“There are no differences between the boys and the girls – only newcomers and not newcomers” Esmail, programme leader
Images PAULA CASADO AGUIRREGABIRIA at JRS
I gather that he is referring to the exercises and movements themselves, although they seem to have some metaphorical bearing on the preconditions for sanity in the camp. Esmail begins his sessions with breathing exercises and shows me exercises for mobility, in addition to drills which have the dual purpose of building force and teaching participants to control their strength. In his sessions, there seems to be no differentiation between boys and girls. “The girls are shy at the beginning but then become stronger as they are no longer newcomers,” he says. “There are no differences between the boys and the girls – only between newcomers and not newcomers.”
The political radical and psychiatrist Frantz Fanon would likely identify these sessions as a form of ‘collective catharsis’, which he described as an “outlet through which the forces accumulated in the forms of aggression can be released”. Fanon himself rejected calls for pacifism on the basis that an aversion to violence only serves the perpetrator. There is something of the same logic in Esmail’s programme: the uncontrolled and unjustifiable violence that the youth have been subjected to is channelled into targeted and disciplined power. It’s a refreshing change amid some of the idealistic buzzwords that humanitarians promote – ‘community stabilisation’, ‘peace building’ – which have little bearing on the harsh and often violent reality these young people can expect to confront.
With each cohort that Esmail trains, new generations of teachers are born: an echo of what Fanon termed ‘collective psychology’ emerges as satisfaction becomes defined by the community’s health. Sandy tells me that her dream is to take her new skills back home to Sudan. As for Esmail, his dreams are perhaps more localised: he wants to take his martial arts programme out of the camp and into the surrounding areas. “And also, I
really like volleyball,” he says. “I’ve learned these movements, so why not another?”
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