Syrian couple builds community in Sweden through “the right to be a host”
This is the third episode in a five-part series called The Idea of Home that explores the home’s many and controversial meanings. Scroll to the bottom for other episodes in this series.
When Ibrahim Muhammad Haj Abdullah and Yasmeen Mahmoud fled Syria after the civil war began, they ended up in an unexpected place: Boden, in the far north of Sweden.
“When we first arrived, we noticed that it was a military area. There were tanks and planes, and the army was present in the city. We had escaped war, we wanted to be around civilians, to have a freer life,” Yasmeen said. IDEAS host Nahlah Ayed.
Ibrahim also felt alienated in his new homeland. He felt disconnected and “like a guest all the time.”
“If you’re not a host, you’re a guest,” he said.
So the Syrian refugee couple recreated what is known in Arabic as al-madafah: the living room. They now receive their Swedish neighbors and fellow refugees in Boden.
“In my childhood, al-madafah was a sacred place in the home. It was forbidden for us to play within it. This was a sacred place in the home that is always ready to welcome guests – expected and unexpected guests, “said Yasmeen.
– In it we used to have political discussions, which of course is forbidden, but this small part of the home was an important place where you could have political and social debates.
Hospitality is a value that the couple both say they grew up with. And once they came to Sweden, they were determined to recreate al-madafah. After six years in Sweden, they still receive guests.
The right to be a host
When the couple first came to Boden, they lived in a building called the “yellow house”, an isolated place outside the city where only refugee families lived.
Ibrahim said that the building had a bad reputation in the rest of Boden, but the couple invited people there anyway.
“We welcomed the first person … The first time she saw us or heard our names she was scared. You could say there was Islamophobia,” Yasmeen explained. But over time, the woman began to refer to them as “my Syrian family”.
“It would not be possible for us to change the stereotype about us or our society without opening ours madafah. So she was the first person. After her, we started inviting the rest. “
One of the people they welcomed was the architect Sandi Hilal, one of the founders of the artistic practice, Decolonizing Architecture Art Research – or DAAR.
“I have always felt that hospitality is a way of life for me,” Hilal said. She had come to Boden for a public art project on migration, around the same time as she moved to Sweden with her family.
She was struck by the alienation she witnessed in Boden, and struggled to imagine how Sweden could become her home. Then she met Ibrahim and Yasmeen.
“When I saw Yasmeen and Ibrahim as hosts for me, I felt the power come back to the room and I thought: what is happening here? What is it I felt in this room that made me feel that it is completely different than all the others of the alienation that I felt around me? “
It was in this moment that she realized what she would miss in Sweden – to be a host and defy the feeling of being an “eternal guest”.
With support from Sandi Hilal, Konstverket, Bodenbo, Havremagasinet and Försvarsmuseet Boden, Ibrahim and Yasmeen created a common living room: a space where other refugees could exercise their right to be hosted.
“It was very simple. There was a yellow carpet, surrounded by pillows with Arabic script. These words mean a lot to us as Arabs, [words] like: heritage, return, refuge, emigration. It was fundamental to give a refugee the right to be a host, says Yasmeen.
“IN al-madafah a person could show off their culture. They would make traditional food, maybe make traditional coffee or tea and host whoever they wanted. “
In the living room of society, refugees could also receive politicians.
“Here we are changing the direction of power, even if it is only for a few hours,” Yasmeen said.
Guests in this section:
Ruth Green is a Haudenosaunee researcher and an associate professor at the School of Social Work at York University. She researches guest-host relationships and indigenous peoples’ perceptions of hospitality.
Elena Isayev is an archaeologist and professor of ancient history and place at the University of Exeter. She researches migration, hospitality and movement in the ancient and modern world.
Basit Iqbal is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at McMaster University. He researches ethical formations, aesthetic sensitivities and political theologies in contemporary Islam, with an ethnographic focus on forced migration and hospitality.
David Goldstein is an associate professor of English at York University, where he is also the coordinator of the creative writing program. He researches food, hospitality and early modern literature and is co-editor of Early modern hospitality.
Fatima Ebrahim teaches English at Southern New Hampshire University and holds a doctorate from the University of Western Ontario, where her dissertation examined interactions between people from England and the Ottoman Empire in the early modern era through the glass of hospitality and food.
Ibrahim Muhammad Haj Abdullah studied law in Syria, then became a political activist. He now works as a teacher in Boden, Sweden. Alongside Yasmeen Mahmoud and Sandi Hilal, he started a project in Sweden to give refugees “the right to be hosted.”
Yasmeen Mahmoud is an architect from Syria who now lives in Boden, Sweden. Alongside Ibrahim Muhammad Haj Abdullah and Sandi Hilal, she started a project in Sweden to give refugees “the right to be hosted.”
Sandi Hilal is an architect and researcher. She was the Director of the Infrastructure and Campaign Improvement Program at the West Bank of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) from 2008 to 2014. She is also a co-founder of DARR (Decolonizing architecture Art Residency).
Petra Molnar is a lawyer and researcher specializing in migration and human rights, based in Toronto, Canada and Athens, Greece.
* This episode was produced by Pauline Holdsworth.