The Neighborhood Tales: Kuwait Under Lockdown project sprouted out of a painful realization that even as history was sure to remember the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, and its impacts on every aspect of our human life, there are some stories, some voices, some experiences that might never be recorded for posterity. In Kuwait, where history still struggles to break out of the official and mainstream narrative, there would be many who, if not completely unheard, would find their experiences subject to but an ephemeral burst of public interest in the newspapers and social media. They might be heard. But not listened to.

This project is an effort to prevent that loss. It’s a community-based effort to document what we’ve lived through. So that we may all remember. But more importantly, so that we can act to bring change. What did we get right? What do we need to fix?

Pessimism and conventional thinking come easy in crisis. And it’s these two instincts we hope this project remedies against. We are guided by the belief that, no matter how challenging the times, there is always hope--waiting for us to wield it. Hiding, in unexpected places.

Neighborhood Tales II : Kuwait Under Lockdown

Neighborhood Tales III : Kuwait Under Lockdown

Neighborhood Tales IV : Kuwait Under Lockdown

Neighborhood Tales V - Kuwait Under Lockdown

Neighborhood Tales VI - Kuwait Under Lockdown

After years as an advocate for accessibility at Training Gate International, Abdulaziz felt confident in his knowledge about disability, but through a series of trips and adventures, he discovered truths that would change the way that he understood himself forever.

Aziz Al Mutairi | Activist

Nationality: Indian
Occupation: Entrepreneur
Date of interview: 12 August 2020
Language of interview: English

Zahra is an entrepreneur, a maths tutor, and mother of twin 13-year old boys. She has been in Kuwait for 15 years since leaving Kerala, India, when she got married. Three years ago, she started an online dress shop. And around two years ago, she and three friends started their own boutique in Kuwait, tailoring all kinds of dresses. It was very successful, but when COVID hit, no one could go out, no one could shop and the rental for their store and their tailor’s salary could not be covered, so the business had to be shut down. However, Zahra said that she learned so much from the experience that she doesn’t consider it a loss of her investment. She figures that on a practical level, her loss is what she would have paid for an MBA, so this first business is her MBA.  

In December, she remembers they would read in the morning papers about the virus in China, but never imagined it would come here. She and her family had booked tickets to travel in March after exams were over, but then February brought Corona to Kuwait and by March things were shutting down. They booked tickets again in June to travel to Turkey, not anticipating the travel restrictions. But then things got serious, a full government lockdown was enforced, and she lost her business. Her husband was still working and getting a salary so she said they were blessed to be able to afford their flat and expenses. They didn’t worry about food because when they knew there would be a lockdown, they and their friends went to the market and bought bulk groceries so that they would have plenty of supplies to cover them for an extended period of time. 

Their unemployed bachelor neighbors used to work in laundries but now roam around all day and she feels sad for them. She and her husband donate financially to their community volunteer programs for those less fortunate. They are too afraid of the virus to volunteer.  

The inability to meet up with and visit friends has been stressful, as everyone stays indoors. For months, Zahra would only step outside within her building to get sunlight with her kids, always wearing masks and gloves, always afraid when another person passed by. Once the lockdown ended and her husband started working, she went out a bit more, trying hard not to get anxious. She washes all her groceries, her clothes, and is very careful. During lockdown, she somehow managed her stress by learning to cook many new things and talking on the phone all day with family and friends. Although Zahra says she is a housewife, she is spending her time indoors buying and selling shares and teaching high school maths online as well. Zahra says that the time stuck inside with the family was pretty stressful for the first two months. She feels like she was the one guilty of screaming or getting upset with everyone in the beginning, but her family was nice about it. The boys were doing online schooling and meeting up with friends virtually through the games they all played online. Mostly, she feels the Indian schools transitioned to online fairly well and her children adapted smoothly. Now she only waits for the time to visit her parents and relatives back home, and this is the first and most important goal. 
“I learned from this crisis is, nothing is, nothing is, you know, nothing is certain. Because uncertainty, this is, I think always I tell my husband that this is a time of uncertainty. Even we wake up on the next morning, you can say that, ‘oh, I am alive’. That is... in my point of view. ...[It] made me think that, we think that if we have money, we can do, we have everything. But that is not true. There is times the money can do nothing.”

ZAHRA - A small business owner and homemaker reflects on work and family life during COVID

Nationality: Bidoon
Occupation: Entrepreneur
Date of interview: 8 September 2020
Language of interview: Arabic

Noora is talking about work… a lot of work--teaching, organizing theaters, call center work for multiple clinics and telecommunications companies, recording voice overs for news platforms--more jobs than she can mention. Because she is Bidoon, it took her almost two years to finally be given acceptance to university. While waiting, she did any and every kind of job she could, and while at university, and after her 2019 graduation, she continued working. She does not believe in sitting idle. She needs to keep busy. There is no shame in any kind of work and she knows that no matter what she studied, she will never be able to work in a decent-paying job in her field, so it is important for her to be adaptable and bold.
 
Being Bidoon limits her ever having job security, but COVID has introduced an entirely new level of insecurity beyond her ever present, underlying sense of worry about being able to financially support her family of seven. COVID added the fear of getting sick or losing a loved one. 

Then work stopped. The schools where she taught shut down, and they wanted her to work for free, teaching online, in order to keep her job. She refused. Since most salaries for Bidoon are 100-200KWD, even the half-salary offered by some was only 50KWD a month, for full time work. Noora relied on her savings and started to operate from a place of fear. Her family members were also pulling on limited savings and Noora started to plan for the worst. She and her father pooled resources with their neighbor to make sure they all had basic food supplies like flour, non-perishable items, and a furnace, worried that money would run out before things returned to normal. They endured this situation for four months, living on no income and carefully managing their resources, with no money to pay rent. Noura said that they all encouraged each other to stay indoors, to live on bread and canned food because they were intensely worried about what would happen if any one of them got sick. How would they quarantine a member of their family? The apartment was too small and their mother had no immunity. They were very careful and rarely ventured outside. 

During COVID, the Ministry of Interior’s Central Agency for Illegal Residents was closed and no one could renew their identity cards unless they had an employment contract. In some ways this came as a relief--everyone felt less stressed as they didn’t have to report in all the time, and could access some services without providing a new ID due to the closure. But for Noora, it was a roadblock. With no employer to provide a contract (the only way to renew her Civil ID during COVID), she was unable to apply for any other opportunities. So with her applications on hold, in July, Noora started her own home business with her last 50KD. She employed her father, and later her mother...her friends supported the business. The experience got Noora to begin to think beyond herself and her family, to the entire community and how other Bidoon women were coping. Did they have a Plan B, C, D? What would happen to them if they couldn’t find employment? She started to help other Bidoon girls set up businesses. When one Bidoon designer could not work because her laptop died, Noora found her a laptop but in exchange, asked her to provide logo designs for other female Bidoon entrepreneurs. Noora’s brothers and their friends did deliveries for her and she found herself supporting a network of people, and helping grow other small businesses.  

When things started to open up, Noora’s (self-employed) father had to go back to his job delivering merchandise and caught COVID - then so did the whole family. This put Noora’s home business on hold until the family recovered, but she is hopeful that it will restart soon and many people have reached out to offer support.

NOORA - A young bidoon entrepreneur reflects on the impact of the pandemic on her community

Nationality: Indian
Occupation: Production assistant
Date of interview: 10 August 2020
Language of interview: Hindi

Abdul Qadir arrived in Kuwait in 2018 from Udaipur in Rajasthan. He has a Master’s degree in Urdu, and started his own courier business back home, but when the business started to suffer he thought he would join his uncle in Kuwait in the hopes of putting aside some money. Leaving his wife and young daughter behind, he arrived and soon started working in a design and printing company. He shares a single room with seven other relatives in Sharq. He is in charge of cooking for everyone, so he doesn’t have to pay for the food. Conditions are not ideal, but at least he is able to send money home regularly. Or he was - until the pandemic hit. All of a sudden, Abdul Qadir and his roommates found themselves without work and without a salary. The haris threatened to evict them if they didn’t pay their rent, so a few of his roommates used money they had been saving to travel back home to pay for everyone. With curfews and lockdown, it started getting crowded in the neighborhood. All the people who would normally have been out for work ended up congregating outside to chat and share their woes. A few charities distributing food showed up. Then a few journalists showed up too. On March 18, buses arrived. The men were ushered on the buses by policemen. They were told it was too crowded where they were, and that they had to leave. “I was thinking, why are they taking me, what are they going to do? Because it is Kuwait, not our country. It is not India that we can ask. Here the language is Arabic. Can't even ask anybody. I felt frightened. If I go and ask, policemen talk less and hit more”. 

