Our founding story
Refugease was born of immediate and direct response to a photo, of which this picture is an illustration (by Yante Ismail), hitting global headlines overnight.
On 2nd September, 2015, a three-year-old Syrian boy named Alan Kurdi changed our lives forever. Alan tragically drowned in the Mediterranean sea as his family were trying to reach Europe.
Upon seeing the photo of Alan Kurdi hit her social media feeds, Refugease Founder, set up a simple Facebook event at a local music venue in an urgent attempt to gather aid to be sent to Europe. The event went viral, attracting thousands of willing individuals to donate items on the ‘needs’ lists that were circulating social media groups.
After a colossal outpouring of generosity from the public, we collected four double-decker buses of aid over a period of two days; we were very lucky indeed to have been donated a warehouse.
Refugease, the charitable organisation, was born.
Since this day, we have not stopped collaborating, researching, collecting, fundraising, crying, laughing, responding, and adapting. We focus mainly on helping refugees in transit. We do this by providing frontline evacuations, where conflicts are at their most precarious, and distributing emergency survival aid for people who we deem to be the most vulnerable. We also work on self-reliance projects, providing formal education for refugee children in Jordan, up-skill adult refugees into employment, and have begun work building hydroponic farming systems. This work is mainly powered by our Aid Shop - an innovative online platform where donors purchase the survival items refugees need most. Each purchase is fulfilled locally by our teams, meaning aid reaches people instantly. Donors know exactly where their money goes, while we avoid the delays, costs, and border complications caused by drastic overnight changes in customs processes caused by events like Brexit, Covid, wars, or road closures.
Alan Kurdi did not die in vain; the graphic reporting of his untimely death created an instant and long-term tidal wave of action and compassion; a global movement took place, of which Refugease is honoured to play a small part.
Above all, we learned that inaction will not protect us; inaction only supports the oppressor.
Our first aid trip.
The Balkans
Our very first aid delivery here on a border crossing between Croatia and Hungary, where approximately fifty refugee families were stuck overnight in the rain. Valentina (pictured third from the right) is still running the charity today.
3am, one night in October (2015)
The Migration | Refugease First Aid Trip. Zákány, Hungary (2015)
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