street based youth work 4 roma inc. report june 2012

Street Based Youth Work for Roma Inclusion – 4/6/2012

Streets Festival

Street Based Youth Work For Roma Inclusion: Results

The report contains the reports and results of the 4 groups that

perform Street Based Youth Work in Kumanovo, Republic of

Macedonia on the afternoon of the 4th June 2012.

Area: Bus Station

Workers: Monika, Stefan, and Rarina & Dijana | Time: 13:30 – 15:30

Session Objectives:

Communication

To learn something e.g. words, their needs, what people know about the Roma community

Dialogue with them

Observation

New experience

Time: 13:45 | Age: 14 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: Bus Station | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

We observed the whole situation at the bus station, but most of them were older people, then we

saw a boy and we started a conversation. We discussed about his age and his work (at the toilet, he

was the cleaner). Then we asked him about his social life, friends, home. After a short conversation

he offered us a ‘joint’ to which we refused.

Review:

The boy was 14 but had a job cleaning toilets.

Told him about Multi Kulti, he was interested and wanted to bring friends.

We were surprised he offered us drugs.

Time: 14:05 | Age: 13 | No: 3 | Male: 0 Female: 3 | Location: Roma Com. Market | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

We approached 3 girls in front of the market and started a conversation about their age, needs,

friends, etc. They needed to take their groceries home so after 20 minutes they left.

Review:

They were buying basic stuff, but the conversation showed that they wanted more.

They took Multi Kulti’s address and number.

They would like to take part in dance workshops.


Streets Festival

Time: 14:20 | Age: 22 | No: 2 | Male: 2 Female: 0 | Location: Roma Com. Market | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

In front of the market one guy approached us and started asking questions about what we do in

Multi Kulti. He offered us a tour of the community while we were talking he spoke with us about

discrimination, his life, family, etc. Then one of his friends joined us.

Review:

They feel discriminated in general.

Happy they can take part in the organisation.

Liked to beat box.

Time: 14:40 | Age: 9 | No: 8 | Male: 5 Female: 3 | Location: Roma Community | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

After going further into the community we encountered 5 children aged from 5 to 10 years that

wanted to talk with us. We felt we needed to ask their parents and after an introduction their

parents let them hang out with us for a bit. Almost all of them attended school and knew a small

amount of English. During the conversation 3 other children joined us.

Review:

Very happy, holding our hands, talking about their life.

One of the parents joined us.

We did some energizers which with received with positivity.

They were drawing with paper and markers we provided for a long time.

Time: 15:05 | Age: 29 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: Near Bus Station | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

Near the bus station a man approached us and asked us do we offer English lessons, because doesn’t

have money to pay for them. He took the organisations number and gave us his number.

Review:

The man was happy that he may be able to get his kids to learn English.

Collected information about what we do.


Streets Festival

Time: 13:50 | Age: 23 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: Bus Station | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

We observed people around us, when we found out that a guy was sitting alone we approached and

asked ‘how are you’. We found out that he does not smoke cigarettes he speaks Serbian, Macedonia

& Bulgarian, but did not mention any Romani language. He may have been hiding his roots. He

finished 3 years of high school and has a job working with monuments.

Review:

We think that he enjoyed talking to us, although he is not an extrovert.

The conversation was one way.

We were standing while he was sitting, may have been intimidating for him.

Time: 14:02 | Age: 24 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: The Bridge | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

A guy sitting on the bridge accepted to have a ‘chat’ with us. We started by asking how he was and

introducing ourselves, then he started speaking Italian. He asked us to listen to the style of music he

listens to and really wanted us to listen until the end. This is how the dialogue started.

Review:

N/A

Time: 14:15 | Age: 22 | No: 4 | Male: 4 Female: 0 | Location: The Bridge & Hill | Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

Later on the last guy we spoke to joined us with 3 other guys. We started learning some Roma

words, the first words they wanted to teach us was ‘I love you’. After a few minutes they asked us to

go for a walk into the community near the crossing into the woods. During the walk we asked how

they thought about Kumanovo as a ‘multi ethnic’ city and they responded with personal issues of

discrimination. What is most important for us to report is their views on Macedonian people and

their level of interaction with the Roma community. They commented that they were happy they we

personally were referring to them as Roma and not Gypsy. They felt comfortable with us and started

to refer to us in a Romani name that means ‘My Brother or My Sister’. One of them asked us what

our towns looked like, specifically the natural surroundings. They started talking about some

difficulties such as pollution ‘beyond the bridge’. We finished the conversation with some pictures.

Review:

We both felt safe with each other.

Many older people in the community were interested in our presence and very friendly.

One of the Roma guys was translator between an elderly lady and out Italian volunteer; the

old lady didn’t speak English or know much Macedonian.


Streets Festival

Our stereotypes of Roma people just collapsed.

They invited us to join a wedding ceremony.

Area: Supermarket ‘My Market’

Workers: Daniel, Liesa, and Aminah & Teua | Time: 13:30 – 15:30

Session Objectives:

Communication

To get to know different groups.