Finally, they arrived in Abdali, where they were told they would be quarantining. Conditions there were good – each person was given a cubicle inside a shared room with three more people. “I spent the days sleeping. Spent time on mobile. What else to do? When it was time for namaz, we used to pray namaz. Then recite Quran for some time. There were four of us in the room so we used to have conversations. We used to recite to one another, you know Islamic juz. What is it called? We used to do isthema and pray for all that we get rid of this pandemic at the earliest.” Thirty-two days after they arrived, they were released. They were never tested for COVID – they only had their temperature taken, and anyone experiencing symptoms would be transferred to Mishref.

Abdul Qadir did not tell his family in India where he was because he didn’t want them to worry. He and his younger brother who works in a salon back home are supporting the rest of the family, which includes his parents and four other siblings. Abdul Qadir was not able to send any money home for four months. Throughout the lockdown, he and his roommates relied heavily on the food donations provided by aid organizations, both through the official charity portal as well as through local community groups. He is now working again, and has slowly begun re-paying all the money people have loaned him and his family. But his outlook on life has changed: “I had many dreams. Before the quarantine, I had a lot of dreams that I will do this. When I go to India, I will construct a house and do something new. Then all these dreams after the lockdown ended. Now, when the lockdown ended, I ended my dreams. I don't want to think of these things again. I killed all my aspirations. The lockdown has taught me that life can be spent in a [single] pair of clothes. This [initially unappealing] type of food can be eaten too [...] My aspirations are under control now”.

ABDUL QADIR - A young Indian man recounts his experience of institutional quarantine

Nationality: Filipino
Occupation: Operations Manager
Date of interview: 4 September 2020
Language of interview: English

As C’jay prepared for his annual leave to the Philippines, the Corona virus hit the world. Countries and airports shut down, and C’jay found himself stuck in Kuwait. His two youngest children were graduating from middle school, waiting for him to join  their celebrations. Instead, he found himself working, without pay, to try to save the small café where he is an operations manager. In the first month of lockdown, there were no salaries for any of the staff. His colleagues found themselves without food and relying on donations to survive. C'jay did not know his salary would stop until the day his paycheck failed to arrive. No warning. No discussion with the owner. For five whole months.

To keep his job, C'jay continued to work hard, alongside the café owner, without pay. He had to find a way to continue supporting his family — six children, his wife, his parents and a brother-- despite having no income.  A small business owner in the Philippines, C'jay was forced to sell all of his investments, except his plot of family land, which his wife refused to sell. Once he had sold everything, he continued to send his family money from his savings in Kuwait, and he himself got food from local charities so that he was able to continue to eat while providing support. His father had just been hospitalized and C'jay had to make sure that the family could procure the expensive daily tanks of oxygen he required. He didn’t want his children to stop their studies - his college age son is studying engineering, a degree that he also completed four years of himself, but was unable to finish because of a family situation. Throughout this time when his own family had little to spare, C'jay’s wife prepared food daily for frontline workers in the Philippines.

C'jay’s employer worked beside him, just as hard as he did to save the café.  But during this time, the employer never inquired about how C'jay was managing to eat, pay rent or support his family, and never discussed the lack of payment. C'jay couldn’t bring himself to ask about his salary - he feels that he should be grateful for the resources he had saved to help him get through this time, and grateful for his and his family’s good health. Yet he worried about his colleagues--if he and the owner couldn’t save the business, how would the other employees survive when there was no way to go home, and no work opportunities? He and the owner made sure after the first month that the other workers had a monthly stipend for food until the café could start operating normally.

For the first time, C'jay started to meet his Filipino neighbors who were concerned about him and each other. Those who were bakers would bring extra bread home for him to eat and would check on him regularly. The Filipino community in his building became closer. As part of the Filipino association to which he belongs, C'jay volunteered to distribute food to those in need when he wasn’t working. He felt better when he was able to help those in his community. He found himself calling his parents and family on a daily basis and finding comfort in these calls--in the past, his family had leaned on him but now these calls felt critical to his well-being, shifting his family dynamic. C'jay was losing friends to COVID, missing his family, working hard for no income.  He exercised regularly and never missed his calls home and relied on his faith, as someone who was not deeply religious normally. The first thing he did when lockdown ended was wait three hours outside church to say mass and give thanks for all of his blessings.

C'JAY - A Filipino store manager describes why and how he continued working throughout the pandemic

Castile is tired. He just came straight from the night shift at the clinic. He used to work in Saudi as an operating theater nurse but 13 years ago he applied to work in Kuwait- building on his career as a technical nurse- and got accepted by the Ministry of Health. But to his shock, once he moved to Kuwait, he found himself assigned to the Central Jail. He laughs about how his career ended that day, because being a jail nurse would not allow him any scope to utilize his extensive skills.

The day-to-day work in the jail is just like a regular clinic—administering vaccines, caring for minor illnesses and injuries. There is no opportunity to use his technical training. But-- he is supporting his wife and four children in the Philippines; the pay is okay, and he gets housing and transportation to work, so he feels lucky. During the pandemic, he and other nurses were among the few people in his community that were able to continue working and had housing and wage security. For others, their lives fell apart. They were unable to send money home, and as their families became increasingly distraught, relations became strained. Castile said there were many suicide attempts in Kuwait, too many of them successful. His community was also experiencing significant loss of life due to COVID-19. Many healthcare workers, especially nurses, medical technicians and ambulance teams, are Filipino, and Castile has lost many friends who were exposed whilst working in the COVID wards and emergency response teams.

Castile feels lucky though. He had a vehicle and a permit as a nurse to enter lockdown areas, so when he was approached by a local aid organization to see if he would be willing to deliver food to people in need, he jumped at the offer. He thought he was doing it for a day or two, but soon it became like a second job. He would finish his shift at the hospital and would immediately pick up his boxes and go into locked-down neighborhoods to deliver aid. He worked long hard days with two different organizations trying to get food out. He felt good because he could help people. He said it really made him appreciate what he has. Because of the pandemic, and there being nowhere to go but work, he saved money to send home to his family and was able to use the rest to help those who were not getting their salaries. “We are not like other communities,” he says. When Filipinos found other evicted Filipinos on the streets, they gathered their resources to send them home. They take care of each other. He said that this pandemic has shown him what is truly important.

“Because for me, really, this is the time that we help each other. Don't, don't talk about the money. Don't mind the money. Help them in every way you can. They are, they are hungry, give them food. Okay? They are crying. Stay with them. Talk to them.”

Castile thinks the Kuwait government did a good job during the pandemic, in treating the sick and in getting landlords to lower the rents, but he wishes they had compensated the healthcare workers for all of the additional time they worked, rather than not paying them for their lost vacation days. He also thinks that community spread is continuing, not because of government policy, but because people are too stubborn to follow the protocols. COVID will be with us a while, he says.

In this clip, Castile reflects on the losses, deaths and mental struggles faced by many within the Filipino community during lockdown.

CASTILE – A nurse shares his experience as a frontline worker and volunteer during the pandemic

Margie is a single mother from the Philippines who came to Kuwait 17 years ago to be able to support her three children back home-- now in their late teens and early twenties. 

For 12 years she has been working for a salon, doing at-home services. It is not easy work, because many of the treatments can take hours, and require contact with a lot of chemicals. Her friend doing the same work ended up paralyzed, and Margie worries. What if she gets injured and can’t support her family? She has cut back on some services she offers to protect her health. She had gone home in November 2019 for a long visit, which used up most of her savings, but she wasn’t worried, as she expected to be working again in January.  However, while she was still there, the Filipino government announced a total deployment ban on overseas workers returning to Kuwait because of the death of domestic worker Jeanelyn Villavende, and Margie had to buy a new ticket, paying an additional 400KD, to try to get back before it came into effect. Then her flight was delayed because of a volcano eruption, and Margie and all of her fellow passengers were terrified that they wouldn’t make it out in time. When her flight finally took off, she was so relieved that she scheduled a home appointment for that same day, to make up for the money she lost. 

Just when she had gotten back on her feet, the Corona outbreak stopped her work. She had no money to send her children, plus she had to pay rent for four months, without salary. Her landlord did not give her and her flatmates any discount, and she felt like she just wasn’t going to make it. She was deeply depressed and used to think about “jumping” but her friend would tell her, “if you jump you will just break your bones and what will happen to your family?”. 

