Social Design Co-op: Refugee Academy with Christian Action

dots.

From dots to a circle : A co-design project with the refugees in Hong Kong

00. 04

Project Documentation

A co-design project with the refugees in Hong Kong

Design Process

Table of content

Chapter 0

Difficulties

Chapter 1 Resolving

Situations of the refugees in HK Solutions for the challenges Building a local-refugee community Bringing locals and refugees together A sustainable local-refugee community

Chapter 4

Sustainability

Chapter 3 Connection

Chapter 2 Elements

How are refugees a part of the Hong Kong community, and in what ways can the connections be acknowledged and built?

Introduction

How are refugees a part of the Hong Kong community, and in what ways can the connections be acknowledged and built?

Throughout the 2-month period from September to November 2019, a team of 14 final year students from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University School of Design with the course tutor, project coordinator Kam Fai, has been working closely with Christian Action- Centre for Refugees (Client), engaging refugees* (End user) and local Cantonese-speakers (End user) to co-design a platform for relationsbuilding.

# For easier reference, unless otherwise specified, the term “refugees” is used to refer to all end users/ client-referred asylum seekers. Nonetheless, differences between “refugees” and asylum-seekers should not be overlooked as they host different positions in the procedures and regulations. More on this will be covered in PART 0. Difficult situations of refugees in Hong Kong.

Roles, Objectives & Methods

Presented with the limitations of the present law regulations and policies, the role of designers in this project is to create more favourable conditions for community-building so that the endusers can adapt to daily life challenges with bottom-up support, thereby recognizing the spectrum of HongKong cultural diversity. Despite our recurring process of redefining and solving the key design problem, the objective of facilitating a more dynamic and inclusive refugee-HongKongese-community for stronger socialcultural bonding has remained firmly in the position since the very beginning. Transitioning from the perspective of designing “for” to designing “with” refugees, building meaningful relations, opening up diverse communication channels alongside with primary and secondary research about this humanitarian controversy and fluid form of multicultural interaction have topped our agenda.

Given the short time period, a more active form of research have made up the major part of our research and design process for more direct response, methods of practice including but not limited to site visits, interviews, discussions, home visits and joining existing activities for community members. Eventually, we have come to realise the inability to interpret, learn and use a new language may not only be the cause of daily life obstacles, but also the consequence of an underlying problem, the lack of local connections and incentive to build them.

Christian

Action Overview Centre for Refugees

The Centre has been our window to the refugee community, the contact point between designers and end users, which provides necessary monetary and facility resources as well as valuable opinion in special regards to concerns, projections and feedback of such a sensitive issue. Established in 2004 in the Chungking Mansions, often refugees’ first port of call and a place to find support, this non-governmental organization is the only dropin service center and community for this group of minorities in Hong Kong.

Serving the most vulnerable—including victims of torture, war, genocide and other acts of persecution from Africa, the Middle-East, and parts of South Asia facing conflict, the Centre is concerned about their clients’ their social, financial, cultural, and mental wellbeing. With the support of a comprehensive support system of professionals such as pro-bono counselors ranging from clinical psychologists, counselors, social workers, an art therapist, a play therapist and life coach, the team is purposed to fill a vital gap between humanitarian welfare and government aid by providing emergency shelter, food, education, counselling, and community support with a vision is to see refugees become empowered, engaged, valued, and respected members of society.

Description

Beneficiaries

3000 (+) refugees in the Centre system – 10-20 new referrals every month.

Services and Activities

Provision of basic necessities such as food, emergency housing, clothes, and other basic needs

Case work, advice , referrals to partner agencies and other AS&R serving organizations

Education support (including transportation to school)

- Empowerment and recreation programs

Psycho-social support and counseling

Advocacy for AS&R issues

Outreach to the Hong Kong community on AS&R

As seen from the activity whiteboard, the Centre has a packed class schedule with several focused areas 1) language-learning, 2)hobbies and entertainment and 3) life and work coaching. They are also actively engaged with other community and academy-related programmes, often invited for cultural exchange guests and as research participants.

1) Cantonese Beginner class, English Beginner class, BC IELTS

2) Football training women’s group guitar, yoga class

3) Homework support, positive parenting, baby health Workshop

Receiving client brief From Centre for Refugees

With all and certainly more knowledge from above, the Christian Action Centre of Refugee suggested several urgent / practical needs of their clients during the initial meetings, language inability and ineffectiveness of online communication. “A set of language-learning tools” was first initiated as the solution to these concerns,the “difficult situations”, which led us to our first round of investigation.

Design Brief

A. Intro

Refugees are one of the most fragile groups in the world, since they are politically excluded and persecuted by their own people, while often culturally rejected by other people. In Hong Kong, refugees are often misunderstood and loathed too, if not simply neglected, by the local. Design knowledge may be useful in intervening this difficult situation.

Cooperating with the Centre for Refugees established by Christian Action (the first and only community centre for refugees and asylum seekers in Hong Kong), students will participate in a community-making project with the refugees and their families. From the project, students will learn from the refugees' singular life experience (their intercultural competence, intellectual capacity and global perspectives) and understand their vulnerability and aspirations. They will design with the refugees a set of language- learning tools, which is at the same time a community-generating medium.

B. Objectives:

(1) To facilitate the refugees to learn Cantonese via exchanging cultural experience with locals in HK;

(2) To enable two-way learning and communication between the refugees and the local;

(3) To experiment and experience a community-making process with the refugees.

C. Design Outcomes:

(1) Students will design with the users (refugees and locals, adults and children) a set of language learning tools, focusing on some cultural theme(s), e.g. food, music, religion, festival or others;

(2) The designed tools should support and enable equal communication and reciprocal understanding between the refugees and the local;

(3) The entire design process and experience will be regarded as a significant outcome to be documented systematically -- since it will be one of the first co-design projects with refugees in HK.

