Features / Reportage
From Bristol to Syria with love
“Words cannot express how overwhelmed we were,” says former lecturer Shazia Malik, who has just sent two containers of aid donated by Bristol volunteers to war torn Syria.
Shocked and horrified by the photos of children washed up on a Turkish beach, Shazia began to fund raise through her Go Fund Me page and organise aid convoys to Calais.
She then went on to work with refugees at camps across Europe.
is needed now More than ever
Shazia Malik has worked at refugee camps across Europe and organised the One Nation donations
Back in Bristol she organised enough donations in just 10 days to fill two 40-tonne containers with food, clothes, wheelchairs and blankets. The containers then joined a charity convoy to Syria organised by One Nation.
The 4-6 week journey will take them inside Syria to refugee camps where people are desperately in need of aid.
The volunteers collected 25 pallets of food, more than 50 wheelchairs, three pallets of blankets and duvets and 600 boxes of clothes.
Shazia said that “saying thank you doesn’t seem enough” to the huge number of Bristol volunteers who stepped up to help.
“I needed to move aid from Stapleton Road and called up SmartMove Removals who sent a lorry within half-an-hour,” she said.
“They stayed on until 7pm that night helping us move.”
She organised the donations entirely through social media and said mosques, churches and temples from across Bristol donated huge amounts of aid.
Shazia said she just felt she had to help the refugees and has been amazed at the response of so many Bristolians: “It’s an inspiration and heart-warming to see how people have got involved.”
Shazia is now looking for a warehouse as a base for future collections and intended to carry on collecting aid for future convoys.