Her volunteer work saved her. A Filipino community group was distributing food and needed volunteers in locked down neighborhoods to assist them. As she was in Mahboula, they asked her to store the food boxes and arrange delivery within the area to the vulnerable people on their list. As she distributed the food boxes, she met people who hadn’t eaten in days, living in dire conditions. She began to try to encourage others, to help them through this difficult time, and she felt grateful to have food to eat, and good friends. She wanted to give the others hope.  She told them to pray, assuring them that they would get through this time. 
Margie worried about her son’s last tuition payment, but, unbelievably, her friends all contributed so that he could finish school. On her daily calls with her children, she would force herself to smile and laugh, although she cried every single night from worry. She didn’t want them to feel her despair or stress. Her children started to reassure her, telling her “‘Mama are you okay there? [...] Just be careful to yourself, no need to go outside because of virus [...] because you are alone there. Don't worry regarding us [...] Mama you want money? We will send money for you’. Then I cried. Why? Because I'm thinking as I am abroad, I am the one who will send to them.”

Her children had all started working online, earning some income without telling their mother. She was so grateful - she had seen other overseas workers being ignored by their families when they weren’t able to send them money. Instead, she became even closer to her children, who  checked on her regularly and wanted to take care of her. Margie says that she has no regrets about this time in lockdown -- even though she is going to have to wait two more years before she is able to pay off her debts and go back home -- what she learned from the experience is worth it. Now she knows, for the first time with certainty, that her children love her for herself, not because of the money she sends, and she feels blessed.

In this clip, Margie tells us about some of the darker moments she faced whilst in lockdown, and how they then led her to volunteer her time as a counselor.

MARGIE - A Filipino beautician reflects on the importance of family and community in times of crisis

What is the worst thing that can happen to an individual stranded alone in a country that isn’t their own in the midst of a pandemic?

For Ashwin, it wasn’t losing his job, which he took in his stride, volunteering his free time to help Indian migrant workers with paperwork so they could return home. It wasn’t residing in an area that was under strict lockdown, and being forbidden from leaving it. It wasn’t even being unable to afford groceries, as he made do with the little money lent to him by personal contacts and food aid supplied by local community organizations, even making arrangements with them to direct food to those who he knew needed it most.

The worst thing to happen to Ashwin during the pandemic was receiving an email from a lawyer in India, announcing that his wife was divorcing him because he hadn’t been able to send her and their daughter money for months.

Ashwin can communicate in five languages, including Arabic and English. Having worked at the Public Authority for Manpower, he has a little knowledge of the legal system in Kuwait, which has enabled him to assist countless workers with bureaucratic and legal issues. He hopes to continue helping people as long as he can, even offering a shepherd trying to go back to India through the Amnesty program refuge in his room-- an initially short stay that ended up lasting two months when the lockdown hit. Ashwin shares his room with three other people.

He follows a simple philosophy - the same advice he offers many migrant workers that reach out to him desperate to return to their families in their home countries: “You should stay alive. How will you stay alive? We should not worry too much about the future. What are you getting here? You’re getting khuboos-wuboos. Eat whatever you get and be happy. You have a mobile, call home. Don't take too much tension, at present.” Ashwin feels that it is the responsibility of migrant workers to take care of themselves first, and set money aside should any difficulties arise, so that they can be protected. He hopes the families of people who have died in Kuwait because of the Coronavirus will receive compensation. When asked about what he has learnt from this experience, his answer is a surprising one — that this situation is not new to him. “[...] [When] I was a child, I did not have food. I didn't have anything. I didn't have clothes to wear, or a place to sleep. I have come up from a situation like that. Now I have a car. I have everything. Alhumdolillah.”

In this clip, Ashwin reflects on the financial struggle and instability brought upon by the pandemic, as experienced by migrant workers.

ASHWIN – A community organizer talks about his work supporting other migrant workers in Kuwait

Mohammed is a member of the Indian Daoodi Bohra community, a relatively small but close knit sect of Shia Muslims which has a significant diaspora group living in Kuwait. His life revolves around this close community--where he lives, works, prays, socializes... He has compromised on the apartment he lives in, just so that he can be in a neighborhood with everyone he feels close to. Daily life is normally meeting and chatting with friends at the mosque, going for an evening stroll to debrief from the day and relieve stress with friends, meeting up for meals and religious celebrations. Every aspect of his world is rooted in this connection and communal experience, and it feels “homey”. 

Now though, COVID has driven everyone inside, and completely brought this communal life to a stop. He believes the psychological toll has been heavy on everyone. Mohammed cannot risk mixing with others because he is uncertain of their beliefs and practices regarding COVID.  He says it’s hard to know who will put you at risk, and you do not want to put others at risk either.  If someone had told him in January that they would be living like this, trapped inside their four walls, encouraging their children to use their devices for entertainment, never having their community lunches, coffees and dinners, he would have “freaked out”. He is amazed, actually, at how adaptable and resilient people are in the face of such challenges-- unable to visit family abroad, unable to meet up with people in Kuwait, he would have thought people would not be able to handle it. But his kids are suffering; they are lethargic, they only walk about 70 steps a day and don’t remember what it's like to ride a bike or to play with friends. The adults have taken to having meet-ups online, especially when someone needs to be consoled and helped through a rough patch. This has replaced their gatherings. He says for rich people with houses, they might be able to go out on their terrace and barbecue or get fresh air, but apartment dwellers are boxed in.
Work has been hit hard. People have been using up all their savings and there are many layoffs and salary cuts - very few people can afford to help one another out. But the community has used their database to map who is in the worst situation, and make sure that people get food assistance and, most importantly, psychological support. Mohammed tells the story of a man in debt for a loan, suffering from depression and anxiety. No one could pay the loan, but the whole community banded together and found people who knew the lender and approached him to defer the loan until they were all working again and could help resolve the debt. This made them realize how much they could do, together, without lots of cash, to ease the burden on their community. They coordinated grocery shopping, created food boxes and a safe distribution system to reduce the number of people leaving their homes and being exposed. Helping people feel less fearful and less alone was as important as food aid. Materialism almost became taboo, because health, family and faith were what was important. Mohammed felt amazed by frontline workers, and his community’s volunteers, and found great personal satisfaction in organizing and distributing resources to the community.  

“I've learned more in this, in this pandemic... I've suddenly started learning that, security is not when you have a... truckload of money in your bank account. Security is not only, you have a nice little house. Security is when somebody calls up and says, ‘Buddy, let me know in case you need something right, I'm around.”

In this clip, Mohamed describes some of the efforts made by the Bohra community to stay connected during this time.

MOHAMED – A young Bohra man reflects on the power of community and collective action

Anwar is 50 years old. She graduated from Philippines University secretarial college. Her three children are college graduates and her husband is a bus driver. She has worked in a number of different roles: as administrative staff for the previous wife of president Fidel Ramos, as a programmer for a foundation and as merchandiser for a footwear company. In 2005, she decided to come to Kuwait because the salaries were supposed to be good. Since then, she has worked as a nanny in many households, until she found her last employer who was excellent and treated her like family. 
When COVID hit, her employer told Anwar that their business was closing and he couldn’t afford to keep her anymore, but he knew her family relied on her income. He agreed to transfer her visa to another house if she could find a good employer, and gave her time to look. She found a position with a family who had had another nanny for seven years - she thought it would be safe to transfer her visa without meeting them. At first, things were okay, but then the father started screaming at her day and night. It was terrible and she didn’t know what to do. She was crying and praying to God every night to make her strong enough to stay there and work because she needed to support her family. Finally she gave up - she asked to leave and agreed to return the advance they had given her if they would only allow her to go. The children of the employer were good people and agreed, and Anwar prayed to God to help her raise the money. Many people in her community gave a little here and there until she had enough to repay them. She returned to her previous employer and looked for another job. This time she was careful to meet each prospective employer. After talking to ten employers, she prayed to God to help her choose a safe home with a good family. That night, at 9:15pm she received a call and she knew that was the employer-- when she met their baby, the baby laughed, and she felt immediately comfortable with them. She now has very little money as she only began work in August and still owes those who helped her. But she sends a little home each month and has told her family to divide it as they can to buy groceries, take care of her mother who had a stroke and her niece with leukemia. She is also supporting her husband, who cannot drive during the lockdown, as well as her four brothers and four sisters. Her money is enough for 25 kilos of rice, which they all share.
In 2017, Anwar started volunteering with a local Filipino organization to help those in need sheltering in the Philippines Embassy, and later to work in a medical mission. When COVID hit, although she was unable to go outside, she worked online using social media platforms to identify people in her community who were at food risk, or who needed baby formula or medication. She collected data for the volunteer organization: names, addresses and needs of each person so that the volunteers on the ground could deliver aid. She now feels blessed with her new job and wants to continue helping others. 
“I don't know, but I'm very happy to help others, even I don't have but I do my best, do my best to do goods to other. Because I believe that if you are doing goods for other, God knows, God will, will [be] there for you, I'm turning back what the God's giving to me. That's why I giving back to others. The things that I experienced, the good things that I have is now-- I have here, I have a good employer before and until now. So I want them, I want this to give back to others.”

