The man behind the mega-popular, empathy-inducing Facebook page Humans of New York has launched a campaign to raise funds for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh who were driven from Myanmar by a military campaign that has been described as “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide.”
Photographer Brandon Stanton recently visited Bangladesh to meet some of the refugees, and throughout this week, the Humans of New York page will release their photos and their stories to its 18.3 million followers.
Here’s the first post from HONY’s Rohingya Refugee Series, posted last night:
The GoFundMe campaign started by Stanton has already raised nearly US$150,000 in 13 hours, donations are still coming in. The funds will be used to build durable bamboo homes for refugees in the sprawling Kutupalong and Balukhali camps. Most refugees currently live in fragile plastic tents, which offer little protection from the coming monsoons.
The homes were designed by Love Army – a humanitarian organization started by French Snapchat star Jérôme Jarre, who visited the camps with a band of artists and social influencers in Nov. 2017 and raised over $2 million in aid for Rohingya refugees.
Each home will have two bedrooms and a kitchen area and will be able to house up to six people. Each one costs $630 to build and will be assigned to families deemed most vulnerable by UNHCR.
“These things sound simple, but under the current conditions, they represent a huge leap in comfort and security,” wrote Stanton in the fundraiser description. Each house costs around $630 to build.
This is not the first time Stanton has used his HONY platform to raise funds for humanitarian causes. In 2016, he posted photos and stories from the pediatric department of a New York City hospital to raise over $3.8 million for pediatric cancer research.
You can find donate to the Houses For Rohingya Refugees fundraiser here.
