Magdas Hotel - a hotel like no others

credit: KirchgasserPhotography

 If you go to Vienna, try to stay at the wonderful magdas Hotel. The hotel, which is celebrating its 5th anniversary this year, is staffed largely by refugees. It is the first social business hotel in Austria, but around the country and elsewhere, others are following suit.

At first glance, it looks like any other European hotels. Only a lone suitcase by the door and framed portraits of various sizes on the wall allude to its story.

The 78-room hotel is staffed by 20 refugees from countries such as Syria, Iran, Somalia and Chechnya, and 15 professionals of the hotel sector. Like in many countries, people with a refugee background have a hard time finding work in Austria. Initial lack of German language skills, the resentment of many employers, as well as the fact that refugees are only allowed to accept work after receiving a positive response to an asylum application (which can often take months or years) make integration difficult.

Located between the green Prater and the Danube Canal, the hotel was founded six years ago by the Caritas charity as a social business to give refugees professional opportunities. Most stay for around two years, gaining skills before moving on to a ‘regular’ hotel. 

Collectively, magdas staff represent 16 nationalities and speak 23 languages, so that guests are almost always greeted in their own language. Their many skills, talents, languages and cultural backgrounds allow for the hotel to have a special position in the hospitality market.

The budget hotel is a former retirement home, transformed through €56,000 crowdfunded and a €1.5 million loan from Caritas, with help from local designers from the nearby Academy of Arts. The hotel furnishings are donated, up-cycled or recycled, so each room has its unique quirky character. The hotel also hosts  sustainable initiatives, such as the harvesting of honey from beehives on the roof.

With its seminar and meeting rooms,  bar area, terrace and garden, magdas functions like every other hotels and many guests are unaware of its true nature, but its focus is not to maximise profit - rather to help refugee integrate and build bridges between communities.

Magdas (“mag das”) is a German wordplay, essentially suggesting that you should “like this.” And people seem to agree as the hotel is rated very good and excellent on booking sites.

If you get a chance to stay there, let me know what you think.

#GlobalGoals - Dear World Leaders, This is an Emergency

Dear World Leaders,

This is an emergency.

We are activists for different causes from across the world, writing as one for the first time to demand your immediate action in this critical year…

So starts an unprecedented open letter launched today, signed by 20 leading global activists, calling out world leaders to act faster to end extreme poverty, defeat inequality and fight climate crisis.

This open letter marks the first time that activists fighting for global causes have been united by one single voice. Ranging from ages 10 to 94, the leading gender, climate, environmental, equality, justice and human rights campaigners include Malala Yousafzai, Obiageli Ezekwesili (Bring Back Our Girls, Nigeria), Tarana Burke (Me Too), Patrisse Cullors (Black Lives Matter) and Dr. Jane Goodall. 

The activists’ open letter has also been signed and supported by a network of 2000 campaigners and public figures across the arts, business and philanthropy from over 140 countries, including Emma Watson, Bono, Danny Boyle, Keira Knightley, Christiane Amanpour, Idris Elba, Femi Kuti and Spike Lee.

The letter declares a state of “emergency” for people and planet. It comes one week on from UN Secretary-General António Guterres calling on the international community to make the 2020s the “decade of action” and 2020 the “year of urgency”.

The letter stresses the need for immediate action, including at key 2020 moments, if the world is to meet the Global Goals. These key moments, include COP26, the Gavi replenishment, Generation Equality Forums in Mexico and France, the UN General Assembly and a landmark biodiversity conference in China.

The Global Goals for Sustainable Development are a historic plan adopted at the UN in 2015 to tackle these world problems. 193 countries (yes, including yours) have committed to achieve them by 2030.

Richard Curtis, SDG advocate, screenwriter and co-founder of Project Everyone, says:  “We are in an emergency for people and planet - the solution to which is the Global Goals  - the historic plan to defeat poverty, fix inequality and combat the climate crisis. In 2020, leaders will be watched by people all around the world who expect them to deliver dramatically. It’s also a clear commitment that this diverse and deeply committed group will themselves press hard throughout this crucial year to kickstart a Decade of Action for the Goals.”

