure is disputed, it comes from an estimation from 2003 - read more here: [2] ** and this really gave me a new perspective on how hard it must be for those people to try and live as normal a life as possible for that time in such abnormal and artificial circumstances. I hadn't thought about how long refugees spend in camps once they got there and to find out that they spend years in those places was a real eye opener to me; it broke my heart thinking about all the children in those camps who haven't experienced anything outside of those walls. I am so glad that Act For Peace works hard to provide refugees with access to education and medical days where they can see medical professionals, especially for the sake of those children who shouldn't miss out on the opportunity to learn and thrive simply because they were born in the wrong place at the wrong time.

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The definition of "Refugee" as included in the Refugee convention is:

"Any person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his/her nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself/herself of the protection of that country." [4]

Refugees are thrust into uncertain circumstances by no fault of their own and are in need of protection by the wider global community. These are people who are totally reliant on the generosity of others. Currently there are more displaced persons than ever before recorded, over 68 Million people fall into the category of 'forcibly displaced'; a majority of those people are internally displaced, which means they haven't yet left the country that they came from but they have fled their homes [5]. That's an enormous amount of individuals throughout the world who need the help of other people, individuals who are extremely vulnerable and rely on others to meet almost all of their needs, including basic necessities such as food, water, and medical supplies. I must say though, the resilience of those people is astonishing, and I urge you to head to Act For Peace's website [6] or facebook page [7] and read or watch some of the stories of those people for yourself, they are honestly inspiring and the amount of gratitude they have for people overseas who care about them and what their going through is just so humbling to see and read about and it made me feel like this challenge was SO worthwhile and I want to share their stories with the world.

What did I eat for the week?

Here's a picture of the rations I got

*Note: I chose not to receive the sardines because I am a vegan, I replaced these with the same weight of cashew nuts instead which I felt was a good nutritional substitute

What surprised me most about the rations that people in refugee camps live on was not the lack of variety or the lack of flavour, but the lack of NUTRITION that was warned about by Act For Peace upon beginning this challenge. Here's some excerpts from their site regarding the nutritional value of the rations for the challenge:

"The calorie content of the food eaten during the challenge (i.e. the contents of the ration pack provided plus the specified additional rice and flour) is below 1738 kcal/person/day. This does not meet the Sphere Minimum Standard of 2,100 kcal/person/day. It is also not consistent with the daily calorie requirements of an average adult recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council."

"It is recommended that pregnant women do not take part in the challenge as they have additional dietary requirements that the rations do not meet."

"it is not recommended that participants exceed the one-week duration of the challenge."

"The calorie content of the food eaten during the challenge (i.e. the contents of the ration pack provided plus the specified additional rice and flour) is below 1738 kcal/person/day recommendation. The full Ration Challenge nutritional information can be downloaded HERE. This does not meet the Sphere Minimum Standard of 2,100 kcal/person/ day nor does it meet Nutrition Australia’s recommendations for a balanced diet. It is also not consistent with the daily calorie requirements of an average adult (or child) recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council. Please seek medical advice before taking part yourself or allowing your child to take part." [8]

I took this to be problematic because the food provided during the challenge is designed to closely reflect the rations available to Syrian refugees in Jordan refugee camps for one week. This means that those people who do not have a choice about how long they eat this way for are provided less than adequate nutrition long term. Even though refugee camps are seen as a temporary solution to an emergency situation, the fact that most refugees spend years in such accommodation means that we have to do better to make sure they get the bare minimum that they need to survive. To me, that includes a nutritionally balanced diet.

What I learned about food and health:

I am super interested in nutrition research and how what we eat impacts our overall health both physically and mentally. (One of my favourite resources which you should definitely check out is Dr. Greger's website [9]) So throughout the duration of the challenge I did a lot of thinking about how this diet would impact my health through the week and how it would impact on the health of those refugees who have no choice but to live on this type of diet day in and day out for an undefined length of time.

Physically: I am a pretty small person, (female, 162cm tall, 53kgs heavy) and so this diet actually provided for me pretty well in terms of caloric intake - I wasn't hungry at all throughout the week which I can imagine others doing the challenge definitely would have been, so I was lucky in that respect. However, that said, I didn't feel GREAT - especially towards the end of the week I most notably lacked energy and did feel a little faint but nothing I couldn't handle and I'm sure had I spent more time on this diet my body would have adapted to it a little bit better.