In this clip, Anwar describes how she has been spending her day off differently since the pandemic-- as a community volunteer and advocate.

ANWAR – A domestic worker describes her reliance on faith and her need to give back

Meena thought she was leaving Kuwait for just one day, but now it may be forever. On a day-trip out of Kuwait, Meena finds herself trapped during her layover in Dubai because of the new COVID-related travel policies. Kuwait is only allowing citizens to enter, but will not accept permanent residents. Despite living in Kuwait for 23 years, and her children knowing only Kuwait as their home, she is locked out, away from her family; away from her 16-year old daughter for the first time. Meena is forced to return to Goa, India, and live in a town she has only visited, in a flat she has never lived in. She has never been away from her family for more than two days, and while she can continue her work as a financial analyst online, with most of her colleagues unaware of her situation, at night she finds herself alone with her despair. It is unclear when she will be going home—she misses her daughter's 16th birthday, she is not with her when she gets her final exam scores. For the first time in her life, she is living alone, and feels like a stranger in her country-of-passport, navigating a complex bureaucracy to deal with the utilities ministries, unable to ask for or receive help as everyone else is also in lockdown. For the first time in her life, she struggles with depression, loneliness and hopelessness, but she cannot reveal to anyone what she is going through.

When she is finally able to return to Kuwait, almost seven months later, she has changed as a person. Her perspective on what she values, and what is important, has shifted completely. She feels more resilient and grateful to have survived this dark time. She sees herself before the pandemic as someone who was negative, angry, a materialist most happy when shopping for extravagant luxuries. After months of carefully washing out her one set of clothes to wear each day, and living with the barest of necessities, taking care of everything herself, and being so lonely in her grief, she decides to change herself and her life’s focus, for something simpler and more meaningful. Meena now reaches out to friends and family to help others who are stuck as she was, and to help them manage to afford the journey back to Kuwait, which is so difficult for many due to the sky-rocketing airline and hotel costs. She also wants to explore ways to provide support for the emotional well-being of residents in her situation, so they do not feel as alone as she did. Meena reflects on the fact that her daughter has always said “Kuwait is my soil,” and never wanted to leave. But after living through this experience, her whole family is stunned by a new sense of exclusion from the country they have called home for so long, and wonder if there is a place for them in Kuwait anymore.

In this clip, Meena tells us about the moment when she came to discover that she was banned from entering Kuwait; her home.

MEENA -  A mother reflects on her experience being separated from her family for seven months

When Alex moved to Kuwait eleven years ago, she felt right at home. Not only because her daughter’s in-laws went to great lengths to make her feel welcome, but also because the culture felt familiar. “It was so much like the old American south that I was born in almost a century ago, eighty-five years ago […] the family structure was just about the same. I grew up with twenty-one cousins and, and grandmother was the most important person on the planet in both families. […] When I look at the Kuwaiti families, it's the aunties and the grandmothers that the family is formed around very strongly. [And] the level of courtesy, the level of privacy you maintained personally because of being in this huge, huge extended family is Southern. You know, you're very, very friendly, but you're very, very private at the same time.” Alex, originally from North Carolina, came to Kuwait to be close to her daughter and grandson. She doesn’t speak Arabic – much to her grandson’s chagrin (he’s been trying to teach her since he was in first grade). But that hasn’t stopped her from establishing a fulfilling life here. She lives alone in an apartment in Shaab Al Bahri, a neighborhood she loves. She knows the names and stories of all her neighbors. The Iranian bakala manager who proudly shares the pictures of his wife and daughter back home. The florist who once taught her how to make origami. The pharmacist that always made sure she could procure the rare medication needed by her late husband. The five Filipina waitresses who work in a local vegan restaurant and who sometimes bring her cookies. Even when she doesn’t leave her house, knowing that she has this community around her makes her feel safe. Which is why, when COVID hit, she decided to stay home rather than move in with her daughter’s family, as they begged her to do. Alex has only left the house twice in the last seven months (it’s now September). Once to go for a walk on the corniche with her daughter, and the second to go swim in her daughter’s (outdoor and private) pool. Her family tells her she can spend more time outdoors now, but she is not convinced. “Because of [my] advanced age, I feel, I feel it's very dangerous outside. There are dragons out there. You know? It does feel very dangerous to me to go outside. […] I don't even want to go down to the lobby. Because there are always people down there without masks.”

Alex has tons of activities to keep herself busy – reorganizing her books, reading, cooking, going through her pictures. She is a very good plumber too, and when her sink started leaking and the weight in her toilet stopped working, she took out her plumber’s wrench from her toolbox and fixed both herself. She does worry though– especially about her loved ones in the States. She feels she is much better off in Kuwait, where the government took decisive action to deal with the pandemic and people are for the most part acting responsibly. She hopes she will remember the lessons she has learnt during this crisis once it is over– how to be more self-reliant, less frivolous; always making sure she remains true to her core values, no matter how challenging the circumstances.

In this clip, Alex compares the Kuwaiti culture and family structure to that of the American South, where she was raised.

ALEX - An 85-year-old shares how she stayed connected with the outside world while self-isolating

Rana is a pharmacist, working in the private sector. She moved to Kuwait from Egypt almost nine years ago, with her husband, an engineer. They have a little boy and an eight-year old daughter. Rana feels that Kuwait is her home and as long as her parents could visit her, Rana felt happy to be here. But, now the visa laws have changed, and they cannot visit anymore, which is harder. Her daughter used to think that she was Kuwaiti because they celebrate all the Kuwaiti national festivals as a family.   
 
During the lockdown and curfews, her daughter has been angry at being confined inside. She misses her school and her friends and playing outside in the neighborhood. Rana’s little boy had never seen the outside because of COVID. He only knows people through screens. When she was finally able to take him out, he was scared of people and the outdoors and could not walk-- he fell down. This makes her sad. Also, during the lockdown, Rana’s husband wasn’t working and it was hard. He was silent and depressed. His company had stopped his salary in February and only recently has begun giving him a quarter of his initial salary. Seven of his colleagues were laid off after COVID hit, so he had accepted not being paid in the hopes of keeping his job. Rana has been supporting the family on her income and working long days. Many of the people coming into her pharmacy cannot sleep, and are also depressed. Rana says it is not acceptable for her to show vulnerability because in her work she sees people with serious problems. Also at home, she cannot show she is stressed because she needs to lighten things for her husband and children in this difficult time. She tries to make them laugh to relieve the tension. She is at a loss as to how she will manage online school with both parents working. She already has a nanny which scares her, because the children might get exposed to COVID. 

Rana is happy living in Kuwait and thinks Kuwait’s government has done a great job of providing information, making sure food and medical supplies are not disrupted, providing care, and implementing lockdown and curfews early on. The problem is the people. She knows from customers that they are still gathering and not observing protocols. She thinks people should be allowed to return to work, because this situation is hurting them psychologically, but they must also change their behavior. Many customers think the virus isn’t real. Daily she sees many customers showing COVID symptoms who are trying to self-medicate and who are not wearing masks. She knows she is at risk of being exposed and cannot hug her children and must isolate as much as she can at home, afraid to infect them. She herself was in denial about the virus until recently-- she didn’t wear a mask and didn’t think it was serious. Now, she empathizes with maskless customers and gives them a free mask and explains why it is important to wear one. She tells people to go to the doctor. It’s not her job as a pharmacist to transgress her role, but many people are scared to go to the hospital and are trying to use the pharmacy like a clinic. 

Rana says that life during COVID has changed her. 

In this clip, Rana reflects on her relationship with Kuwait, and how her family life was affected by the pandemic.