Design Objectives

Exchanging cultural experience by learning Cantonese

Community-making with the refugees

Two-way learning

Design process

Evaluating the client brief

After receiving the client brief, base on the above objectives, we tried to understand our real client in Hong Kong. As refugees are sensitive and special to all Hong Kong locals, knowing the difficulties will help for the design. Therefore, the first step of the design is to evaluate the client brief and research for the situation of refugees in Hong Kong. Since we are not familiar with the client, asking questions will be the approach for us in the whole design process.

What

Policies and procedures

Since Hong Kong had not signed “Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees” of the United Nation in 1951, there is no law and regulations relating to refugee rights and government responsibilities. Hong Kong has only signed the “The United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment”

聯合國禁止酷刑公約 , which only means Hong Kong cannot return the person back to the original country that may have tortured someone. So, theoretically, Hong Kong has no responsibility for giving shelter to the refugees, but only the transfer station before the refugees finally settle down in a country.

Hong Kong has a "long-established policy of not granting asylum and we do not admit individuals seeking refugee status"

求難民身份的人 citing fears that asylum seekers would abuse the system given the prosperity of the city's economy and liberal visa policy. The attitude of the Hong Kong government towards refugees is under “not-welcoming” policy. The procedure of the refugee application is complicated and timeconsuming. The system only allows application after the valid staying period is over, which means the asylum seekers have to stay illegally.

Difficulties dots.

UNHCR: responsible for the case of Non-refoulement Claim

Immigration Department : responsible for Torture Claiant, etc (雙軌審核機制)

Unified Screening Mechanism (統一審核機制)

- Review the case of asylum seekers

- Granting refugee status

- Long-term planning for the claimant, such as third country transfer

of UNHCR

Long-term planning for the claimant, such as third country transfer

Verify the case of torture claimant

of Immigration Department

Verify all Non-refoulement Claims (including Torture Claimant and asylum seekers)

N/A

Role of Hong Kong Courts

Appeal for the rejection of claims made by Immigration Department

A higher acceptance rate for asylum seekers’ torture claims came after a 2014 ruling that meant immigration officers had to give equal weight to the prospect of “cruel, inhumane or degrading” treatment of a torture claimant’s return to where they came from.

Hong Kong has a non-refoulement screening mechanism to protect refugees from being sent to a place where they might be persecuted. Once such a claim is substantiated, the claimant is referred to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for consideration of resettlement in a third country. That process, however, can take more than 10 years.

System

Role

Role

Definitions Aplication System

According to Immigration Department data, the city has more than 11,100 claims outstanding under the nonrefoulement policy. That backlog of claims would take more than five years to resolve at the current rate of 2,000 a year.

Key point 1:

Hong Kong is never the destination of refugees or asylum seekers. In fact, most of the time, this small group of people had almost no choice when and where they have to escape to because of time and resource limitations.

Definitions

Aplication System

Key point 2: Difference between “Refugees” and “Asylum seekers”

Problem: The system only allows application after the valid staying period is over, meaning applicants have to break the law to hand in applications, thus exerting a negative “criminal” image on them.

0.2

Reality

Reality

Maintain living in Hong Kong

Under the “not-welcoming” policy of the Hong Kong government, the asylum seekers and the Nonrefoulement Claims applicants will not get assistance directly from the government departments. All along, the NGO to operate the said humanitarian assistance programme has been selected by the Social Welfare Department (SWD) through open and fair tendering exercises. At present, the assistance programme is operated by the International Social Service Hong Kong Branch (ISS-HK). Items covered by the assistance include:

Assistance Item Assistance received by each service user / month

Food $1,200

Accommodation (Rent Allowance) $1,500 (adult) $750 (child)

Utilities $300

Transportation Allowance $200 to $420

Other Basic Necessities Provided to service users in kind

They can also receive fee waivers for:

- Medical services from public hospitals and clinics (other than Emergency Services, which are available to all),

- A tuition waiver for school (HKSAR Education Department Bureau)

0.3 Daily Life Challenges

0.3

Daily Life Challenges

Daily Life Challenges

Refugees face problems of different layers of needs, ranging from the lack of basic daily necessities to social disconnection and mental fatigue. It is not possible for us to see the full picture within such a short period of time, but we do see our version of challenges they face and are organising them here under the main area of “psychological ill-being”.

Psychological ill-being

Even with the support of more schools being willing to take these children, no matter how well they as students perform, they cannot be presented in front of the public. There have been countless cases of refugee children losing overseas growth and development opportunities such as competitions and exchange trips just because of their in-born “flaw” of lacking an “identity”. They are isolated from the Hong Kong society and its resources network.

Due to language inability, cultural barriers, misleading media and politician influence, refugees often find it hard to adapt to the local community which has already formed negative stereotypes upon this group of minorities. In addition to the complexity of Chinese language, the fact that they may not live here for the rest of their lives further limits their intention to actively try and learn the local language, especially when they can sometimes get by with English. In fact, the majority of refugees we have met do not speak English as their first or even second language, making English the more effective language channel of communication under such harsh conditions. Some interviewees also responded the unfriendly association the language has with the strict faces of Hong Kong people makes it even more unwelcoming a language to learn. Although eventually they understand it is usually not the locals’ intention to scare off people, the newcomers still find the expressionless faces and strong tone of language a bit too intimidating. That is why most refugees do not and are not motivated to speak the local tongue.

Refugees Standing Up: 2014 Occupation Movement Against Food Manipulation

Apart from those between local volunteers, community connections with “locallocal” i.e. Chinese speakers are rarely seen among the refugee community. Some cases that involve sensitive religious beliefs also stop refugees from communicating with other members of the local ethnic minority group they belong to, for example a Pakistani women who positions herself in the Ahamadiya Muslim community, which is a religious branch banned in her home country, would avoid interaction with other Pakistanis in Hong Kong to get rid of offensive or embarrassing moments. suffer from immense disappointment from their very limited interpersonal relationships. One male interviewee, a former lawyer revealed his personal experience by saying “Most of them (other Hong Kong residents) will cut their ties with you. Because they look at u differently or from a different angle. It’s not good to be a refugee in Hong Kong”.

