Suranga is an area coordinator responsible for all Agency for Technical Cooperation and Development (Acted) operations in Zaatari, King Abdullah Park and Cyber City refugee camps. She’s an experienced humanitarian manager specialized in complex emergency and recovery programmes in conflict, post-conflict and natural disaster contexts.

Leave your questions in the comments and Suranga will be back at 2pm ET | 7pm BST to respond

What is your typical day like?

Since my arrival in Zaatari last April, I have been working 12-hour shifts usually from 6am to 6pm in the evening inside the camp, six days a week most of the weeks. It’s quite intense but not unusual for most of my colleagues working here and even in other countries in similar contexts.

I start my day with a very early and quiet drive through northern Jordan desert roads from our guesthouse into the camp that allows me to think of what awaits us on that day.

On most mornings I have a walk inside the camp as the refugees are still asleep, looking at work done by our teams the previous day, taking advantage of the fresh temperature and the light to take shots of the camp and sometimes stop for a quick chat and chai with the elderly.

At 8am we kick off the day. Acted is one of the leading Wash [Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene] agencies operating in Zaatari, as we provide the refugee population with the entire water supply, solid waste management, camp and sanitation cleaning, hygiene promotion, distributions and community mobilization. We have a team of roughly 300 individuals, both Jordanian and Syrians.

A typical day is a mixed bag:

Troubleshooting water truck drivers who are on strike because of multiple attacks on their trucks by refugees

Fixing garbage trucks stuck in the camp because of lack of access and poor road and drainage infrastructure

Coordinating weekly cash payment for [some] thousand refugee laborers who perform large scale camp and sanitation cleaning

Distributing of baby diapers and soap

Ensuring we are spreading the right messages and information on Wash-related services via our community mobilization teams

Dealing with the occasional security incident which requires immediate relocation of teams until the situation becomes normal again.

What's your annual salary? Do you get benefits?

I am currently paid €27,000 per year on a French contract and receive most of the benefits of the French labor law. It’s a decent salary in France, lower in comparison to other Anglo-Saxon agencies or the UN for whom I worked too for many years. I usually choose jobs mostly based on the context, the country and more importantly the roles and responsibilities involved as well as the type of projects implemented.

What is the most challenging aspect of your job?

Definitely insecurity and protection of staff: we often work in challenging environments with an increasing number of incidents and attacks targeting us directly, despite basic humanitarian principles and common sense. I’ve lost many colleagues I worked with in other missions who didn’t make it alive through indiscriminate shelling, and just last week, two Acted colleagues in Central African Republic were killed during an evacuation by armed men, and I’d like to take this opportunity to send our support and condoleances to their families and colleagues again for this tragic episode.

Here in Zaatari, we used to have a very high number of security incidents which would hamper the delivery of aid. While it has now significantly reduced, we are still on alert while also keeping in mind that it is the actions of only a small minority affecting a large population usually very supportive and grateful for our interventions.

What makes your work fulfilling?

There are two main aspects: First, one can hardly describe the rewarding feeling of being exposed to incredible human beings. I feel grateful to have met and worked with many, many unsung heroes who made it alive through war, natural disasters and their related traumas and will still smile, draw suns, and carry on with their lives. They teach me life, full stop. I remember a very old lady displaced multiple times by fighting in Northern Sri Lanka and carried her granddaughter for days while injured in the head and made it alive for her on the other side of the frontline. That lady is for me a modern superhero and their strength to resume their lives – with or without our help – is incredibly inspiring.

In addition, and equally as important, the most fulfilling aspect of this job is to build capacities and skills of our national teams: they are the cornerstone of many of our interventions as they know the context, the environment, and have been there before. And unlike us expatriates, [they] will be present after we [leave]. I have been lucky to work with very experienced and skilled teams and it’s really rewarding to see them grow in their roles and responsibilities with the right amount of management, space and trust. I feel I have done my job when projects are managed and run smoothly with little supervision or monitoring, that’s when it’s time to step out and let nationals run interventions in their respective countries.

What's one thing about your job that you think people should know?

I wish people – including my friends and family – understood that the humanitarian and development career path has become increasingly professional, competitive and requires highly qualified and experienced individuals. It is not just a part-life hobby but a genuine commitment from many of us with strong ethics and values to contribute to make a difference. The time when one had good intentions and will to help is long gone and it’s just not good enough to ensure high standards and quality of aid provided as we are accountable to both communities we are aiming to assist as well as tax payers back in our countries funding our interventions.

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