RANA - An Egyptian pharmacist reflects on her work and home life, whilst in the throes of COVID-19

Sidi likes teaching in Kuwait. He was seconded as an English teacher to the Kuwait Ministry of Education from the Mauritanian government 26 years ago. He has enjoyed teaching English in Kuwaiti public schools, and feels like Kuwait has been good to him. The government provides him with a housing allowance and healthcare and continued to do so during the pandemic, despite the fact that the school was shut down at the beginning of the outbreak. For all these years, he has been able to visit his family every nine months, but next year he will be 65 and will pack his bags for good and go home.

The Mauritanian community in Kuwait is small and dispersed-- they connect via WhatsApp but mostly, his community are his colleagues at the public school where he teaches, the people in his mosque and his online Scrabble community (he is responsible for seven Kuwaiti government schools setting up scrabble clubs and competing locally and internationally).

Sidi has enjoyed the move to online teaching, and his students have also seemed to enjoy participating in this format. His colleagues at work have been extremely supportive and helpful in getting his skills up to speed. However, the pandemic has really changed the ways in which they interact at work—they used to eat together as a community, hug, share breaks, but not anymore. No shared food is allowed on campus, staff must maintain distance and cannot gather. This has been a big shift for them as a close community, but he feels lucky because they all kept their jobs and have all kept safe. Private schools threatened to lay off teachers he knew, without pay, while the government schools were the opposite, supporting and training their staff to adjust to the situation.

He knows his situation during the lockdown was privileged. Although it was hard not being able to go to the mosque, he spent much of his time praying at home and reading the Quran, which he found helpful. He was more fortunate than his neighbors and assisted them when they had difficulty. Sidi reflects on the fact that the lockdown has exposed the Kafala system and the trafficking system, and he believes this is an important lesson for Kuwait. He thinks laws should be enforced with big fines, so that visa traders will think twice about sponsoring people with no jobs. He believes this will lead to more equality and a better demographic balance.

“[…] having spent twenty-six years of my life here, this country is dear to me, you know. It has brought everything for me that is joy, happiness.”

In this clip, Sidi takes a closer look at the Kafala and trafficking system which was exposed by the pandemic.

SIDI - A Mauritanian public school teacher shares insights into the lives of expats in Kuwait

Dia grew up in Kuwait. Her father has been in the country for around 40 years, and her mother, 30. Dia says that more than anything, the pandemic shocked her into realizing her privilege. She is working and going to graduate school, and meanwhile, only five minutes away, someone has lost their job and is struggling to find money for food or is trying not to get evicted. She has felt anxiety and stress, but her concerns are mostly around her tuition payments, in the case that she loses her job. She has realized the huge gap between herself and those living around her.
Dia has hated working from home. It was the blurring of the lines between personal and professional life that was getting to her. She also missed working with her colleagues in person, although sometimes when working at home, she could finish a task in a third of the time she would need back at the office. She missed getting feedback and support from her colleagues. But once they started returning to the office part-time in June, she was very anxious. What if she infected one of her parents, who are both older? She has been isolating as much as possible since the full lockdown was lifted- it is a question of ethics- she works with young people and cannot risk bringing the infection to them or to her parents, no matter how much she would like to go out. She is frustrated by how lax people are with health protocols, and by the government removing the grocery store shopping appointments. People were cautious then, and she could go and buy two-weeks worth of supplies. But then she remembers that other people share their apartments and one refrigerator with ten others, and realizes that weekly appointments for shopping wouldn’t work for them. It was another example of her privilege. She has been thinking a lot about this and about the need to help others. You shouldn’t help because it checks some box about how generous you are, and also people shouldn’t question the genuine need of those asking for help.  
“[...] I think it has to be more of a duty upon everybody, regardless of anything, just being more open? Being more-- what's the word-- being more receptive of the struggles that people are going through, I think. And trusting them to trust you in being vulnerable. It's very hard to admit that you don't have the money. It's really hard. It's really hard to tell somebody you don't have money for food.”
Another issue that has become more apparent in the pandemic is that there is a lot of talk on social media about “migrants” and “expats”. There is no distinction between the person working in Kuwait temporarily, and those for whom Kuwait is home, who have lived here for generations. Dia holds an Indian passport but she doesn’t know the country, she only knows some relatives there, but if she had to move it would not be home in the way Kuwait is. She cannot believe that due to the pandemic, her friends whose families have been here for generations haven’t been able to return to Kuwait and are basically homeless; living in limbo outside of Kuwait, and separated from their families. She never thought much about feeling excluded before this moment. 
“I mean, I've always known this, you know, like, like I'm wel--I'm welcome in Kuwait until I'm not anymore. But I think during this time it's right in your face that it's not easy to push back anymore. And you just keep thinking, okay, I need to plan my exit out of Kuwait, not because I don't love this country, but because this country doesn't want me.”

It makes Dia feel homeless. Like she has a home, but doesn’t-- as if she is stuck nowhere. She has her Indian passport but she grew up here, and has no idea where she could live if she lost her visa. 

In this clip, Dia talks about home and belonging, and what this time has made her realize about her place in the world.

DIA- An Indian woman born and raised in Kuwait reflects on her sense of belonging and privilege

Nadia is a perfectionist. She likes to plan well and control outcomes. This quality probably makes her good at her work, but made the pandemic a nightmare for her in the beginning, increasing her anxiety. Nadia is a pediatric physiotherapist working with children with disabilities. She is originally Syrian, but holds an Egyptian passport and lives with her husband, a doctor, and her two young daughters. At the beginning of the pandemic, Nadia worried about so many things, especially related to her children’s health and the treatment of her young patients at work, as well as the general uncertainty about all aspects of their lives. Many clinics started to lay off their non-Kuwaiti workforce and she feared she and her husband could lose their jobs. 

The worst time for Nadia wasn’t the lockdown, but the end of February when they announced that schools and clinics would be closed. How would she manage her girls’ lives, stuck inside a 60 meter apartment? How would she manage to continue her work with her patients and their families? Initially the scenes at the grocery stores, with everyone lining up and hoarding food reminded her of things she had seen during the Egyptian revolution. Those first few weeks, she had panic attacks nightly and couldn’t sleep.

As Nadia realized that her previous plans were dashed, she surrendered to the situation and was able to feel less anxious, focusing on controlling only what she could. She moved furniture so that her girls could do a fitness class daily, and lifted their screen restrictions so they were able to meet up with friends online. In early March, her team designed and implemented an online treatment program for her patients and their parents, so that the children would not lose the gains they had made in their therapy. Once online school began for the girls, she supported them during the day and offered online therapy sessions to her patients after school. 

As a physiotherapist working with children, she needs to be psychologically strong to support the child and the family. Surprisingly, the move to online therapy was positive overall. Previously the children worked exclusively with therapists in the clinic, but parents usually neglected their at-home maintenance therapy program. During the pandemic, the parents had no choice but to engage. They had to log on and be with the therapist and child for their sessions to facilitate the process. Parents are reporting feeling closer to their children, understanding them better and feeling more confident to take a role in their treatment. Nadia feels this is an important positive outcome of the pandemic. 

As for Nadia’s family, they have coped with the changing situations and have been ok. The clinic supported their staff throughout, which made Nadia feel more connected to her workplace. What has been concerning her is the outpouring of hate speech against expatriate communities that became prevalent on social media after the pandemic started. 

“I remember I was standing at the balcony once and saw an expat woman looking in the garbage for food in a country where food is available in abundance and it tore me apart from the inside at the poor people who can’t manage. So if these expats had better living circumstances the virus would not spread rapidly among them. If there were buildings special for them where each two live in one room their life would be better and hence fewer problems would occur. I felt terrible especially for workers who don’t get paid much.”

In this clip, Nadia reflects on some of the disruptions and positive outcomes of the lockdown on her work.

NADIA - A pediatric physiotherapist & mother juggles online schooling and therapy with her own angst

Hussein caught COVID. It was unexpected...he has worked in Kuwait for the past 17 years as an oncology nurse, and was exposed through a patient. Eight out of 28 nurses on the unit had been infected, and when Hussein started to show symptoms he was given a chest X-ray and sent home. After five days, he was finally able to get tested and was confirmed positive. He quarantined at home in one room, separated from his wife and 16-year old daughter. His wife, also a nurse, later caught the virus as well. Hussein feels like the government system is good until it gets to the clinics, where communication breaks down. He was sent back and forth to three clinics before being tested and each gave different information. Sometimes the medical forms he had to fill out were not available in English. The quarantine protocols shifted from 28 to 10 to 14 days while he was sick. Some people weren’t aware of the policy changes and re-entered the workforce while probably still positive. Hussein believes that the system has gradually broken down, with less testing and less enforcement of health protocols.

