LEBANON / SYRIA RAGDOLLS

Shamsa and Thuha fled Aleppo, Syria, with their family when they were just seven and five years old, respectively. One of the things they miss the most is playing with their cousins and making ragdolls together. UNHCR

• Categories: News & Features / News Stories / Unifeed
• Video Length: 00:02:23
• Production Date: 29 March 2016
• Asset Language: Arabic
• Corporate Name: UNITED NATIONS HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR REFUGEES - UNHCR
• Subject Topical: CHILDREN IN ARMED CONFLICTS; REFUGEE CAMPS
• Geographic Subject: LEBANON; SYRIA
• MAMS Id: 1591981
• Parent Id: 1591981
• Alternate Title: unifeed160329c

Description

STORY: LEBANON / SYRIA RAGDOLLS
TRT: 02:23
SOURCE: UNHCR
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ARABIC / NATS

DATELINE: 1-4 FEBRUARY, 2016, BEKAA VALLEY, LEBANON

Shotlist

1. Wide shot, tented settlement where Shamsa and Thuha live
2. Wide shot, refugee children playing football
3. Med shot, Shamsha and Thuha walking back from school
4. Wide shot, Shamsha and Thuha walking towards their tent greeting their parents
5. Med shot, Shamsa goes inside the tent
6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“Planes would pass by and drop barrels, we got scared, hid and started crying.”
7. Wide shot, Shamsa and Thuha sitting down inside their tent preparing to make ragdolls
8. Close up, Thuha cutting a piece of fabric with scissors
9. Pan right, ragdolls on the floor
10. Close up, Shamsa’s face
11. Close up, Thuha’s hands sewing fabric
12. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“My mother in Syria taught us how to make dolls. Then when we came here she told Shamsa and me, why don’t you start making dolls like we used to do in Syria.”
13. Med shot, Shamsa sewing hair on her doll
14. Wide shot, the sisters working
15. Close up, hair being sewn on the dolls head
16. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“I bring a piece of fabric and I sew it. When I finish, I turn it over and fill it inside.”
17. Wide shot, sisters sewing
18. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“Then I fit the head on. The hair comes last.”
19. Various shots, sisters sewing
20. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“I make them. It’s better than having someone else make them and sell them to me.”
21. Close up, mother’s face
22. Close up, sewing machine
23. Med shot, Shamsa sewing
24. Wide shot, Thuha and Shamsa walking outside their tent
25. Wide shot, sisters walking Bekaa mountain in background
26. Wide shot, sisters walking past tents
27. Med shot, sisters walking with the dolls in their hand
28. Wide shot, sisters walking with the dolls in their hand
29. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“We miss our cousins and toys; we hid the ones in Syria in a bag in the outdoor clay oven”.
30. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“They probably got burned now because someone needed the oven.”
31. Pan left, girls studying

Storyline

Shamsa and Thuha fled Aleppo, Syria, with their family when they were just seven and five years old, respectively. One of the things they miss the most is playing with their cousins and making ragdolls together.

The family has been living as refugees in a tent in Lebanon for three years now. Shamsa and Thuha’s father lost his eyesight to diabetes. Their mother struggles to pay the rent, buy medication and feed the family with the aid they get.

Shamsa remembers being scared when bombs started falling on their neighbourhood. When the family ultimately fled, the girls feared for the fate of the dolls, so they put them in a bag and hid them in the clay oven in their garden.

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“Planes would pass by and drop barrels, we got scared, hid and started crying.”

Using leftover fabric from their mother’s tailoring work; the girls have gone back to making ragdolls.

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“My mother in Syria taught us how to make dolls. Then when we came here she told Shamsa and me, why don’t you start making dolls like we used to do in Syria.”

That was just the nudge they needed.

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“I bring a piece of fabric and I sew it. When I finish, I turn it over and fill it inside.”

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“I make them. It’s better than having someone else make them and sell them to me.”

The dolls are made up of leftover fabric from their mother’s tailoring work.

The aid they get is spent on paying rent and medicine for their sick father, so they live in debt.

But Shamsa and Thuha are too young to understand these struggles.

They miss Syria because they had more fun there.

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Shamsa, Syrian Refugee:
“We miss our cousins and toys; we hid the ones in Syria in a bag in the outdoor clay oven.”

SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Thuha, Syrian Refugee:
“They probably got burned now because someone needed the oven.”

Doll making keeps their memories of home alive.

Shamsa wants to be a tailor, Thuha a doctor to treat her father.