Dialogue with them

Observation

Outreach Work

Understand culture, thoughts, position in Kumanovo.

Time: 13:45 | Age: 20 | No: 2 | Male: 0 Female: 2 | Location: My Market| Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

Short conversation, informed us about Roma, but one girl had to go and to look for her 3 children.

Review:

Would like some more information another time.


Summary:

We talked about education and school, the older one was not going to school. The female child

spoke German as she had lived in Düsseldorf for 4 months.

Review:

One has a mentor to go to school.


Streets Festival


Summary:

A mixture of ages with 30+ young people lots of them spoke German, Macedonian and Roma with a

large amount of the older group speaking English as well. A number of adults were there, mainly

parents of the younger children. We received information on living conditions, health issues, school,

discrimination, etc. We took photos with them and gave the children some sweets.

Review:

Need for mentors and social workers.

Contact the educated adult Danjel.

Need to distribute more information about youth centres and their opportunities.

Street work: talk to them, programme for smaller kids.

Area: Supermarket ‘Tosh’

Workers: Tea, Nazmul, And Nikola & Lurij| Time: 13:30 – 15:30

Session Objectives:

Communication


Dialogue with them

Observation

Time: 14:00 | Age: 13 | No: 1 | Male: 0 Female: 1 | Location: Tush| Ethnicity: Albanian

Summary:

Zorica listens to rap music and she really likes 50 Cent and Eminem. We introduced her to

information about Multi Kulti; she didn’t know about Multi Kulti and had never ever visited another

country.

Review:

Since she had never heard about Multi Kulti it might be worth going into schools to

introduce its activities.


Streets Festival

Time: 14:10 | Age: 16 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: Tush| Ethnicity: Serbian

Summary:

The young person was a friend of another volunteer in Multi Kulti. He is in 2nd year of high school. He

loves football and was heading to the supermarket. His parents are from Serbia, he knows about

Multi Kulti, but wasn’t very interested.

Review:

Why he is not interested?

Time: 14:25 | Age: 21 | No: 1 | Male: 0 Female: 1 | Location: Tush| Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

Melanie doesn’t go to school / college / university; she is a smoker and lives in the Roma community.

She likes the music of Beyoncé and Shakira.

Review:

Not studying or working.

Does not have much to occupy free time.

Time: 14:35 | Age: 10 | No: 1 | Male: 1 Female: 0 | Location: Tush| Ethnicity: Macedonian

Summary:

A 10 year old boy whose mother came a got him as she didn’t seem to like him talking to us. We

established that he spends a lot of time on the computer.

Review:

N/A


Summary:

Two guys who could speak English and were attending final year of a local high school. They loved

football and we gave them some flyers for them and friends about Multi Kulti.

Review:

Again it would be useful to promote Multi Kulti in schools.


Streets Festival


Summary:

A guy and a girl both from Kumanovo who know about Multi Kulti, but they don’t attend. The boy

loves football and the girl studies English, they can both speak English well. They are both fans of

Macedonian music.

Review:

N/A

Time: 15:20 | Age: 14 | No: 4 | Male: 4 Female: 0 | Location: Roma Square| Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

First we met a child who told us his name, but when his friends came we found out he had told us

the wrong name. He may have also lied about his age. The boy had spent 1 year in Germany. One of

the boys was quite obviously ‘the boss’ of the group. One of them loved Basketball and has beaten

Nikola in a 1 on 1 match. They asked for money and told us that they didn’t go to school. Neither we

nor the group didn’t have much time; we both had to leave after 5 minutes.

Review:

They were not very open with us.

Area: Centre Square

Workers: Shabima, Tobi, Luca, Jelenab & Jelena| Time: 13:30 – 15:30

Session Objectives:

Communication


Dialogue with them

Observation

Time: 13:30 | Age: 14 | No: 3 | Male: 1 Female: 2 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: Macedonian

Summary:

Conversation about Multi Kulti, college and general conversation.

Review:

Friendly with good English, used balloons and card tricks.


Streets Festival

Time: 13:45 | Age: 24 | No: 3 | Male: 3 Female: 0 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: Roma

Summary:

Gave them information about Multi Kulti and spoke about Germany.

Review:

N/A


Summary:

Gave them information about Multi Kulti. They claimed they don’t understand Albanian girls because

they only speak Albanian. We talked about Albanian and Roma Communities.

Review:

N/A

Time: 14:00 | Age: 16 | No: 9 | Male: 9 Female: 0 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: Macedonia

Summary:

Talked about Multi Kulti, Youth Exchanges, German NGO’s, Couchsurfing, Facebook, Roma

community and young Roma children.

Review:

Smart guys with good quick English.


Summary:

We gave them balloons and played with them for a bit they wanted us to write their names on the

balloons. They didn’t want to show us the place where they usually hang out, but they were still very

friendly.

Review:

N/A


Streets Festival

Time: 14:20 | Age: 45 | No: 3 | Male: 3 Female: 0 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: 2 Roma & 1

Albanian

Summary:

Discussion about social situation, suppression by the state and lack of future opportunities for their

children. One guy has 5 children and another has 2 children.

