New Year's

On the occasion of the New Year, Al-Nahren charity held a celebration for Iraqi kids in Damascus in the big church in Jaramaneh area where a lot of Iraqi refugees live there.

January 3rd was a good day for my students because I was able to get 15 tickets for them to the celebration. The amazing thing that the Christians and Muslims kids celebrated together in the church without prejudice, and everybody enjoyed themselves.

The gathering included Iraqi clowns and distribution of gifts for the children. There were about 300 kids at the celebration, as well as Iraqi actors, staff from the Iraqi embassy and some Iraqi volunteers in the UNHCR.

The clowns were able to put smiles on the kids' faces even though this is a difficult time — in the winter it's cold here and the students need many clothes and not all of them have heating systems and if they do it's very expensive this winter, because power is getting more expensive and everybody knows that the Iraqi refugees haven't any income in Syria.

Three months ago the UNHCR stopped the food system to Iraqi families in Syria, we don't know if they will continue or not. I think if they stop assisting refugees for much longer they will return back to the dangers of Iraq.