In addition to their dimmed prospects, asylum seekers whose application are still in progress, are afraid the immigration would send them back to the places where they have escaped from, where freedom and basic rights are striped off. Another single mother of a young child said, “Maybe it’s better I die together with my son because I don’t have any friends and family (if I have to go back)”. Under such a constant state of anxiety and depression, but have no right to work or make a living so that ends can be met, this forms an upsetting situation where in reality they barely have anything to live for. The hope for successful transfer to the third party country and settle down there is their last straw but before that, asylum seekers feel like they have and are “nothing”. It is the despair of having the experience, skills, labour but not being able to utilize them and grow as an individual, failing to make any progress that makes their life “hopeless”.

Symptoms, as reported by the Centre

• Hopelessness

• Loneliness

• Suicidal ideation

• Substance misuse and abuse

• Low self-esteem

• Irritability and anger outbursts

• Sleep disturbance and nightmares

• Physical problems: headaches, stomach pains, increased heart rate

After comprehending the general story of refugees in Hong Kong, we cannot emphasize more the fact that unlike all false claims from untruthful media and politicians, the existence of refugees is not for the sake of overtaking local resources, but rather a demonstration of a pure form of political struggle, fight for freedom, like all other HongKongese since 2019 summer. We are all living in the same place striving for basic human rights, as simple as this.

Below is an encouraging story that happened 5 years ago when the refugee and asylum seekers community pulled themselves together and called for righteous treatment, who eventually, received a response upfront and changes in the way of doing from the organization.

In 2014 February, a research by the South China Morning Post supported claims that food provided to asylum seekers was 30% cheaper than International Social Service (ISS-HK) contracted by the government.The investigation, based on complaints from refugees and their union, has prompted calls from non-governmental organisations and human-rights lawyers for an overhaul of the support system for asylum seekers.

“Dozens of members of the newly formed Refugee Union, an association of refugees that represents nationals of many countries seeking asylum in Hong Kong, entered three offices of the government contracted service provider, and demanded a stop to what they claimed are ‘unfair’ practices... Faced with ISS-HK staff unwilling to concede to their demands, Refugee Union members began the ‘Occupy ISS’ movement. Inspired by similar occupation movements that in recent years have taken place worldwide to combat inequality forced by globalization and perpetrated by governments supporting neoliberal economic principles, Union members staged a week-long protest, occupying the offices of their service provider in order to ensure their demands were given due consideration... The occupation ended with a court injunction that forced refugees to vacate the premises before receiving any meaningful reply. “ (Vecchio and Beatson, 2014)

Significance:

1) Importance of collective action towards successful change/ execution of demands

2) Role of protestors being their own agency of actions for changes and no longer through other mouthpieces

3) Evaluation on safe and fair response strategy against criticism from government or other irresponsible legco member or media press

Negative image built by false claims from the authorities

Meanwhile, the movement had to stand all other biased reports and voices which labelled them as source of “danger, filth, terrible aggressiveness”, which includes government officials. On March 30, 2016, the President of the EOC agreed the very much outdated and inhumane “solution” of setting up an enclosed refugee camp.

At the same time, the Immigration once claimed all unaccepted applications i.e. every case other than the 48 successful ones out of the total of 6000, were “fake refugees”, a highly misleading statement which overlooked the true reasons for failed recognition of applicants’ sufferings. In fact, the screening mechanism is far from comprehensive and not yet up to the international standard as the types of persecution considered “valid” are limited without regarding the diverse cultural context of each case. For instance, women who are to be persecuted by the family is not considered a valid claim because it belongs to the unique "cultural aspect" of each country, which is not a part of the office’s concerns

By

solving which difficulty will be effective for the refugee to have a better living in HK?

Is/ are communication tool(s) essential to resolving the difficult situations of refugees in HK?

To understand the difficulties encountered by the refugees and further look into their situation. Hence, a more detail analysis can be conducted in order to tackle the problems.

1.1 Problem Challenges faced by the refugees

Refugees are facing different tough situations in Hong Kong. Many of them are suffering from deficient protection in political rules and law. Fixing those deeply embedded problems within 2 months is an unfeasible goal for us to achieve. Even though we cannot solve the problem from regulation, designing language learning tool is a possible direction to start our design project.

Based on the previous desktop research and sharing from case workers from Christan Action, there are some reasons that can support our assumption. Lack of communication tool is one of the concerns that we think refugees probably do not know Cantonese before. It is hard to enter the local communities in daily. Speaking fluent Cantonese can eliminate the language barriers between refugees and locals. Children found that learning Cantonese in school is not easy. Designing the language tools may be effective for them to learn verbally. Most of the news and newspapers in HK are written in Chinese. Lacking of Cantonese language causes refugee cannot receive those information in Hong Kong efficiently. Based on those results, we believe that refugees may need to pick up Cantonese.

Observing refugee’s activities is efficient to understand their daily life in the centre.

Client / From Cameroon Activity

Stayed in the centre of Christian Action to watch the news and also to charge his smartphone

Internetional News on TV

Showing the current situation in Hong Kong

1. Centre Visit

There were some clients always stay in the centre leisure area to watching TV channels and playing video games. In the centre visit, we discovered that a client was watching the international news broadcasting channel with English subtitles, there is one of the ways for receiving non-written information. For client’s background, he only know a little oral Cantonese sentence such as hello, good morning, and thank you, even though he stay in Hong Kong for 2 years.

During the centre visit, we found that some clients might have different opinions towards learning Cantonese.

Mr. Mustafa, who has stayed for 7 years in Hong Kong, said that he has no friends in Hong Kong but he still wants to learn Cantonese. Speaking cantonese may only help in Park’N Shop because the cashiers do not know English.

Mr. Karmander who has stayed for 5 years in Hong Kong, he finds nothing to do in his daily but not interested in learning Cantonese, he believed that learning Cantonese is useless in his daily life.

To understand the real situation of learning Cantonese language of refugee, our team members started observation and joined some relative classes provided by Christan Action including centre visit, Cantonese beginner class, and women wellbeing group.

1.1 Mapping

To understand refugee’s scenario of speaking Cantonese, we invited two clients to draw a daily route map, once is staying in Hong Kong for 3.5 years, he can speak some simple Cantonese. Another one is a newcomer, he cannot speak Cantonese.