Review:

One guy was selling items for a very low price.

One guy had worked in many European countries, but could never find a stable job.

They were all living off less than 100 Euros a month.

Time: 15:00 | Age: 45 | No: 2 | Male: 1 Female: 1 | Location: Church near the Square| Ethnicity:

Macedonian

Summary:

There was a lack of understanding and communication. They were husband and wife and they

wanted to know what we were doing there. They said they wanted someone to do something

concrete for their community.

Review:

Failure for positive engagement due to lack of communication and understanding.

Time: 15:05 | Age: 16 | No: 2 | Male: 1 Female: 1 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: Albanian

Summary:

General talk, card tricks, information on Multi Kulti and provision of Balloons.

Review:

N/A


Streets Festival

Time: 15:10 | Age: 19 | No: 2 | Male: 0 Female: 2 | Location: Main Square| Ethnicity: Unknown

Summary:

Two girls from Kumanovo who engaged in conversation about the city being one of different

languages, culture and religion. They believed that in the future relations between the different

groups will improve.

Review:

Old people in the city seem to have a bleak view on the future, but young people are a lot

more positive.


Summary:

Spoke about age, school, multi Kulti and card games. We performed some card tricks for them and

had a drink of coke and Fanta with them also. Then we performed dome football tricks with

balloons.

Review:

The group had interaction throughout the day with other groups we spoke to.

The group was watched carefully by security guards from Tinex.

Harassed off the grass by security.


Summary:

The girls asked about our project and why there were German and Italian people here. We tried to

explain the reason behind the project and why it is important to connect with different people and

culture.

Review:

N/A


Streets Festival

0

2

4

6

8

10

09Yrs

13Yrs

14Yrs

22Yrs

23Yrs

24Yrs

29Yrs

Age

Total No.

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Male: Female:

Results

Bus Station

As you can see from the table the people encountered by this group were exclusively

Ethnic Roma. The Age and Gender distribution are is represented visually here:

Age: Total No.

Group Size: Male: Female:

Ethnicity: Male: Female:

Total Ethnic No.

09 Yrs 8

1 15 6

Roma 15 6 21

13 Yrs 3

3 14 Yrs 1

2

22 Yrs 6

8 23 Yrs 1

1

24 Yrs 1

1 29 Yrs 1

1

4

Total

21


Streets Festival

0

10

20

30

40

50

11 Yrs 18 Yrs 20 Yrs

Age

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

Male: Female:

Supermarket ‘My Market’

As you can see from the table the people encountered by this group were exclusively

Ethnic Roma. The Age and Gender distribution are represented visually here:

Age: Total No.



Total Ethnic No.

11 Yrs 2

2 29 20

Roma 29 20 49

18 Yrs 45

2

20 Yrs 2

45

Total

49


Streets Festival

0

1

2

3

4

5

10Yrs

13Yrs

14Yrs

16Yrs

18Yrs

19Yrs

21Yrs

Age

Total No.

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

Albanian Serbian Roma Macedonian

Male:

Female:

Total Ethnic No.

0

2

4

6

8

10

Male: Female:

Total Ethnic No.

Albanian

Serbian

Roma

Macedonian

Supermarket ‘Tush’

The Age, Gender and Ethnic distribution are represented visually here:

Age: Total No.



Total Ethnic No.

10 Yrs 1

1 9 3

Albanian

1 1

13 Yrs 1

1

Serbian 1

1

14 Yrs 4

1

Roma 4 1 5

16 Yrs 1

1

Macedonian 4 1 5

18 Yrs 2

2

19 Yrs 2

2

21 Yrs 1

4

Total

12


Streets Festival

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

10Yrs

11Yrs

14Yrs

16Yrs

18Yrs

19Yrs

24Yrs

45Yrs

Age

Total No.

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Male: Female:

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Male:

Female:

Total Ethnic No.

Total Ethnic No.

Macedonian

Roma

Albanian

Unknown

Main Square

The Age, Gender and Ethnic distribution are represented visually here:

Age: Total No.



Total Ethnic No.

10 Yrs 2

3 26 11

Macedonian 11 3 14

11 Yrs 6

3

Roma 7 2 9

14 Yrs 3

9

Albanian 2 1 3

16 Yrs 11

2

Unknown 6 5 11

18 Yrs 3

3 19 Yrs 2

2

24 Yrs 5

2 45 Yrs 5

6

3

Total

33


Streets Festival

The Street Based Youth Work for Roma Inclusion Training was held from the 30th May

2012 to the 6th June 2012 by the Kumanovo based NGO ‘Streets Festival’.

The training was funded by the Youth ion Action Programme and included and number of

Youth Workers and Volunteers from several NGO’s from across the European continent.

The report is compiled from the research they conducted and information they collected

during their practical session of Street Based Youth Work conducted in four areas of

Kumanovo, Macedonia on the 4th June 2012.

street based youth work 4 roma inc. report june 2012

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