The activists demand sustained innovation, financing and action over the crucial decade ahead to 2030. Recent reports underline the need for swift action; at least half the global population does not have access to essential health services, hunger is on the rise after a prolonged decline, and at the current rate of progress, it will take almost 100 years to close the global gender gap. Meanwhile, greenhouse gas emissions are reaching record levels and key ecosystems are on the verge of collapse with one million species in near-term danger of extinction.

The open letter is accompanied by a public campaign asking citizens to show their support by sharing the letter and to join this effort for people and planet by using #GlobalGoals. The full list of signatories can be seen at www.globalgoals.org. A campaign film has also been directed by Richard Curtis.

Please share.

Generation Z fears climate change more than anything else; lives in failed system

Credit: Rosa Castaneda

At the UN Climate Change Conference in Madrid, Greta Thunberg today called upon world leaders to stop using "clever accounting and creative PR" to avoid real action on climate change.  Thunberg’s chiding of world leaders seems to chime with young people’s beliefs, according to a major new study by Amnesty International.

The Amnesty poll, released yesterday on Human Rights Day asked more than 10,000 people aged 18-25 - also known as Generation Z - in 22 countries across six continents, to pick up to five major issues from a list of 23.

Of those, four out of 10 young people (41%) selected climate change, making it the most commonly cited issue globally, ahead of pollution (36%) and terrorism (31%).

“For young people the climate crisis is one of the defining challenges of their age,” said Kumi Naidoo, Secretary General of Amnesty International.  “This is a wake-up call to world leaders that they must take far more decisive action to tackle the climate emergency or risk betraying younger generations further.”

Global warming was also most commonly cited as one of the most important environmental issues facing the world (57%), out of 10 environmental issues such as ocean pollution, air pollution and deforestation.

In their own countries, Generation Z’s concerns extend beyond the climate crisis, reflecting the everyday struggles and concerns young people are facing and the feeling that they are  “living inside a failed system”.

At a national level corruption was most commonly cited as one of the most important issues (36%), followed by economic instability (26%), pollution (26%), income inequality (25%), climate change (22%) and violence against women (21%).

“This generation lives in a world of widening inequality, economic instability and austerity where vast numbers of people have been left behind,” said Kumi Naidoo.

“The message from young people is clear. The climate crisis, pollution, corruption and poor living standards are all windows on an alarming truth about how the powerful have exploited their power for selfish and often short-term gain.”

The survey’s findings come at a time of widespread mass protests around the world, from Algeria to Chile, Hong Kong, Iran, Lebanon, and Sudan. Many of these movements have been largely led by young people and students, who have angrily called out corruption, inequality, and abuse of power and faced violent repression for doing so.

Symbols of Humanity: Syrian artist bridges times, religions

In our divided and polarised world, who, but artists, can conjure up the possibility of coexistence between cultures, ethnic groups and religions?

Born in 1966 in Aleppo, George Baylouni fled to France during the war.  And now his work builds bridges between the East and the West, and the past and the present.

Fascinated by the ancient civilisations of Mesopotamia, he studied their mysterious artefacts and texts, written in ancient cuneiform. He paints religious symbols and makes collages, adding gold leaf, his trademark, telling a tale of ancient worlds and of contemporary times. Uniquely, his paintings combine religions, with several pieces focusing on both Christianity and Islam in the same painting.

His work has been showcased prominently in the Middle East and Europe and he was named one of the 100 most important personalities in the Arab world in 2014 by Arabian Business Magazine.

”Symbols of Humanity”, Baylouni’s first exhibition in London, opens at the Stories Art Gallery in Mayfair on October 17 and runs until November 17. 

Baylouni's exhibition marks the first anniversary of Stories Art Gallery, which features renowned and upcoming artists from around the world, many from war-torn countries, and focuses on the stories behind their artwork.

If you have a chance, do see the exhibition and meet gallery director, the wonderful Manas Ghanem, who was born in Damascus, then educated in the West. Before opening her gallery, she worked as a lawyer in the Middle East and North Africa with UNHCR and Unicef.  

 

Extinction Rebellion Art and Design at the V&A

Extinction Rebellion posters. Photo credit: Chris J Ratcliffe Getty Images

Protest movements have always used art to carry and amplify their messages. The Climate and Ecological emergency is THE issue of our time, and the Extinction Rebellion (XR) movement is skillfully using art and design to galvanise public concern for the planet with maximum impact. Their flags, banners and flyers in punchy colours with carefully worded slogans and woodblock prints are now immediately recognisable across the globe.