During lockdown, his family was depressed. His daughter missed meeting up with friends, and his wife wasn’t working. They felt claustrophobic and anxious. They were unable to travel in February to visit family in Iran, and his 22 year old son studying in Iran couldn’t come ‘home’ due to the travel ban. The long separation has been hard. In addition to Hussein’s concerns about the family’s visa renewals, he was also worried his son would end up losing his residency if he couldn’t come back in time. Hussein has begun to feel that his status in Kuwait is unstable. He reads about Kuwait reducing the quotas of foreigners, and now residencies need to be renewed yearly. On social media, Kuwaitis are writing about disliking expats and some expats are writing bad things about Kuwait. It increases his anxiety about his future here. He already felt things were different here than in his home country. There is no real “neighborhood”. His neighbors are Egyptian and Indian and they say ‘hi’, but there is no community, no support network. 

Thankfully, his work colleagues and the hospital have been supportive. When he returned to work, it was difficult because he continued to get fatigued easily, as did his colleagues who had COVID. One of the nurses caught the virus twice, so they never feel like they are fully safe or immune. They have also been severely short staffed so the work has been much more demanding. He admires his colleagues who ended up working double their time to cover for those who were sick. His Filipino friend, a nurse who had worked for years in Kuwait, delayed her annual leave to help and ended up dying of COVID. Another Filipino colleague and an Egyptian colleague both lost their mothers to COVID and couldn’t travel for their parents’ funerals. He feels these things. He is disappointed that frontline nurses were not given better information and care, as if nursing was just a regular job. It is not-- seven or eight other medical staff at his workplace have also died from COVID. Hussein worries he could be next. He realizes now that plans are only plans, they may never happen. The feeling of chaos and instability is compounded by the contradictory rulings and circulars issued by Kuwait’s ministries regarding the status of expats. He is not sure what all this will mean for his family’s future. 

“I changed. I felt some things, you know, inside my soul is deeply affected by these things and changed really because the, you know, this like is not a joke. People say tiny virus changed all the world. So of course it changed the person also.”

In this clip, Hussein talks about the unease and nervousness brought upon by the anti-expat sentiment which heightened during the pandemic.

HUSSEIN - An Iranian oncology nurse navigates the chaos, loss & uncertainty of life in Kuwait

“Honestly, I feel like [if] one more thing happens, I'm going to collapse […] I'm on the verge of falling apart.”

Amal is a 25-year-old Palestinian woman who has been living in Kuwait with her family since 2004. The lockdown hit Amal’s family hard; she witnessed multiple mental health crises in her closest family members during the period, which heavily impacted her own stress and anxiety levels. Married for just over a year and a half at the time of our conversation, Amal had to learn how to navigate living with her husband 24/7 under the new restrictions and the intensities that brought along.

Then, her 23-year-old brother in the US suffered from terrifying hallucinations, tried to harm himself, and ran away from home. Fortunately, together with her 20-year-old brother who was with him in the US as well, they managed to get him help through a crisis management hotline and admit him to a mental health institution for a few weeks. He was diagnosed with a severe bipolar disorder. Amal is thankful her younger brother was there, as without him it would have been impossible to get help.

Meanwhile, the lockdown triggered episodes in her father in Kuwait, who was also diagnosed with bipolar disorder. This happened during the lockdown, that coincided with Ramadan, during which curfew was lifted for just two hours every day, and only walking was allowed. Every day during that time, Amal would walk for up to an hour from her apartment in Salmiya, to her parents’ in Jabriya to check on them and to help calm them down as they would start blaming each other for what happened to their son. “It was hot. It was dusty. I was depressed. It was the worst time to be an adult.” She would tell her 13-year-old sister to block out their parents’ fights by locking the door and putting a pillow over her head.

As if her familial challenges weren’t traumatizing enough, Amal also faced discrimination at her workplace, with the company she’d worked at for nearly three years temporarily shutting down operations and telling her to consider herself on vacation... a vacation without pay. As a result, she could no longer contribute to household expenses and help her husband financially, which made her feel extremely guilty. To add insult to injury, she found out that some of her colleagues were receiving full salaries, despite the company being shut down. When the lockdown lifted and operations resumed, she was called back but on half pay. She resigned soon after, and was almost cheated out of getting her indemnity when the accountant gave her misleading information to save the company cash. Fortunately, another employee came to her aid and she was able to secure what she was owed.

Since Amal’s husband has a Canadian permanent residency, the couple is planning to relocate to Canada next year. Her mother and sister have already moved to the US, where her sister has been able to go for therapy, since it’s more affordable there. She’s saddened to be moving further away from her grandparents and extended family in Saudi, but she says, “[...] it's time to leave, hopefully to a place where you [will] be able to eventually get the passport and own a home, and have your rights.”

If there’s one thing Amal has learnt from this ordeal, it is the value of mental health. “Sometimes it's okay to not be the adult in the family [...] I learned to open up and speak to my husband and close friends and not let it eat me up inside. You never really know what's going to happen tomorrow. So I really just try to be in the moment.”

In this clip, Amal tells us how she and her family dealt with the intense effects of the pandemic on their mental health.

AMAL - A Palestinian copes with workplace discrimination & mental health challenges during lockdown

Meriyemi is from Ethiopia. She has lived in Kuwait for eight years with her husband and, now, their baby girl. Her daughter was born in Kuwait, while her five-year old son was born in Ethiopia and lives with his grandmother back home. Meriyemi loves her family so much, but this pandemic has made her feel a little crazy, worrying all the time. Her mother and sister in Ethiopia worry about her too. Does the baby have enough to eat? Is the family able to buy food? Thankfully she has a really good employer who she loves. She works as a nanny, and the family has continued to pay her salary and supply her with milk and diapers for her baby, and even food when it was not available. Even whilst Mahboula was under lockdown, her employers would come to the police station to give Meriyemi her salary and supplies across the barricades. Although she hasn’t been able to see their child for months, she still talks to her online and misses her. She is so grateful that her employers have supported her because her husband, a taxi driver, cannot work. Lockdown and curfews have made life extremely difficult. Sometimes the stores have no supplies, and shopping can take hours. Also, because they are living on one salary, she cannot send the monthly support home to her mother and her son, which makes her very sad. Prices for food in Ethiopia are very high now because people are still hoarding food due to the pandemic. Many people are getting sick. Meriyemi’s husband has recently started working again, but very few people are using taxis so he hasn’t been able to earn much. 

Her baby just had her first birthday, but they did not celebrate with a cake - they were fasting, and they could not gather with their friends anyway. Usually, the Ethiopian community is very tight-knit, and they celebrate birthdays and Christmas together, sharing food on injera (traditional flat bread), along with their special coffee. 

Right now, Meriyemi only meets with one friend in her building - just to help relieve her stress. Like many others, the lockdown in Mahboula has made them want to move to a new area, but it is too expensive now. Meriyemi is still afraid of catching the virus-- people don’t take care in the bakala, they use cash, no one is paying attention to the rules. She thanks God because despite so many people sick in Mahboula, her family’s health is ok. Earlier they all had terrible coughs, including the baby, but her husband insisted there was no way they could have COVID because they had stayed inside. They never got tested and to be honest, Meriyemi says, she was afraid of being separated from her baby to quarantine, and couldn’t imagine what she would do. 

Meriyemi says she and her husband have learned from the pandemic that they need to make a savings plan. Meriyemi wants her children to go to university, to have books, to learn all the things she wasn’t able to. She is optimistic about the future though.

“Someday life good, someday life not good. I am accept, you know? Only pray for God. Sometimes for everything change, you know? No money, no thing, whenever you want, you can't do. I will smile. Yeah. I will smile. No angry. No angry for God. Please God [...] Something you give. I will trust for God. You know, I trust to God.”

In this clip, Meriyemi reflects on the gratitude she feels for her sponsor, who continued to support her and her family through the extended lockdown in Mahboula.

MERIYEMI - An Ethiopian nanny nurses her newborn child & constant worry whilst trapped in lockdown

Ram was born in a remote area near Kathmandu, Nepal, close to the Himalayas, in 1979. Growing up, the closest school was an hour and a half away by foot, which Ram traversed everyday. He moved to Kathmandu after 10th grade to finish his higher education, and pursue a bachelors degree in English to fulfill his dream of becoming a teacher, but it wasn’t meant to be. He had to flee the country because of Maoist terrorist activity, his journey leading him to Kuwait in 2004. He then worked between Kuwait and Iraq at an American base camp for four years, where he notes that everyone, regardless of their position, was treated with respect. 