Client / Manoj

Manoj is living in Hong Kong for 3.5 years

He can speak some Cantonese in order to make friends with locals and help him easier to chat with locals in everyday life. Compare to Amine Aissaoni, ChungKing Mansion is not a place that he always stays in, he only joins the interest classes and leave immediately after the class. According to his sharing, he treats Hong Kong as his home, he hopefully can make some friends with locals. Sometimes, he will randomly chat with local strangers by speaking Cantonese in the star ferry and outside of iSquare, because the practising with local strangers can easily connect to the local communities.

Additionally, Manoj has different communities in Hong Kong. Manoj not only shared their experience of making friends to locals but also shared the place he often goes to. Jubilee Ministries is his main community, there are many refugees stay together. He mentioned that he almost joins all activities in the church when he has time, therefore he makes many friends, who also have similar backgrounds, from different activities provided by the church.

Client / Amine

Amine Aissaoni is a newcomer from Morocco, he is staying in Hong Kong for 2 months only.

Tsim Sha Tsui is a place that he always stays in, especially ChungKing Mansions, Kowloon Park, middle road children’s playground, and the star ferry. In his weekday route, he will start from ChungKing Mansions to the star ferry, he really enjoys the view of Victoria Harbour. In his weekend route, he will go to Kowloon Park to reading books with a natural and fresh environment. According the route map he drew, he only lives independently and engage with relative zones such as Christan Action and non-local drinking bars.

Findings

From Centre Visit and mapping

Findings One

/ There are insufficient English channels for clients to receiving information.

In addition to the international TV channels, there is a WhatsApp group for receiving news and announcements in English form provided by Christan Action. However, the English channels are not enough for clients live in Hong Kong, even though the local newspapers and TV channels, they almost are Chinese.

Findings Two

/ There are no common platform or channel to connect with locals.

In the client's daily life, some clients only stay in their comfort zone, they do not engage with locals. Even though some clients are willing to make friends with locals, their sustainable relationship cannot be maintained because of common language.

There is a Cantonese beginner class provided by Christan Action on every Monday, the class only teach clients to speak basic Canotnese sentences.

2. Cantonese Beginner Class

Both male and female are welcome to join the Cantonese beginner class. Generally, from Dr. Lok’s sharing, she mentioned that not many students will join the class, there are 4 to 6 students come normally.

Situation-based learning is a teaching method of the Cantonese beginner class, there are no clear class instruction and teaching plan, Dr. Lok always said that what Cantonese dialect you want to know. Significantly, the teaching content is different to the general class, even her teaching content is mistaken in sometime. For example, the syllable is not fully transfer from standard form, the Cantonese tone shift from nine tones to four tones. This is not to point out the teaching method of Dr. Lok is problematic, but we are questioning the effectiveness of learning Cantonese.

Situation in Cantonese Class

Teacher - Dr. Lok

Has been teaching Cantonese Class in Christian Action for 2 years. She believes that interaction is important for learning especially in languages.

Student - Manoj

Staying in Hong Kong for many years. He takes two Cantonese Class once a week because he wants to have more communication with the local.

" I treat Hong Kong as my second home."

Student - from Gambia Staying in Hong Kong for 5 years.

" Today is my third time joining the Cantonese Class."

" Planning for furture career in Hong Kong is the reason of learning Cantonese."

Facilitations

Two tables has already fit the class. A white board for jotting down the notes for students to revision after the class.

Meanwhile, there is another Cantonese language learning class provided by another organization, which is more well-organized and professional. After the Cantonese beginner class in Christan Action, Manoj invited us to visit another Cantonese class at Jubilee Ministries. In the same day, we joined and observed the class provided by Jubilee Ministries. Before we started the class, class notes were provided by teachers. During the class, there was a local or people, who can speak Cantonese fluently, be a leader to guide and check student’s pronunciation individually. Most importantly, students can also take revision after the class through play back the voice recording materials and send direct message to teachers. This Cantonese learning class is more systematic and well-prepared for students who would like to learn the language.

Findings From Cantonese Beginning Class

Findings One

Reasons for learning Cantonese is from wide to narrow

There are three main reasons that clients are learning Cantonese. Some of them are free, therefore they join the class to kill time. Some of them hope to enter the local communities easily, so they try to learn some basic Cantonese sentences. Some of them are willing to make more friends with locals, therefore they want to learn more Cantonese for practise more.

Findings Two

No uniformed and accreditable Cantonese class

Compared with Cantonese beginner class in Christan Action and Cantonese learning class in Jubilee Ministries, the teaching methods and plans are totally different. If some clients will join both Cantonese class at the same time, they might be confused in the learning process, especially the Cantonese tone and syllable.

The class is an English class where all participants, no matter the teacher or students, are both refugee or asylum seeker. Apart from using the usual methods to teach English, the teacher tends to encourage the students to speak in English actively by discussing the interesting topic.

3. Women Wellbeing Group

This is a class organized by Christian Action on every Wednesday afternoon. During the class observation, we felt energetic because of them. Even the students were using simple phase to express themselves, they tried their best to discuss in English. After the class, we approached the participants — Student Afia and tutor Uzma. They have stayed in Hong Kong for more than 4 years and both from Pakistan. The reason why they escape to Hong Kong is attributed to their religion. Ahmadiya Muslim Community is not accepted by Muslim in Pakistan. If they stay in there, they might be killed by the radical parties.

Client / Uzma

Uzma is an active member in Christian Action, when she joined the workshop organized in outside, she might be able to get in touch with Local Hong Kong people. For instance, she went to secondary school for sharing the pakistan culture and women’s life in Pakistan, then she needs to talk with the students. But that would not be a sustainable relationship.

Even there are some the Pakistani in Hong Kong, she feels they are not friendly to them. They came to Hong Kong for 4 years, none of the local Pakistani, who was born in Hong Kong or came to Hong Kong for a long period, became their friend.

