«Were it not for the assistance from Lebanese charities and the UN, my family would have died from hunger, poverty, and suffering,» 45-year-old Fathiya says. In her words, she is substantiating the importance of human solidarity among the society of nations, which, she says, has not yet been stripped of its humanity, despite what is otherwise said.
Inside her tent in the wilds of the Ouzani region, along the southern border, Fathiya tells her story: «I fled with my family from the Raqqa province two years ago. We fled from the killing and death brought by the aerial bombardment and from the tyranny of Daesh and other armed factions. My husband had a stroke that left him bedridden, even though he could still pronounce words and use his memory. When we arrived to Masnaa [a Syria-Lebanon border crossing], we were received by a Lebanese humanitarian organization, while a UN agency managed our transfer to the Ouzani camp for Syrian refugees».
Syrian women usually work in agriculture, but this was not an option for the asthma-afflicted Fathiyah. Her children worked in the fields as day laborers, instead. Her pride would not allow her to ask for assistance, but she received it anyways. «The international organizations and, for that matter, the people of the surrounding villages never once withheld their embrace, and they provided us with life’s necessities,» she affirmed. «They never make us feel like strangers».
Fathiyah attended sewing and embroidery lessons that some Lebanese associations had arranged for Lebanese and Syrian women. She quickly learned the fundamentals of the trade and translated them into her benefit. With a 200,000 LL loan, she purchased a sewing machine, and she began her work to bridge her family’s needs. In this way, too, her husband would not have to feel any shame or disgrace about his incapacity.
Though the Syrian refugee crisis grows in complexity every day, UN and Lebanese civil society organizations never stop striving to prevail over the challenges and undertake their humanitarian missions. When we visited Fathiyah, we saw delegates providing medical aid to refugees in the camp.
Behind her sewing machine, Fathiyah began to weave a garment modeled on a skirt for the women working in the fruit and tobacco fields. She sang love songs to the sounds of the stitching to calm her shaking, which she shares with most Syrian refugees. She tries to conceal her tears, so she returns to the conversation about her creative profession. «A lot of girls from the clans work in farming, and it’s the responsibility of women to conceal all their charms. They bring me colorful cloths, and I stitch them into garments,» Fathiyah said.
She makes long skirts that fall from the midriff to the soles of the feet, and long dresses that conceal their bodies during their work.
«If she can’t choose a style, I choose one for her,» Fathiyah said, laughing, «and she has to accept it. The style is one thing and the cut is another. The only thing that changes is the color, and sometimes you’ll see a group of girls all wearing the same color dresses».
She charges 5,000 LL per dress and can make 3 dresses in a 10-hour workday. That is $10 per day, though sometimes she only makes around $5, if a lot of women come in for stitches and patches.
Would you like to sew men’s clothes, we ask Fathiyah. She quickly replies, «It’s like the saying goes, ‘Sew someone else’s needle’».
Fathiyah refuses to beg from anyone. «My husband used to work like a horse, without tiring or getting bored, but God decided he should be crippled,» she said. «So I took over as the head of the family, and with my work and that of my son and daughter, we are able to eat and pay back the loan we got to purchase the sewing machine».
The pain and cruelty of displacement does not temper Fathiyah’s aspiration to become a skillful seamstress, so she can accrue more income. But, she laughs, «Of course I won’t be sewing for artists and starlets, but self-reliance is important».