Why one Irishman swapped his 'holiday of a lifetime' for volunteering with refugees
Gerry Clancy planned to see the Great Wall of China but belatedly felt 'woeful guilt about spending €6,000 on myself'. Two months later, he set off to work in a Greek refugee camp. Picture: Brendan Gleeson
After running a company for more than two decades, Gerry Clancy from Kilfinane in Limerick was due to go on the holiday of a lifetime in 2018, a treat for his 65th birthday.
He decided he would finally see the Great Wall of China and travel the Yangtze River.
Before that, though, he took a break from work and went to a Tibetan Buddhist retreat on the Beara Peninsula in West Cork in a move that changed everything.
“Part of that was talking about people in less well-off places around the world and when I was coming home on the Sunday evening I had a woeful guilt about spending €6,000 on myself,” he said.
At the time, he had seen a post online about a charity called Refugee Support Europe.
“They were trying to help people by bringing back some dignity into their lives,” he said.
The charity was set up just two years prior and provides aid with dignity through ‘dignity centres’ situated in refugee camps.
“There could be 100 people at the door every morning, mostly looking for food,” Mr Clancy said, explaining that each eligible person receives 840 points which equates to €8.40 which they can use in the dignity centre’s food shop.
“Believe it or not, we can give someone a week’s worth of groceries for €8.40.”
He has encountered countless refugees through his volunteer work, all of whom are in crisis, he said.
“Everyday life for them is a huge uphill struggle,” he said before adding: “I had a 22-year-old girl from Nigeria back in March who was there because her family wanted to marry her off to a 65-year-old guy she had never seen. She refused and ran away and her life is now in danger from her own family.”
Mr Clancy recalled meeting a former senior judge who had to flee Afghanistan and remains living in constant fear for his family after putting members of the Taliban in jail.
Using Cyprus as an example, Mr Clancy said refugees can only work in a limited number of “very low-paid jobs” which the centre helps them to curate CVs for.
“We write CVs based on those jobs even though sometimes they give us information that they’re qualified mechanics, electricians, or plumbers but they can’t do any of those jobs in Cyprus,” he said.
While providing information for vital services in the area, the centre also acts as a café, and somewhere to get a haircut or charge a phone.
Dignity centres such as the one in Cyprus cost approximately €25,000 to operate each month. Originally there were four — two in Greece, one in Moldova, and one in Cyprus — but just the two latter remain due to difficulties in raising funds.
Mr Clancy decided to organise a sponsored walk in Kilfinane in July which saw 40 people, including 10 Ukrainian people living locally, turn up to raise €6,500.
Since 2018, Mr Clancy has raised €105,000 for Refugee Support Europe which relies solely on public funds and volunteers who all pay for their own expenses while abroad.
He said people from all across Limerick , including JP and Noreen McManus, support the cause each year while other across the county travel to Kilfinane in December just to donate.
Separately, he raises funds each summer by selling planters in June, with this year’s proceeds going to Merchant’s Quay and Mid-West Simon.
“The response from the community is unbelievable,” he said.
Mr Clancy has volunteered at refugee camps abroad in Greece and Cyprus five times and is now gearing up for a sixth visit next month.
“You’re in a bubble and when you come home, everything is strange,” he said.
“I never got to see the Great Wall of China and I never got to go down the Yangtze River,” he said, laughing.
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