For her son, Sabi. He is studying in Hong Kong but he hates cantonese. It is quite diverse nationality in his class — Local Chinese, Local Pakistani, Local Nepali, Local Indian and some refugees. However, It has different gaps in his class even for local minorities with refugees. He has not much connected with local chinese, only interacting with refugees’ classmates.

Her husband, Naveed was a graphic and textile designer, having a factory to produce his design. Since the refugee policy in Hong Kong is not allow them to work, he became unemployed. This is the reason why he felt depressed in Hong Kong. However, he kept drawing at home everyday, which becomes his spiritual pillar. During this conversation with Uzma, she was eager to know any platform could let Naveed’s artworks to expose, like any chance to exhibit his work in PolyU or platform to sell his work.

Debating topics in the group: Should humans eat to live or live to eat?

Does money motivate people more than any other factor in the workplace?

Is age an important factor in relationship?

There are some sharing we think meaningful and inspired:

“ So busy with their life and business… If it works, it’s work only, no more... Welcome supermarket cashier lady seemed to be shouting at me… didn’t know the plastic bag fee policy here... like they don’t care if you buy or not, they look at me in the shop, I’m scared to touch or take things… When they see me, they see Pakistan, I want to be a good representation, I want to understand the culture. We don’t know the language, maybe this is the problem.”

“ Difficult to communicate, for example my old landlord in To Kwa Wan could not speak English at all. Luckily his daughters would translate for us.”

“ We’re proud to be here. Hong Kong is our home. It’s heartbreaking to see how people are treated because we saw it before. It’s not happening here, it’s everywhere!”.

“ We only had 2 hours to decide to go or not and where to go, even had to give much money to the immigration officer and refugee application agency. We’ve never heard of Hong Kong. It’s never a planned trip. Tried other countries but failed.”

Findings From Women Wellbeing Group

Finding One

Lack of connection with locals is more serious than the language problem

For Afia, she visits to Christian Action sometimes. Since they have limited source in Hong Kong, they’ve got a few options no matter buying food, or activity. When we talked about the connection with Hong Kong people, she thinks Hong Kong culture is hard to integrate. First, old people cannot speak English. For Uzma, she is an active member in Christian Action. Apart from teaching a women English class, she willing to join “human library”, which is a story sharing session in some culture sharing workshop of university. Also, she participates Chinese class because she enjoys to learn a new language. However, there are not many refugees and asylum seekers are willing to learn Cantonese because it is too complicated to them. Even she has learnt Cantonese for a while, she only knows the basic knowledge, such as numbers 1-10, thank you and hello. To summarise their difficulty, different bonding in community and different cultures are the key. As they cannot speak cantonese fluently by learning in a short period, learning language cannot change the situation.

Finding Two

Clients are willing to connect with locals but not much chance

Living in Hong Kong is never easy for them. When we asked would they consider Hong Kong as their home, they answered that they would call Hong Kong their home even it is a mess now. When they feel suffering, here provides the reason for them to live. It expressed their sense of belonging to Hong Kong, even though they have got less connection with Locals.

Finding Three

Clients are more talented than we thought

Since building connection between clients and locals is a better alternative than making language tools for them. After the short conversation with Uzma and Afia, we found that Uzma has more experience to join different workshops and activities in Hong Kong. We tried to focus her living condition in Hong Kong more than the difficulties. About her life in Pakistan, they were a middle class family in Pakistan and her husband Naveed was a graphic and textile designer. Back to Uzma’s experience, they are living in a small place now. And the only local friend is her previous neighbourhood who is willing to share food, chatting with her. They became friends because of her neighbourhood shared wifi with their family when they first come to their place. It implicates that the interaction is the key connection instead of language.

One

After we visited the relative classes and interviewed with clients in Christan Action, we found that learning Cantonese is not essential to resolving the difficult situation faced by refugees.

People joining the Cantonese class or willing to learn Cantonese are usually not the newcomers but who have stayed for several years. The phenomenon of people coming Cantonese beginner class mainly are clients who are living in Hong Kong for a long time. They typically treat Hong Kong as their home. They are not dealing with basic communication to learn Cantonese, they want to understand the local cultures and stories through teacher’s sharing in the class, even they will chat with locals actively by using Cantonese. In order to understand about Hong Kong and locals, joining Cantonese class is one of the methods. Therefore, we found that making a connection between refugees and locals is significant instead of designing something to clients for learning Cantonese better.

Existing langauge course is sufficient

There are some Cantonese classes provided by different parties or organizations even more professional. After observed the Cantonese beginner class several times, there are a few clients to join the class. Many clients believe that it is not enough to learn Cantonese if they only join the Cantonese beginner class in Christan Action, therefore they will join another language learning class provided by other organization which is more systematic and well-organized. As long as they want to learn a language, they can find more resources in outside.

Two Three

Low moviation on learning Cantonese

Motivation of learning Cantonese is affected by the fact of lacking local community. After evaluate the route maps, we found that whether it is a newcomer or clients who live in Hong Kong for a long time, they have no platform or channel to connect with locals stably. Without the local zones, clients believe that speaking Cantonese is unnecessary. The fact of the lack of local community is the main reason that clients have no motivation to learn Cantonese. Moreover, some clients are willing to connect with locals, in fact, there is not much chance. Lacking of local community is the reason that they do not have any motivation to learn Cantonese in their comfort zone.

The clients who is staying longer in HK has greater interest on assimilating into the local community

During the conversation with different refugees, we found that they are willing to share with us about their own experiences, such as their cultural background, daily experiences or even their views to political issues in Hong Kong. But most of them do not able to speak chinese.

Cantonese is not a must to learn

Therefore, we tried to ask about their thoughts to cantonese, they think it is not necessary for them to learn. A Indian man, which come to Hong Kong for a few years, but he still does not know how to speak chinese. He said learning cantonese is too difficult. He has participated in a few chinese beginning class in Christian Action, but he thinks the pronunciation is too hard for him. The second reason is no necessity to learn. He mentioned his community does not require him to learn cantonese. And also mentioned ”I have no one to talk to if I learnt cantonese”.

Another refugees come from Nepal. He said he knew some chineses phrasing because his community has more local people. Sometimes when he needs to go to the wet market, so he has to learn a few phrases and words to communicate with the shop owner. But still, their normal routine in life do not require them to use Cantonese much.

