This is a story on the first travels of the Migration campaign suitcase: how it moved from Aalst (Belgium) to Nuenen (The Netherlands).
On the 30th of December the suitcase had its first moment of fame on the Belgian radio. At 6:40 in the morning (!) an interview with Joke (Migration campaign prep team member and maker of the suitcase) was broadcasted. She told the listeners about the Migration Campaign, how the prep team of the campaign had thought of a suitcase that will travel through Europe and the purposes of this action. It was a very good interview, even though Joke was woken up in the early hours of the morning to tape it and had to think in an intellectual fashion (as we Greens do) before she could even open her eyes!
The next day the suitcase left the place where it was made for the first time. It went to the station on foot, then rushed up some stairs and made it just in time for the train to Brussels. People stared at it, because it is a very old suitcase and contained already 3 stickers of member organisations of FYEG and their mother parties. In Brussels it took the train to Roosendaal and in that train it passed a border for the first time.
It was not at all difficult, even though the suitcase contained 2 refugees and their false
passports. The suitcase only saw a good looking Belgian check the train ticket of his smuggler, but didn’t even notice crossing the border at first. In Roosendaal it had to wait on the station for 30 minutes. It was very cold and the refugees, who were used to warmer temperatures, didn’t feel comfortable there at all. Luckily the train was warmer and after 4 hours on Belgian and Dutch trains they had reached Eindhoven. This was the city where Stefanie (campaign coordinator) is a distinguished Green councillor and the suitcase
hoped that it would go to a nice council building with heating and a luxurious room for itself. Unfortunately, the council doesn’t have such a luxurious building and Stefanie wasn’t in Eindhoven anyway. So, now came the difficult part: the suitcase was bound at the back of a bicycle and cycled through the coldness for about 8 kilometres. By now it was used to being stared at. Finally arriving in a town named Nuenen, it went inside a warm house and could stand next to a very friendly Christmas tree. There it passed the change of year, dreaming of its future travels.