Extinction Rebellion, as many might already know, is a global activist group calling for urgent action on climate change through acts of non-violent civil disobedience and disruption. Since its first public action on 31 October 2018, urging the UK government to declare a climate and ecological emergency and commit to reduce emissions to net zero by 2025, XR has grown into an international movement with over 363 groups active in 59 countries around the world.

XR’s graphics balance joy and menace with a bold, tongue-in-cheek approach, and are characterised by four core design elements. These include the use of the Extinction Symbol, the XR logotype, a colour-palette of 12 playful tones including ‘Lemon’ yellow and ‘Angry’ pink influenced by pop artist Eduardo Paolozzi, and the fonts ‘FUCXED’ and ‘Crimson’. Often juxtaposing imagery of the natural world with more sinister images of skulls and bones, XR’s urgent visuals articulate hope, while outlining the grave consequences the group feels failure to act will bring. 

Recognizing the importance of the movement and the value of its unique designs, the London V&A has acquired a series of objects exploring the design identity of Extinction Rebellion.

The pieces produced by the Extinction Rebellion Arts Group, a coalition of graphic designers, artists and activists responsible for XR’s Design Programme, range from the open-source Extinction Symbol created by street artist ESP in 2011 and adopted by XR in 2018, to the Declaration that accompanied their first act of Rebellion, and flags carried during mass demonstrations. They are on display in the V&A’s Rapid Response Collecting Gallery (gallery 74a).

The objects have been acquired through the V&A’s Rapid Response Collecting, an innovative programme that enables the acquisition and immediate display of design objects that address questions of social, political, technological and economic change.

“Design has been key to Extinction Rebellion’s demands for urgent action on climate change. The strong graphic impact of the Extinction Symbol alongside a clear set of design principles have ensured that their acts of rebellion are immediately recognisable,” says Corinna Gardner, Senior Curator of Design and Digital at the V&A.

“Extinction Rebellion have galvanised public concern for the planet, and their design approach stands in relation to earlier protest movements such as the Suffragettes who encouraged the wearing of purple, green and white to visually communicate their cause.”

Kosovar women fight patriarchy - 20 years after the war

The art installation Thinking Of You, by the Kosovan-born, London-based artist Alketa Mrripa-Xhafa, in Pristina, Kosova – 2015. Photograph: Hazir Reka/Reuters

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This month, 20 years ago, the 1988-89 Kosovo war ended. It was a particularly brutal conflict that led to allegations of genocide and crimes against humanity, and the controversial involvement and bombings from NATO. During that war, 90 per cent of the population was displaced and some 20,000 women and girls were systematically raped - a crime that was used as a weapon of "ethnic cleansing."

In this predominantly traditional ethnic Albanian country, the rape’s stigma is so strong that many women have never talked about what happened to them during the war and never sought help. Some of their husbands have left them, unable to endure the shame.

Two decades later and despite years of international supervision that was supposed to bring gender equality, rates of sexual assault and domestic violence remain worryingly high. In a 2015 survey, 68% of women reported that they had suffered from domestic violence at one point in their lives.

In Europe’s newest country (which declared independence from Serbia in 2008), women struggle every day for social and economic equality in a rigid patriarchal society where men have the final say in all family matters and women are left with very limited access to education, health, property, protection and job opportunities. More than three quarters of women don’t have jobs - Kosovar women have the lowest employment rates and education levels in all Europe. Many have been widowed during the war and placed in the role of primary provider for their families, but without access to skills and resources, they are unable to make ends meet.

But many are fighting back.  Some have formed associations that give women the tools and resources they need to rebuild their lives and their communities, while others have run for office.  Others yet have launched small business, like Zarie Malsiu, from Kacanik municipality, a mother of five who married young and dropped out of school, like many young women at that time. After the war, she enrolled in a training for social and economic empowerment run by local NGO Kosova – Women for Women. She has formed her own agriculture association, collecting and selling medicinal and aromatic herbs and forest fruits. Her organization now counts 100 women. Kosova – Women for Women, a local independent organization affiliated to Women for Women International, has trained over 33,000 women in over 30 communities across the country, in life and vocational skills and rights awareness.

Women have also fought for justice and campaigned for women’s rights.