Based on these daily experiences, we think the community is quite an important factor when deciding the language usage of a person. If we need to figure out the fundamental problems of refugee identity, it might be a lack of community platform for others to understand them. Besides, if their communities can be enlarged, not only more convenience can bring to them, but also the mental security of them to living in Hong Kong will be more secure.

Therefore, we encourage a friendly community to be established in order to enhance the self-identity recognition of them in Hong Kong. In our future direction, we would be focusing on how to connect and build a relationship with them in person. Thus, a more diversified and harmony community can be built.

Relationship metters. A friendly community will ease the language barriers among people.

What elements are available for local-refugee community building?

2.1 Problem

So far we don’t have an effective way to build the community for refugees, how can we tackle this problem? Refugees are a group of people escaping from other countries to strive for security and freedom. Other than that, they want identity and dignity, while awaiting for the confirmation of their application during their stay in HK for several years or even longer, they could get a sense of belonging provided by the community. The relationship with the local people is the biggest problem for refugees since many misconceptions from the public are existing. People think that refugees have used up their resources, moreover, many people pretend to be refugees so as to gain attention and get helped. The resistance between the locals and refugees should be torn down. Therefore, we need to find out the real perspective of both sides and seek consensus. Also, christian action is always playing a key role of a refugee centre that tries to help them measure their daily concern but can it also be a suitable place for the community building as well?

From physical well-being to social well-being. We did some field research on the home visit, kitchen in Christian Action and the storytelling class.

Description of Home visit

2.2 Finding Solution

2.2.2 Home Visit

Keeping contact with Uzma from one of the refugees meeting in the women's well-being class, we have the privilege opportunities to visit her household. Lots of pictures and videos of her husband Naveed’s Artworks are definitely worth to let more people to know.

Background of Naveed

Naveed was used to be a professional textile and fashion designer in Pakistan. He has factory workers to help him finish the design, and also having his own room with a large table to design.

Then, he became a refugee since 2015 because he is part of a religious minority in Pakistan. He wants to continue drawing when he came to Hong Kong, so collaborating with women community in Christian Action, insists on working and creating alone are the ways to continue.

About his drawing style, Mughal Art is what he keeps working on. In Pakistan, Mughal art is the key visual style Muslim fashion, for example, Pakistan women outfit “shalwar kameez” and more, so what he was doing in Pakistan was designing the pattern for Muslim fashion. Even he came to Hong Kong, he still fascinated with this style, and more focus on natural life related graphic. He practices Mughal art graphic on daily cloth accessories with cloth paint, cloth colour dye by free-hand with poster colour usually. However, he has to experimental and critical with materials due to price and material shortage.

Naveed’s Artworks

dots.

A demonstration of their place and drawing process

28 Sept | Uzma and Naveed home visit

Workplace and setting in Hong Kong

approx. 150-sq.ft shared flat

paintings sticks on the refrigerator.

2.2 Finding Solution : Home Visit

02 Elements

Uzma gave us some Pakistan’ snacks to welcome us.

He works at his home and always works on floor.

Sabi’s

A demonstration of their place and drawing process

2.2 Finding Solution : Home Visit

Tools

He store his tools under the bed, under the dressing table and inside the cabinet.

Highly consumed Long-term use Masking tape

Watercolour plate

Step of painting a pattern

layered poster colour drawing with inserted thread net.

Copy the pattern to another paper with tracing paper and painted in poster colour.

He has taught us the correct way to hold the paintbrush.

Works in Hong Kong

He made all artwork with these tools in Hong Kong.

Poster colour

Paintbrushes

Foam Towel Plastic bowl

Tote bag design and making

Ribbon square mates

Tie-dyed T-shirt, scarf, cushion-sheet

Layered poster colour drawing with inserted thread net

1.

1.

2.

2.

3.

3.

4.

5.

A demonstration of their place and drawing process

28 Sept | Uzma and Naveed home visit

Works in Pakistan

With the factory and large room at home, abundant cheap materials

School exercises

Pattern design practise

2.2 Finding Solution : Home Visit

Fashion design and making for his wife

02 Elements

Silk drawing practise

Findings on refugees’ knowledge from Home visit

Finding 1

The uniqueness we further see in craftsman’s work during home visit. Despite clients’ and maybe others’ expectations, the strongest emphasis about Naveed’s works is not the level of his delicate technique, but the daily strengthening process he absorbs himself into. It is what keeps him alive and passionate about something in life.

Naveed’s design pattern

The pattern designs of Mandala and symmetry is Naveed’s strength. His artistic style are flattened, neat, tidy, and wellorganised. Mostly, 3 primary colour-mixing and painting techniques are represented in his design work.

Beyond the craftsmanship, the level of sophistication lies in experimentation and perfection-seeking process, which contributes to maintaining his transformed social status despite challenging situation. From the slight cut-offs from the edge of the paper stencil, we immediately realise the efects of handcrafts will remain in the majority of men’s works for a long period of time, if not for good no matter how much love the craftsman has for his work and goals. Machines such as laser-cutters can always cut with more precision and efficiency, but these should not be the only pursuits of human civilisation, at least in this case of refugee and asylum seeker community. It should be the love and human connection, which keeps the world warm and reachable be valued the most.

Finding 2

There are some foreseeable difficulties. Weak connection to locals and unknown willingness to external outreach and communication openness with different intention. What clients see or value most seems to be the work itself. Hand-paint ones are highly appreciable when seen as illustration and artistic expression but when it comes to digital making, it becomes mediocre work without personality, especially when compared to those from the intense competition of the local relevant field.

Mandala Symmetry

2.2 Finding Solution : Assisting meals for clients

2.2 Finding solution

2.2.3 Assisting meals for clients

Christian Action provides meals for their clients on every weekdays, Saturday morning and afternoon. We have conducted some on-site research on the food assistance session of the center, in order to understand more about the refugees in their daily life. Taking part as the meal assistance, we have some findings about the knowledge of refugees.

