Well, they are obviously not paved with gold and the food is shit also.
But, maybe they have family/friends in england or feel they have a better chance at work there. The point is – why shouldn’t they come to england and see for themselves if they want to? Afterall, you can go to France whenever you feel like. can’t you?

When asked about the camp, chatting with a group of Iranians and Kurds still living at the NB camp site, they said they were happy with the camp, they appreciated the showers, the food and the police relatively left them alone during the camp, though it was difficult to get into the camp past the police. It was quieter in the ‘jungles’, but after the camp the police have been worse (one of our concerns), “you fucking asylum seekers” was quoted as a common bit of French community policing. More racism was mentioned.

People liked lots of activists coming, but then when everyone goes, and it’s still hard (or impossible) to get to England, they wonder where people are who can help them. Also there have been more plain clothes police patrolling the lorry park up on the other side of the motorway from the camp.

Talking to an Afghan in another ‘jungle’, when asked how we could work together more, WITH migrants not FOR them his two main suggestions where to get action medics over here (he was interested in the whole action medic set up we have) as he could put them in touch with migrants with medic skills and they could work together to provide medic aid – the PASS clinic is near the centre of town and it is common for police to pick people up on the way there, especially as lot of people if they are injured can’t run away, and drop them off 3km out of town. Nice eh? Common injuries are from police attacks – physical beatings and asthma related stuff from tear gas, and injuries from attempting to get onto lorries, either from the lorries themselves and their contents or being stabbed by people smugglers of you have a go without having paid your fee.

The other suggestion was to get in touch with Afghans (in the case of his community) with status in UK who could come to Calais and offer solidarity. This would deal with language issues. Problem here though is that if you have Refugee status in UK you still need a visa to travel (to France as well I think), and it’s obviously not a safe place for anyone who isn’t white.

Nice article above by the way, and interesting comments. Refreshing after ploughing through the shit that stands for comment on indymedia at the moment

An important update: The French government are planning to evict one or more of the jungles THIS WEEK, in a big ‘clear up’. Solidarity and support is needed – there is a demo at the French embassy on Monday 20th July, 12.30-2pm at Knightsbridge in London SW1X 7JT; also see http://calaismigrantsolidarity.wordpress.com/

while conflict amongst the migrants is hardly any surprise, and i wouldn’t wish to cover that up, people – calaisians, afghans, kurds most of the time got on well – particpated together in the putting together of the camp – and in the final decsion making. in retrospect, there was clearly going to be sexism issues – which i think it is fair to say that no one had given any serious thought too before the camp. i guess

i don’t want to diminish the importance of the potential loss of your favourite knife, but given the massive issues we were attempting to address at the camp I question whether the minor theft (s) were really worth reporting ?

workshop wise, i put on the workshops that had been offered, the call out for workshops only went put 2 months before the camp started, and with uncertainty about structure (whether we would have any!) the workshop co-ordinator done the best he could. sorry if it wasn;t good enough. – maybe you could contribute to it next time if you have any better ideas/ more time to put into it.

thanks for the food though.