Ram’s dedication over the years got him steady promotions, and eventually to a management position at a major F&B company in Kuwait. He is an active social worker, volunteering with an informal volunteer organization that supports Nepali migrant workers in Kuwait by orienting them on the rules, regulations, labor law, and cultural practices of the country, and helping with legalities and paperwork. It’s a cause he hopes to continue working towards until he dies. 

Unfortunately, Ram was let go soon after the pandemic hit Kuwait. Undeterred, he focused his attention on social work to help those who had been adversely affected by the lockdown— working with his volunteer team to conduct Facebook live sessions on a weekly basis, connecting with workers and listening to the challenges they were facing, and holding interviews with mental health experts and government bodies. They also interviewed individual workers over Zoom, including those who had been diagnosed with COVID19. Since several Nepali residents who’d worked in salons, restaurants, hotels etc. lost their jobs without notice and had no money to even buy food, Ram’s team joined forces with other local community organizations and charities to distribute food to over 500 people in Kuwait, using embassy vehicles to reach those in areas under strict lockdown, like Mahboula.

Ram’s organization also appealed to their government and local charities to sponsor airfare, and organized webinars with colleagues from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and the Philippines to understand what their governments were doing to financially support migrant workers and to enable their safe return to their home countries. This was to note best practices so they too could help migrant workers return to Nepal. During the Amnesty period in late April, he was involved in helping undocumented workers—”not illegal,” he says, “as no one in the world is illegal,”—with travel documents so they could register for amnesty. It was during this time that he contracted symptoms of COVID19: fever, respiratory problems, and body pain, but was allowed by the doctor to quarantine in his room, where he lived alone. 

Through his conversations and experiences helping those in need, Ram has encountered some truly heartbreaking stories. He recounts one of a worker he visited in Adan Hospital, who was pushed out a fourth-floor window by an unidentified man while on the job. The fall broke his backbone and paralyzed half his body, leaving him unconscious for two months. He was given good treatment and care by the doctors, but was not visited by his employers, which Ram feels is very painful as “companies are our second home.” He also wonders how his family will be able to support him if and when he returns home, permanently disabled.

How is Ram able to stay optimistic amid such difficult circumstances? “Always, you have to think positive. I'm always telling my fellow workers and [...] whoever I meet, if you can do something good for people just do it, but don't do bad for people. If I can support somebody, that's fine. But [if you can’t], don't destroy them.”

In this clip, Ram shares the advice he offers to members of his community, on how to maintain hope during the pandemic.

RAM - A Nepalese social worker recounts his efforts to help those affected by the lockdown

Hamza is originally Lebanese, but has lived in Kuwait since he was four years old. He is an architect and he lives with his parents, who also work here. Kuwait has provided his family with the stability that Lebanon couldn’t, even during peacetime. Growing up a third culture kid, Hamza felt a strong sense of belonging in Kuwait, as did his whole family, but the pandemic has changed this. It wasn’t because of the loss of his job - after all, construction companies and architecture firms have been badly hit all over. It was more about the way that expats were talked about in the media and amongst the local Kuwaiti population. Suddenly, he felt, they were being treated as disposable - seen merely as workers, not as people. This narrative has made residents feel unwelcome, and many in his community have decided to leave, even giving up good jobs, because they are hurt. 

“So like, like we always feel like there is sense of belonging to Kuwait. And then when we, you know, when you're treated like as if we are just numbers, you feel like you are being undervalued, not just [...] as a person, as a human being in general.”

When the crisis hit, Hamza wanted to volunteer, but the opportunities he found were restricted to Kuwaiti nationals. He thinks it was a mistake not to include expats in these efforts.
‘Kuwaitis and expats together would have been… positive points… because it's more like a cooperation between Kuwaitis and non-Kuwaitis. So this serves a country. So instead of you splitting the society, you are trying to, to merge it together in a very positive way in order to help the country...So instead of the expats becoming a burden on the government, they would have been an aid for the government… because in the end, the society is like a huge well of human beings and human resources that you can utilize…”
He was also upset that when the government or aid groups came to distribute food to laborers in Hawally, the headlines were about how these expat workers didn’t follow rules and overran the trucks. No one thought about the way the food was distributed - in a sandlot instead of to buildings - or how bad the system was, and how desperately hungry workers had become.  He saw more hungry workers outside the co-op, begging for 100 fils. They sat and roamed in groups and you could see how tired they were. The barbed wire enclosing the area kept bringing images of concentration camps to Hamza’s mind, and reminded him of refugee camps back in Lebanon. 
“... So for some reason when I'm driving around in Hawally, the image of that, like clustered prison, like a full area as a prison, started to come to my mind, especially after I saw the barbed wires at the edge of Hawally. And I'm like, why?”

When Hamza went walking around his neighborhood in the allotted two hours during lockdown, he thought the empty streets made it feel like a European city, but his architect’s eye also noticed the lack of public and green spaces. He also saw many more laborers, single men, where once there were families. He found out later that during the pandemic, many families relocated to Salmiya and many laborers then moved into Hawally to avoid being trapped in the outlying lockdown areas. He felt upset when they extended the lockdown in Hawally, an expat neighborhood, when Jahra and Ahmadi had more COVID cases but both remained open.

Becoming suddenly unemployed for the first time in his life, Hamza decided to treat it as an opportunity, and he applied and was accepted into graduate school. He also took online courses to upgrade his professional skills. The entire experience has made him reconsider what “stability” would look like in his future, and to rethink the role that Kuwait will play in it.

In this clip, Hamza talks about the unfair policies and media portrayal of the expat community in Kuwait during the pandemic.

HAMZA - A Lebanese architect rethinks his future in Kuwait

Ahmed is an assistant pharmacist and has been living in Kuwait for 11 years. His young family is back in Egypt -- his wife was pregnant when he last returned to Kuwait three years ago, and he has yet to go home. His first month back, his sponsor did not pay him, and when Ahmed notified him that he wanted to quit, the sponsor opened a court case against him as “absentee”. The sponsor said Ahmed could leave the job if he paid him 500KWD, twice the salary Ahmed was never paid. If Ahmed refused, after 60 days he would be arrested by the police. Only the sponsor could lift the charges. Ahmed had no choice but to pay. He got into 1500KD debt from paying his sponsor, looking for work, paying rent and sending money home. It meant he couldn’t travel home to see his family for a while.  Luckily he found his current job, but had to wait the legal minimum of nine months before he could request leave, and then travel got banned due to the virus. Sometimes these days, he feels like he is dead to his own children, merely a picture they see and a voice. Although he is upset not to see his family, he is thankful that he is in Kuwait. He feels that Kuwait has done a good job taking care of people’s health, enforcing serious measures to contain the virus and making sure to meet people’s needs in lockdown. Ahmed follows all the guidelines, not even seeing his brother who lives in Hawalli. For the past seven months they have only spoken online.

Ahmed lives with seven men in a clean apartment. They are not interacting as much as they used to because everyone is scared that the others might not be careful enough when they go outside. When they would cook together during the full lockdown, they would sterilize all their shared cooking items and use plastic utensils. His roommates are depressed. Luckily, the apartment is near the beach so Ahmed can walk to let off steam, but, honestly, he has also been going crazy with stress during the pandemic. He feels mentally exhausted, doesn’t feel like eating, cannot sleep and has tremendous anxiety. He cannot reply when clients are disrespectful to him at work - he always thinks that because he is Egyptian, he could be deported if he argues. At night, he replays the conversations in his mind and cannot sleep. Usually he is patient but now he finds himself getting angry… he tells himself that everyone is unhappy, stressed, on edge, but he takes the anger home with him. He thinks that what he has learned from the pandemic is that you should only be kind to those who are kind to you, and for the others, give them back what they give you. He didn’t feel this way before, but you really learn who cares for you when crisis hits, he says. He has gotten closer to his family. 

Ahmed thinks Kuwait is incredibly generous. His father worked here his whole life, and he himself came when he was 21. He feels he shouldn’t complain because he has earned his living here and worked with many Kuwaiti friends over the years. Things have begun to change though. People used to feel excited to come to work in Kuwait, but because of the recent rise in discriminatory rhetoric and policies, that is not the case anymore. He thinks Kuwaitis can solve their problem with demographics by investing more in their own country, and asking people they don’t need in their labor force to leave, yes, but with kindness and courtesy. 