Process of Food Assistance

First client need to sign up for their name on a name list, which is confirming their identity for the center.

Client will pick up the plate, queueing up, then give it the assistant for getting their food. The assistant can only give one portion of meat to the clients since they cannot count the exact comers of each day, vegetablesand rice can add in if they required.

Sit freely and finish their meal together, they will wash their dishes after and they can leave whenever they want to.

Kitchen in Christian Action

Description of Kitchen in Christian Action

1.

2.

3.

2.2 Finding Solution : Assisting meals for clients

2.2 Finding solution

2.2.3 Assisting meals for clients

Storing ingredients

They blend the ginger and garlic together by the blender and store in the refrigerator inside a big container. They will add them directly onto the pan when they need to use it. In Hong Kong, we decide how to use flavours, such as garlic and ginger, depends on the types of dishes.

Findings on refugees’ knowledge from the kitchen in Christian Action

Finding 1

Cultural practices of different backgrounds can be represented in the centre kitchen. Based on the observation on the kitchen, we discovered that the refugees are distinctly different cultural practices on their food culture. And it would be a kind of cultural assets of different backgrounds.

Cutting method

The way that the chef cutting some ingredients is different from our usual practice. Cutting eggplant as an example, the chef would cut in the middle of the quarter piece. She said it would be more easy to pickle it with Turmeric powder. However, we never saw this kind of cutting method in any eggplant dishes in Hong Kong. We can only see people cut it into strips and slices.

Diversity of flavour

In the cupboard of the kitchen, we found that there are more types of flavours than the common kitchen of local. For example, chili powder, Turmeric powder. However, in Hong Kong, we seldom use these flavours to make our dishes. We mainly use soy sauces, salt, raw flour to make the sauces of our food.

2.2 Finding Solution : Assisting meals for clients

2.2 Finding solution

2.2.3 Assisting meals for clients

Food types

Christian Action kitchen sometimes serves yellow ginger rice with dishes like curry, which tried to fit for the cultural background of refugees. In Hong Kong, we usually eat white rice, with several dishes, such as scrambled eggs with tomatoes.

Homemade herbs

They buy different herbs separately in the indian stores, and they blend by themselves as a mixed herbs. In Hong Kong, we usually buy bottle milk in supermarkets and wet markets.

We think these cultural practices represent the unique value of refugees. When we are trying to build up a localrefugees community, it is important to understand their cultural assets and background. We think these assets would be a good resource to promote or encourage local to understand their culture.

02 Elements

2.2 Finding Solution : Assisting meals for clients

Findings

Finding 2

The resources are potential to local-refugees community building. From the observation in the kitchen, we found that the kitchen of CA has a potential to provide platform for activity about local-refugee community building. First, the cultural resources of refugees could hold some cooking related activity, such as the community kitchen between locals and refugees, cooking class taught by refugees. Combining the sufficient cookware resources and flexible setting, we could use the kitchen to hold different activities.

Apart from that, the center also shows a part of the refugees living. For example, they will finish their meal here, finding assistance from caseworker, having lessons etc. If we are trying to promote some activity, the participants could know more about the center, and also the understanding to the refugees.

Resources of kitchen in Christan Action are sufficient.

on refugees’ knowledge from the kitchen in Christian Action

Draft mapping of the kitchen Environment Flexible

Food donated by other organisation

Bread Food in refrigerator Snacks

Snacks Sauce

Description

of

the Prof. Gordon Matthew’s weekend discussion

2.2 Finding solution

2.2.4 Prof. Gordon Matthew’s weekend discussion

Prof. Gordon Matthew’s Weekend discussion is held on Saturday and weekly. The form is group-based discussion, and it often sticks in Christian Action centre or the same restaurant in Chungking Mansions floor 2. The purpose of the debate is first to let Gordon Matthews correct data from refugee, and the second is to allow refugees to share their opinions, thoughts and experiences to among others. Our team visited the discussion class for four times, and the discussion topic is Political issues regarding newspaper headlines. The process of Prof. Gordon Matthew is the holder of having a south morning newspaper and reads out the subject of today, and he waits for a refugee to answer and share their option.

Findings on refugees’ knowledge from Prof. Gordon Matthew’s weekend discussion

Finding 1

The embryonic form of a local-refugee community building has been established. In the class of Professor Gordon Matthew, participants meet up regularly either in the kitchen of christian Action or the restaurant in ChungKing Mansions. Holding a conversation between the locals and refugees is one of the purposes of the class so that both of them can express their thoughts and opinions in a respectful way.

Finding 2

Refugees are active and expressive. The articulation of refugees is assertive that they are open-minded with every matter happening around the society instead of only caring about their own self or topics related with refugees. In most of the Gordon Mathews’ classes, refugees are always longing to talk and share with different angles.

2.2 Finding Solution : Gordon Matthew's discussion

Findings on local perspective from Prof. Gordon Matthew’s weekend discussion

Finding 1

Locals are curious to learn about cultures around the world, especially the knowledge beyond books and news. The event provides an effective channel so that participants can truly understand the current state of the world society.

Finding 3

The spontaneous form of activities of refugees may bring greater repercussions to local. A participant once learned about this activity and reach out to the professor by another organisation which is spontaneously operated by a group of refugees named Wandering Voice. He said that he would attend regularly because he was very interested in the topic of refugees.

Finding 4

An equal space with freedom for articulation can meet the needs of the conversational platform for locals and refugees. Most of discussion, refugees are the majority, the venues are either in the restaurant or in the kitchen of Christian Action. Participant can discuss with each other on the topics provided mainly in political or personal. Overall, the atmosphere is very friendly and sometimes a lively discussion with respectful.

Finding 2

Having refugees to share their personal experiences helps to attract participants. Some participants believe that many foreign media now using a western perspective to describe the places where refugees used to live, but there are often many gaps. He admits that he does appreciate the opportunity to have direct contact with refugees because their sharing are more realistic.

