Little Amal: The giant puppet walking 5000 miles from Turkey to the UK
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Meet Little Amal - the not so little puppet of a 9-year-old Syrian girl who is walking 5,000 miles from Turkey to the UK.
The journey represents the stories of the millions of young refugees who are forced to leave their homes and often travel alone without their parents.
Designed as part of a project aimed at raising awareness of the difficulties faced by child refugees, the nearly 12-foot-tall puppet will cross the border of eight countries.
She'll be moving from Turkey to Greece, then Italy, France, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium and finally the UK where Little Amal's journey will end in Manchester on 3 November.
The giant puppet has been made by the same people who worked on the horse puppet for the theatre production of War Horse.
Called The Handspring Puppet Company, it takes a total of four puppeteers to animate Little Amal: one for each arm, one for her back, and one actor inside her body, walking on stilts and also operating a contraption called "the harp," a complex system of strings that control the puppet's facial expressions.
It's precisely because the world is now looking at other issues that it's so important to bring the refugee crisis back into focus.
Amir Nizar Zuabi, Artistic Director
The Handspring Puppet Company's founders, Basil Jones and Adrian Kohler even came out of retirement to create it.
"The refugee story is the big issue of our time," said Kohler.
Who are refugees?
A refugee is a person who has been forced to leave their country because they are in danger. This can be war, being treated badly because of their beliefs or escaping a natural disaster.
Refugees leaving their countries often take long journeys by car, lorry, boat or even on foot to get to safety.
Often refugees gather in places called refugee camps, which are giant camps with many thousands of people living there, often in poor conditions.
Called 'The Walk' the project has the slogan: "Don't forget about us".
"It's precisely because the world is now looking at other issues that it's so important to bring the refugee crisis back into focus," says Amir Nizar Zuabi, The Walk's artistic director.
He added that the aim is to highlight "the potential of refugees" rather than just their "dire circumstances."
Little Amal is based on a character from UK-based Good Chance Theatre and their production called The Jungle, a play about the Calais refugee camp in France.
In the story, Amal is nine-years-old and a Syrian refugee from the city of Aleppo, searching for her mother.
Moner came to live in the UK after escaping the war in Syria (2020)
The Syrian civil war officially began ten years ago, since then families have suffered during a brutal conflict that has torn the country apart.
About 6.8 million Syrians are now refugees or asylum seekers and another 6.7 million people have been forced to leave their homes and now live in poor conditions within Syria.
Together that's more than half of the country's population and about half of the people affected by the Syrian refugee crisis are children.
Many refugees have fled the war in Syria
Amal ended the first part of her route from the Turkey/Syrian border by watching the sunset along with her puppeteers, the event ended with a farewell concert by Syrian singers, before the giant puppet set off on the next part of her journey stopping in Greece.
In each of the 70 towns and cities Amal is visiting, there will be a festival of music dance & theatre in support of refugees.
Little Amal is travelling through Europe on a 5000 mile / 8000 km journey
Paid for by an online fundraiser, The Walk project has already raised more than the £30,000 target needed to make the journey possible.
"Yes, refugees need food and blankets, but they also need dignity and a voice," said artistic director Amir Nizar Zuabi.
- Published15 November 2021
- Published8 November 2018