In this clip, Ahmed b. talks about the importance of patience, and how it helps him manage the pain of being separated from his family in Egypt.

AHMAD B. - An assistant pharmacist reflects on separation, injustice, and life in Kuwait post-COVID

Helen is proud of supporting her family in Ethiopia. It has not been easy. She left home to work in Lebanon when she was just 17, to support her four siblings and parents when her father got ill. She left before she even saw her 12th grade exam results. Her mother told her that her scores were good, and that she should return to study teaching or nursing. But then her father passed away. Helen decided to continue working, because she didn’t want her siblings to struggle. Her journey has been hard. After three years in Lebanon, she went to work in Dubai.  After three years, her sponsor in Dubai, who was like a father to her, suddenly tried to sexually assault her. When Helen fought him, the police were called in to intervene. Although she was the victim, the police deported her back to Ethiopia. Her mother begged Helen to stay with them-- they didn’t have much, but at least Helen would be safe.

Helen feels lucky though, because in 2008, soon after leaving Dubai, she was able to get a job in Kuwait working in an abaya shop. She is 37 now and has been supporting her family all of these years--her sister now has a good job after studying to be an accountant, and the other siblings studied as well. Helen also supports her adopted daughter. She became the godmother of her friend’s baby when she was just a girl herself. Helen’s friend died 18 days after the child’s birth, and Helen adopted the little girl. Her daughter is now 20 years old and in university.  

Although Helen has been through a lot, the pandemic has been one of the worst times she has lived through. Her salary was stopped, there was no work, and when she returned she was working full time, but only getting 25% of her salary. Her landlord cut the rent payment by 25%, then 50%, but Helen is still in debt to him, and for other loans she took out. But she feels lucky because she lives with three Ethiopian roommates, and they help one another with food and necessities; they pray together, and support one another. She says that she has become closer to God.

Helen’s voice is thick with tears as she talks about the hunger of people in Mahboula during lockdown. A very young man in dirty tattered clothes approached her begging for just 250fils for food. Helen asked for his phone number, she wanted to cook for him, but he couldn’t speak her language and maybe he didn’t have a phone--he just motioned to his mouth saying “ruba dinar”.

She was crying when she got home, because she didn’t know how to help him, and there were many like him. Maybe he didn’t have anyone in his community to help him, the way she and her roommates help one another. Helen says that for those that don’t speak English or Arabic and lost their jobs, there was nowhere to turn, no way to communicate what they needed. She cried and asked for God’s forgiveness to help them through this time. She knows aid was being given but she doesn’t think it was well-managed or she wouldn’t have seen so many hungry people.  She hopes that Kuwait will not lock out the people who work here in the future because they wouldn't be here if there wasn't a need. She misses her mother’s smile and her smell...if she could, she would give anything to be home with her, but she stays in Kuwait because she needs to help her family. She says today the people who come here to work need the jobs in Kuwait but someday, maybe Kuwait will need them too.

In this clip, Helen reflects on how badly the neighborhoods of Mahboula were hit during the lockdown, leaving many begging for food on the streets.

HELEN – An Ethiopian sales associate shares her struggles during lockdown in Mahboula

Laila has been in Kuwait for the past seven years. She is an assistant second grade teacher. She has a bachelor’s degree in English and works to support her five children, her husband and her parents in the Philippines. When the pandemic came, her school went online from February to July but continued to pay staff. She lived with the school owners as a tutor for their children for the first two months. Staying in a Kuwaiti house for the first time in six years was lonely and she felt shy, but she had to be tough and remind herself she was lucky to have work. So many in her community in Kuwait lost their jobs due to the pandemic, as did her cousins back home. She and her cousins abroad coordinated to send money home to support their extended family, but Laila also used part of her salary to support her jobless friends in Kuwait. In addition, she volunteered with a group providing aid, collecting the names of those in need to submit to the coordinators making deliveries. 

Laila, crying, says you need to act strong when you are helping others. As a mother herself, she felt very emotional for the lactating mothers who didn’t have enough food, or for those who didn’t have formula or diapers for their infants. When listening to those suffering from depression, she struggled to not show her own emotions. ‘Bayanihan’, which means taking care of community, is so important. You must take care of your own health and then take care of those in your community, she says, and the Filipino community all cared for one another during this time. But also, Laila stresses that you shouldn’t only seek to help those of your same nationality. Their volunteer group reached out and coordinated with members of African, Indian, Bangladeshi and other communities, to together find those most in need and make sure they got assistance. The five head volunteers were Filipino nurses who could get the food into the fenced off areas. They would work such long hours to ensure all the food was delivered that they often forgot to eat themselves. 

Her emotions have been so mixed throughout. She sees the distress of parents who have lost their jobs and cannot provide basic food and necessities for their children. But then she also sees all of the groups working together to help these families, and she feels joy at the heroism of so many. Also, when Laila wasn’t able to go to work because of the restrictions, she would stay up late and call her children at a time when they were all able to talk, about 2am in Kuwait. These nightly talks were a positive and precious side of the pandemic, strengthening her bonds with her family. She said many of her friends had the same experience with their own families. 
“I appreciate small things now in my life, especially my health... even if you don't have enough money and if your health is good, you’re considered yourself as a wealthy person. And you know, everything is temporary in this world. And one thing maybe that also made me mature is that you're not thinking of yourself only. You're thinking of other peoples’ conditions, other peoples’ struggles. You try to reach out more than before. You try to give more than you can have, even though you have only small things left on you for yourself. There is, you know, the feeling that, ‘Oh! I have to give this to you. I have to share this with someone because they need it more than myself. They need it more than I.’”

In this clip, Laila talks about the importance of having your own space, whilst living in her employers' home during lockdown.

LAILA – An assistant teacher works to support her family and community in Kuwait and the Philippines

Pedro was an assistant professor of computer science and taught at a university in the Philippines before coming to Kuwait 12 years ago to work as a systems administrator. Over the last few years though, his core work has shifted, and he is now a full-time social worker. He also volunteers for a local migrant rights organization. He is talking from outside a warehouse as they complete a food drive with other charities and prepare boxes to deliver to workers who have no jobs or income. The organization he volunteers with has coordinated with different migrant community groups to deliver aid. He and other volunteers with day jobs are now working 12 hours after their working days and averaging 3-4 hours of sleep a night. This is because they must prepare and deliver all of the aid in limited time frames to different areas across Kuwait. Boxes need to be adapted for families with infants, or communities’ differing staple diets. Due to lockdown restrictions, the aid workers try to coordinate with the police to arrange food delivery into restricted areas and to the amnesty centers where workers wait to be sent home. The authorities have largely been helpful with permits and assistance because the aid group is wearing full PPEs, delivering door to door, and does not create security or health threats. Sometimes though, there are just too many checkpoints and some police will not allow them to pass, so they just try again at the next opportunity. They have to be so careful with the health of their volunteers---they have maintained a small team in order to minimize risk of any of them contracting the virus. One of the aid recipients was in a household where two family members died of COVID, so the volunteers adapted their PPEs, doubling them and wearing face shields when delivering the food. So far they have served over 12,000 people. The project consists of 28 volunteers. 

In addition to food aid, the group has been providing other forms of support. There are a lot of couples who delivered their babies and then couldn’t go see them in the hospital. The project has tried to help those couples get in to see their newborns and provide transport. But the greatest challenge has been to get psychological services to those with COVID. At the time of our conversation, there were an average of eight suicides every day, and Pedro and his team didn’t have access to counseling professionals that could assist them in seeing people through this period. Pedro reflects on the fact that migrant workers are meant to be the strong ones, the providers for their families - but now, they are barely able to afford food for themselves, and the pressure they feel can become unbearable. If they catch COVID, it can put them over the edge. 

Pedro says nothing will return to exactly how it was - we will all need to adapt to a new normal. This applies to labor laws, to personal behaviour, to everything. We must all work together… what is my normal as someone from a specific background, he says, may not be normal for someone else. That means that all of us have to be included in determining how we move forward, to think of that path together and try to work between our different political, religious, and national identities. 

As soon as he is able, Pedro plans to go home to see his wife, his three sons and his daughter.  He says you must never forget to make time for yourself to be a husband, a father, and to dedicate time to your own family. It is only by taking care of your own life that you are then able to help others. 

In this clip, Pedro imagines the 'new normal' and life post-COVID, and stresses the need for new standards, particularly when it comes to the labor law.

PEDRO - A Filipino social worker shares his efforts to deliver aid and support expats in lockdown

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