Interview at Lily Unden written by Jorge and Jacob

On the 22 December 2022, Jacob and Jorge went to the reception centre « Lily Unden » (Lily Unden is an reception centre that helps people that fled from their country) to make an interview about it.

The reception centre « Lily Unden » is located near the primary school « Batty Weber ». It has a lot of rooms, activities, a kitchen, a canteen, a salon, and even a gigantic wardrobe as big as standard room with a lot of clothes where the people that live there can take the clothes if they need them.

Jacob and Jorge interviewed Bastian Eul the responsable of « Lily Unden »

What does Bastian Eul do ?

His name Bastian Eul and he is the responsable of « Lily Unden » and the reception centre « Don Bosco » (reception centre just next to « Lily Unden »). He is also the responsable of the team of five people. In the team with him are a few educators and a social assistant. There is also a technical team if something breaks in someone’s room they are there to fix it.

What the residents can do

There are also a lot of activities that the team do with the residents like going for a walk, going to the museum, drawing, doing sports, music related activities, etc. For the activities sometimes volunteers come and help or help the residents for their homework. There are also organisations that plan activities where the residents can come.

How it works

If we count in the « Don Bosco » reception centre there 180 residents in the two buildings combined. There is a team in « Lily Unden » that helps unaccompanied minors. It’s complicated to say how long the residents stay in the reception centre because it’s really different depending on the person. For exemple it’s a exeption if a resident stays only a year because it takes six months or longer to have the document « national security » and then they have to find a stable job and have enough money to leave the reception centre to find a house or an appartement and that can take a very long time.

The reception centre « Lily Unden » has families with childrens, couples, men, women, unaccompanied minors, mothers alone with their child or children and the same thing for fathers. The residents can’t be from the European Union but from else where like countries from the middle East or Afghanistan.

The residents don’t go to school in the reception centre but they go normally to school.

After they leave

It’s complicated for the reception centre in contact with residents that leave the centre because 180 people is to much to stay in contact with, but when for exemple Bastian Eul a former resident see then is he happy to speak with them.

A typical day

A typical day for Bastian Eul starts at half past eight, with his team they speak about what happened yesterday and what they could do today with the residents. They also look if they an emergency with a resident or more. In the afternoon they often do the activities that they planned earlier in the day.

Why this job ?

Bastian Eul chose this job because he saw people that didn’t has the same privilege as him and he wanted to help them. One day he went to Russia and he saw people that were really poor and he said to him himself that these people have dreams or want to get out of this situation so Bastian Eul decided that he wanted to help these people.

Good sides and bad sides

In every job it is possible to have some things that you don’t like and for Bastian Eul he hates when there are conflicts between the residents but Bastian Eul and his team always find a solution to solve these conflicts. In all job there is also a good part, Bastian Eul loves to help the residents and make them happy. Bastian Eul has a lot of good memories too like one time they had a music activity where they played djembé with the residents and even people that never played an instrument before they also took part in this activity and had a lot of fun.

The residents of « Lily Unden » are strong people they don’t give up and they always go forward.