2.2 Finding Solution : Gordon Matthew's discussion

Description of Home survey

2.2 Finding solution

2.2.5 Survey on locals

Nowadays, few chances are available to acquainted with refugees. Therefore, many locals don’t know who are the refugee and the reasons for becoming refugees. We want to know more about this situation among locals through these questionnaires. We have surveyed google forms, collecting local people's views to refugees. The link to the online questionnaire was sent to the interviewees by our teammates, friends, teachers, and parents. Therefore, we hope that the interviewees can cover different groups of people, including but not limited to different age groups, educational backgrounds, degrees of familiarity of hong kong. Luckily, 113 respondents answered our questionnaire.

Our objective is to distribute this questionnaire to the local people, and we can understand their cognition of refugees. After we analyze the result, we will find some possibility of executing the pilot test and some project directions. The questionnaire also helps to find some potential participants in the pilot test by knowing the background of the respondents. Though google form, we can get respondent contact and build a connection with them.

Some questions are set to collect respondent personal information to understand the background of each respondent. More than half of the respondent is female (67.3%), while 32.7% of the respondent is male. We have spread the questionnaire to different age groups, 63.7% is 19 to 24 years old, 17.7% is 25 to 30 years old, 9.7% is 37 years old or above. In terms of our respondents' educational background, a majority of the respondent has a bachelor's degree or above. 85.8% of the respondent has an associate degree or bachelor's degree, 8% of respondents are a secondary student, and 5.3% has a master's degree. As this questionnaire is to ask for local opinion, the last question is to make sure almost all of the respondent is a permanent resident of Hong Kong (99.1%). 69.9% of respondents know their community.

Findings on local perspective from survey

Finding 1

Locals are interested in the activities about cultural exchange with refugees. In question 16 (Will you join refugee cultural exchange activities hosted in the future? ), over 85% of respondents said that they will at least consider or join the following activities.

Q16. Will you join refugee cultural exchange activities hosted in the future ?

2.2 Finding Solution : Survey on locals

2.2 Finding Solution : Survey on locals

Findings on local perspective from survey

Finding 2

Refugees’ life stories, cultural background and life skills can be a viable part of future activities. In the question 8 (Are the following topics interesting to you?), 89% of the respondents are interested in knowing why people will become refugees and their stories behind, 64 respondents are interested and 37 respondents are very interested. Following by the second preferred choice, locals care about refugee’s cultural, family background and language. 82% of the respondents are excited with the life skills of refugees in Hong Kong, 93 respondents are interested or above.

Topics related to refugees living in Hong Kong are also a concern from the local. In question 9 (If you find other interesting refugees' topic, please write it down), some specific questions are asked by the locals such as “Can refugee become a Hong Kong permanent resident?”, “How do refugee get into Hong Kong society?”, “Why refugee choose Hong Kong?”, “ What are the difficulties they are facing when they are living in Hong Kong?”.

Finding 3

Media in terms of news and movies play a key role to motivate locals to contact with refugees. In question 10 (Which of the following will be the reasons why you take the initiative to get to know the refugees?), nearly 90% of respondents addresses that their intention to know more about refugees is affected by the news report or topic related movie. Social connection is another main reason that motivates locals. More than 80% of respondents choose the option of cultural exchange and making friends.

Q10. Which of the following will be the reasons for you taking the initiative to get to know the refugees? (Can select more than one answers)

Findings on local perspective from survey

Finding 4

Locals prefers to participate in static activities. For question 11 (Are the following cultural exchange activities interesting to you?), 76% of respondents choose to watch refugee’s topic movies, 61% respondents want to have cultural exchange activities with friends. In aspects of dynamic, 61% of respondents prefer cooking with refugees. Both of the activities are not systematic and standardized. It reflects that locals are interested in a more freestyle interaction with refugees.

Q11. Are the following cultural exchange activities interesting to you?

Participate in volunteer service

Friend introduction

Watch movies about refugees

Cook with refugees

Refugees' life experience day

Refugee discussion group

Play board games with refugees

Do sports with refugees

Very interested interested

Uninterested Very uninterested

02 Elements

2.2 Finding Solution : Survey on locals

What elements are available for localrefugee community building?

2.3 Insights

Assets of refugees

Based on the findings in the design process, there are different disorganized knowledge and experiences on the refugees, even those are highly individualised such as dancing, sports playing, arts, cooking, personal stories, music performing, and others.

A lot of skills and talents of the refugees are very unique. Many refugees are already equipped with a great deal of knowledge and they are willing to share. Refugees utilising their skills by sharing their specific knowledge could be a possible scenario. Before coming to Hong Kong, some of them are experienced professionals, however, they are not allowed to work or even to volunteer after staying in Hong Kong, they have lost their positions to serve. Therefore, opportunities are needed to be given to refugees to utilise their skills. Also, lots of human resources can possibly be found in the Centre of Refugees, Christian Action.

Curiosity from locals towards refugees

Interests about knowing the life and culture of refugees are revealed in the outcome of the research on locals. Comparing with the common opinion of the public, locals are more eager and keen to understand and meet the refugees. It provides an opportunity to bridge the locals and refugees.

2.3 Insights

Is there any space of linking the assets of refugees and the curiosity of locals?

Refugees are willing to share Locals are curious about the refugees

Areas of overlapping = Chances for community-making

Referring to some existing activities in Christan Action and real cases in the previous research, we roughly organized three multiple-formed activities using the elements of arts, cooking, and stories, which concluded as multimedia art, community kitchen, and storytelling sessions. Although there are limitations on the existing network and resources, the organized activities are as pilot tests to prove how the overlapping point works as the mediator for community-making. Another limitation is time, which can only allow us to finish the tests intensively within two weeks. The result will be discussed in the following.

How to bring refugees and locals together through disorganized knowledge from refugees?

From the solution of the previous part, we can conclude that there is an overlapping point for the refugees and locals. The locals are curious about the life of the refugees in Hong Kong, while the refugees have the capacity for sharing. We believe that making good use of the overlapping point of two groups may help for community-making.

After the evaluation of the above findings, we finally decided the direction which is more potential and discrepant for the future design. Most significantly, the refugee assets should be utilized and locals are interested in their unique assets. By holding various types of multiple-formed activities, locals and refugees can be connected as a community.