The Best Kept Secret

Springs of Hope
Oct 12
5 min read

The Hope Garden, 1400 square meters is located inside Shariya Camp, the only green space inside the weary camp. It's a place where the impossible has happened oh so naturally.

It began, as do many good things, with a crisis. With the Covid 19 pandemic and the lockdown of Kurdish Iraq. As the borders closed, so did the trade routes between Kurdistan and Syria, Turkey and Iran. At the time of greatest need there was no access to fresh fruit or vegetables. The crisis made it clear that it was vital to provide a local food source for our impoverished and remote community.

There was just one piece of land left in the camp, conveniently adjacent to The Hope Centre. We applied for permission to create a community farm garden, and thus this unused concrete area became an oasis for food production, connection and education.

The Hope Garden is not only farm and field, the Garden has become a place for learning, and of quiet rest and meditation for both our students and camp residents in need of destressing. It’s our outside classroom. It offers education in sustainable agriculture, food preparation, small business skills and landscape management in addition to our regular classes.

By combining hands-on season by season experience with online learning partnerships the Garden has become a powerful tool for both children and adults to explore new opportunities.

As the Garden has matured and grown, so has its role in the community. It’s become a much loved and respected gathering place where students and members of the community work side by side, or simply sit in silence, taking precious time out. Some come to weed, to trim, to help Sami with planting, watering, picking the fruit and veg, weighing, and packing, where others come to sit beside the Angel Fountain, to get away from the intensity of tent life.

The Hope Garden is fondly called "The Best Kept Secret in Shariya Camp" ( although all know of it ) or "The Gem of Shariya Camp." Our students call it Heaven on Earth.

The Garden is home to many types of fruit trees, pomegranates, apricot, peach, pear, persimmon, fig, cherry, chinaberry and mulberry. We have vines, olive trees, and rows of herbs such as lavender, oregano, thyme, aloe and rosemary, onions and garlic .We harvest watermelon in the summer and pumpkin in the autumn.

We have two seasons where we plant, October and February, this is when we plant the seed for green peppers, cucumbers, aubergine and right now, broccolli. Our vegetable harvest each season ( about three months ) is 1 ton of cucumbers and 1 ton of green pepper.

We give all our produce away, to our students, to the widows, elderly and sick in the camp, to the orphans in the village. All our students snack freely on the day’s produce. Khero ensures that there is always a huge pan of soup cooking for our children, and pickles to munch.

Our veg leaves Shariya to be given to our Syrian community in War City. It goes to Camp Management, the Police. Municipal Workers. To whoever needs it. Hope can be in the form of a cucumber or green pepper, a radish or a bag of sunflower seeds.

Sami: Head Gardner

"I live inside the camp, so I know from up close the everyday struggles, tensions and difficulties of life in the camp, of displacement, lack of employment, and yes, lack of food. The Hope Garden has been a great support and blessing to our community. It has continually provided for those who have nothing.

Our produce is cleaner and more healthy than any other produce in the area, simply because we use clean water and pay attention to every plant. We had a tough summer in comparison to previous summers due to the nematodes which attacked our cucumbers. As they are soil based we will have to change all the soil in the greenhouses before the next season. This is the reason that we planted broccoli, to support and enrich the soil before the next planting.

We will continue with our chain of production and distribution until mid December, then we will prepare the land for the spring season.

As Head Gardener, I am honored to be a part of this mission. As I walk home through the camp, many people greet me with tears in their eyes and words of gratitude, "God bless you and keep you for us."

For many destitute in the camp it is hard to believe that something like the Hope Garden could exist, until they see it for themselves. We are deeply grateful to everyone who makes this possible. "

Sami

Khero: House Father

"The Hope Garden is a part of me, both during my working hours and beyond. I live in the camp so whenever I see or hear of someone in need, I take their details and add their name to the long list of recipients of our organic fresh produce.

The Garden is a huge blessing for our community."

Khero

Avya: Play Therapist

"I love the Garden. It’s my happy place. This summer Sami planted sunflowers which I absolutely love as they are bright like the sun and have a cheerful, optimistic face. When I see them they give me hope.

I always have fresh fruit in my classroom and frequently take my students into the Garden, to help and to relax. May this wonderful garden always remain full of light and peace, and may it continue to be a blessing to all who visit and to all who receive its goodness. "

Avya

I remember the risk we took when we requested more land and promised to feed the hungry. As with everything that we have done by the grace of God here, we knew nothing. And yet. But God. Every time I walk into the garden there is something new. A garden is part of life for most who come from our west. Here, post genocide, a garden is something to be loved and treasured. It is the land. The meaning, the history and the stories of the land. They all affect the soil, the seeds that go into the soil and the produce it brings forth. As I walk our garden at different times of the day, my prayer is for our tribe, our community, for all those who partake of our secret, our gem.. may they be like a well watered garden, whose waters never fail.

And as you all know, the stories always lead me back to one story in one garden. East in Eden. And I wonder if that’s the reason for our bumper crops. Perhaps.