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Volunteering In Calais With The Refugee Community Kitchen

Serving thousands of meals to people from over 20 nationalities, Refugee Community Kitchen serves nutritious food without judgement to those fleeing war, poverty, persecution and climate change living in Northern France.

You don’t need kitchen experience to get stuck in, just a willingness to work hard. RCK can teach you everything you need to know, from prep to cooking to serving. Roles include chopping vegetables, washing up, stock sorting, driving and cooking.

Volunteers should be self funding and will need to arrange their own accommodation before arriving. If you are interested and can stay for two weeks or longer, visit https://refugeecommunitykitchen.org/volunteer-calais, and read their FAQs, to find and more.

Longer term volunteers that are aged over 21 and have self funded their accommodation for a month may be able to be accommodated with other long term volunteers.

Barbara Campos, herself a descendant of refugees who were forced to emigrate from Germany to Brazil in the 1930s, wrote about her experience volunteering with RCK a few years ago. She described the work in the kitchen as hard and non stop.

“The music is loud, the volunteers are cheery, and the atmosphere is full of love. Vegetables need to be washed and prepared, huge pots and pans need washing up, the floor needs to be swept. The days are long – up to 11 working hours each day.”

Kerstin Rodgers, AKA MsMarmiteLover, is another former volunteer. The Refugee Community Kitchen reminded her of her activist past, of squat cafes and cooking at festivals. Her co-volunteers were mostly young people with dreadlocks and fresh faced students, punctuated by the odd older person.

Two more organisations in the area to investigate are Care4Calais and Auberge des Migrants.

A Facebook group connecting volunteers looking to liftshare with each other to the camps near Calais and Dunkirk can be found here.

Volunteering with refugees is a frequent subject in our newsletter. Sign up or read the latest issue here.