Mentally: Our diet impacts SO heavily on our mental health **This is one of the leading reasons why I chose to transition to a vegan diet - I'm sure I'll write about this in another post on this blog**. Perhaps I, suffering from some pretty severe mental health issues, should've considered how this would effect my journey before I chose to undertake this challenge. But at the same time, I consider myself a pretty strong advocate for disadvantaged people and this gives me an awesome platform to spread awareness about mental health and diet. People who have gone through traumatic experiences can develop mental disorders such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder [10] (PTSD) and Depression [11]. Experiencing displacement from one's home and seeking refuge in a refugee camp can be considered traumatic experiences, and so refugees are ALREADY at higher risk for developing mental illness, this coupled with the fact that they are given inadequate nutrition means that they're not being given the right tools to be healthy and happy. Throughout the challenge and just afterwards I experienced quite a big relapse in my Major Depression Disorder. It may not have been solely caused by the limited diet but I think it's fair to assume it did play some part. I think we should be looking after refugees better and providing them with more adequate nutrition to care for their health properly.

What I learned about donations and moral obligation:

This is an interesting one, and I do want to share my thoughts on this; however, I am conscious that this is a very sensitive topic. I don't hold it against any individual at all who chose not to donate to my cause OR who chooses not to donate to any charity or cause. So I want to make it clear I am NOT shaming anyone in any way, I just want to share how I feel about donation, and about charity, and how I apply that to my own life's journey. I'm fully aware that most people choose to donate to charities that fit and promote their own values and I have a deep respect for that; there are just so many causes that deserve our money, and I wish there was less of a need in this world. I do *perhaps reluctantly* believe that we are perfectly entitled within the law to do what we like with the money we earn (after tax of course). However, I think in the western world we are often oblivious to just how much privilege we really have and we are not aware of just how much impact a small amount of money could have on the lives of others. I know my view on the subject is not shared by everyone but I feel that we should feel morally obligated to share our wealth with others and try *at least a little* to help redistribute opportunity across the world. Not only that, but giving to others is not a loss in any way, and the benefit to oneself of demonstrating altruism and kindness is actually massive and it goes as far as to affect your life expectancy! This planet is so broken, so corrupt, and so horrible - but we are often blissfully unaware of this on a daily basis. I think our cultural attitude to donation and to requests for money is potentially problematic in that we DON'T see donating to charity as an obligation, and that we see it as an annoyance when people promote their causes. People often have a visceral reaction to requests for money, and I'm not sure exactly why this is the case but when asking for donations I found you must be extremely careful as to what language you use. I do hope I did not come across as pushy at all. One of the things I have found is that people with LESS often *not always* want to give MORE and do generally give more in proportion to their wealth than those who are relatively affluent. This is an interesting phenomenon, and I think I attribute this to an empathetic response and an understanding of how hard it is to struggle, how it feels to have less or have to make do with not enough. I wish everyone felt an inherent empathy towards all other members of the human race - it sure would solve a lot of problems. On the whole though, I experienced a huge amount of support both monetary and otherwise, from my community and I am hugely grateful for all the amazing people who I spoke to throughout this challenge and how kind they were to me and how supportive they were that I was trying to raise money for this cause.

What did I raise?

I am still raising money for this cause (PLEASE consider donating, you can do so: HERE) until September 2018. I heavily campaigned on facebook throughout my challenge and as well as raising over $4,000 in funds to support refugees throughout the world via Act For Peace, I think I've done a pretty good job in raising awareness for who these people are, what they go through, and how we can help.

I am SO grateful to Act For Peace for setting up this challenge. Taking part in it has been an amazing experience and I have really valued everything I have experienced and learned as a consequence. I am so humbled by the outpouring of support I have received from family and friends and the amount of money I have been able to raise for the cause. I'm very thankful to everyone's patience as I have tirelessly posted about refugees, messaged people, tagged people, and bugged people throughout the whole challenge. AND I'm thankful for YOU you amazing person, for reading this WHOLE post and getting all the way to the bottom. I hope this was a valuable article to you, please let me know what you think via the comments. BIG BIG love to you. Let's change the world together one step at a time.