Welcome Refugees with a Festival
Life is a Festival #123: Mike Zuckerman (Borders Without Borders)
Can we take Burning Man principles and apply them to refugee situations? Mike Zuckerman has spent the last six years creating a toolkit for refugee-led spaces that help instill creativity, connectivity, and hope. Now he’s in Poland welcoming 4 million refugees from Ukraine who are crossing over into Europe.
Our conversation starts with a brief overview of the situation on the Polish border. We discuss Mike’s history creating spaces from Temple nightclub, to [freespace]. We talk about Burning Man and Mike’s idea of a Leave a Trace Festival which he wanted to implement in Greece. Mike shares his work with Patrick Muvunga Trickpa in creating Uhuruland, an artistic “playa” in the middle of the 64 year old Nakivale Refugee Settlement in Uganda. We turn our attention to the Polish border where informal volunteers are creating a festival to welcome refugees. We finish with the necessity for self-care for volunteers and how we can help.
Mike Zuckerman has designed everything from environmental nightclubs to a global network of [freespaces]. For the last 6 years he has focused on the global human migration crisis setting up alternatives to traditional refugee camps where the refugees themselves take a leading role in their design and implementation. He was project manager for Elpida Home in Greece in 2016, Uhuruland in Uganda, Bangladesh and more. He is currently on assignment with Alite, formerly the American Refugee Committee, at the Polish border.
Links
Timestamps
:06 - A brief overview of the refugee situation on the Polish Ukrainian border
:14 - Mike start with Temple nightclub and free space,
:24 - Burning Man principles in refugee environments and the Leave a Trace festival
:34 - Uhuruland the playa within a refugee settlement in Uganda
:42 - Assessing the situation on the Polish border with Ukraine
:47 - The role of the media in crisis
:59 - How informal volunteers are making the border feel like a festival
1:06 - Self-care in disaster relief and service
1:16 - What can we do to help
Graphics Designed by Ali Agus
Audio Engineering by Trevor Coulter
Theme song ““Peculiar Colors” [Manjumasi]“ by dj atish