Among them is the amazing Dr Feride Rushiti, a physician who is the executive director of the Kosovo Rehabilitation Center for Torture Victims in Pristina. Through almost two decades of research and advocacy, she has secured access to healthcare and justice for civilian victims of war. In 2017, her campaigning work led to a landmark government decision to fund pensions for Kosovo’s victims of wartime sexual violence. And now, after many years of silence, hundreds of survivors have started to come forward.

Kosovar women’s braided stories show the enormous challenges women still face in the country, but also how they have managed to become self sufficient and obtain recognition and reparation - and the impact it has on themselves, their families, communities and the next generations.

I wanted to report this story with Arben Llapashtica, a brilliant photographer based in Pristina, as well as a cameraman and documentary filmmaker, but sadly we couldn’t get a commission. If you know a publication that might be interested, please let us know.

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Britons amongst most supportive of refugees’ right to seek asylum

Contrary to what many might believe, British people are among the most supportive of the fundamental right of refugees to seek refuge – including in their own country - to escape war or persecution. Seven in ten (72%) agree that people should have this right (compared with 61% globally), according to a new Ipsos global study. These findings are rather heart-warming in the actual political landscape where immigration has been such a loaded issue.

The study, conducted to mark World Refugee Day, finds that a majority across 26 countries believes that people should have the right to seek refuge – including in their own country - from war or persecution.  Those in Latin American countries are more likely to agree (Argentine 74%, Chile 73% and Peru 70%) than those in Europe (Hungary and France 43%, Belgium 50% and Germany.)

However, the survey, conducted online among adults aged under 74, finds that broader opinions towards refugees still include some negative attitudes, and there are some signs that they could even be hardening compared with two years ago, although this is less the case in Britain. 

Kully Kaur-Ballagan, Research Director at Ipsos MORI says: “These findings show that Brits are very compassionate about people’s fundamental right to seek refuge from war and persecution and they are among the least likely globally to want to close the borders to refugees.  However, in practice there is widespread concern about people taking advantage of the system and the public remains relatively divided over the extent to which refugees will successfully integrate into their new society.” 

It is clear that countries’ policies and the number of refugees arriving in each country have a direct impact on people’s perceptions, but I am wondering whether the media are also playing an important role in molding people's attitudes?

Half of Brits are skeptical that many refugees are genuine. Those most likely to doubt the authenticity of refugees coming into their country are in India (70%), Turkey (69%) and South Africa (66%), while those among the least likely to question whether refugees are genuine are in Canada (45%) Spain (45%), Brazil (40%).

Brits are relatively divided over whether refugees will integrate successfully into their new society; 45% agree they will integrate compared with 38% who disagree.  Countries that are most optimistic about refugees successfully integrating into their new society are India (68%), Argentina (58%) and Saudi Arabia (55%).  Those most likely to disagree that refugees will successfully integrate are in South Korea (67%), Sweden (64%) and Turkey (63%).

Brits are also more positive about welcoming in refugees than the global average with just over half of Britons (54%) disagreeing that the country’s borders should be closed to refugees (46% globally) compared with a third (33%) who think that borders should be closed at this time (40%).  These figures have seen little change since 2017.

Countries where views have hardened most about closing their borders since 2017 include Mexico and Peru, which have both seen an increase in people seeking asylum from neighbouring countries according to UNHCR.  In Serbia agreement has also increased 13 points from 38% to 51%. In contrast, the desire to see their borders closed has fallen in Hungary (down 17 points from 61% to 44%) and Poland (down 6 points from 45% to 39%) – perhaps reflecting the hard-line stance the Polish and Hungarian governments have taken on restricting entry to refugees.

Emma Harrison, CEO, IMiX – migration communications hub says: 

“We know Britain welcomes refugees because every day we hear stories of kindness and of welcome. Concerns about integration are real but they could easily be resolved by government investment in English lessons for new arrivals and enabling people to work while their asylum claim is being processed.

“More than anything, refugees want to build a new life for themselves and their families - having made their perilous journey here and having lost so much already. We also know that people don’t make the decision to leave their home lightly -far from it. These decisions are made when the bombs are dropping on your city, when soldiers are storming your hospitals and schools, when you are being persecuted because of your sexuality or your beliefs.  When you are not safe in your own home it makes sense to move – and here in Britain we respond more often than not with friendship and compassion.”

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