Ideas Box brings oasis of learning to Syria child refugees

The middle of a desert is not the kind of place you’d expect to be able to sit down with a good book, watch a movie or surf the Internet.

But that is exactly what children who have fled the deadly conflict in Syria are now able to do at Azraq refugee camp in Jordan.

The camp, some 100 kilometres (60 miles) east of Amman, opened a year ago and now has a population of 18,000 and a capacity of 100,000.

For young impressionable minds, the major battle has been to ward off boredom.

Azraq now boasts a library nestling in the middle of thousands of metal sheds.

It was created at the initiative of French NGO Libraries without Borders (BSF) in partnership with the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR and the NGO Care.

“There’s an illness that threatens people. It’s called boredom,” said BSF president Patrick Weil.

“No other person could stay here just to eat three times a day. They need to be able to connect with the world to know what is happening. They need to look to the future,” he said.

Four multicoloured cubes and two storage units make up the BSF-designed kit library dubbed an “Ideas Box”.

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Ideas Box brings oasis of learning to Syria child refugees