⚓️ FIELD GUIDE 66: Chosen Families

One summer I traveled abroad and missed an important family member’s wedding in the midst of my studying. This marriage brought me two new cousins, and an uncle.

Casey being the eldest of those two new cousins has become one of the most inspiring and comforting presences in our family, and I am forever greatful for his dad joining my crazy family and bringing him along with him.

Casey graduated from George Mason University in Virginia just about a year ago, and he has set off to make quite the difference in the LGBTQ+ community. Doing work that others may be too apprehensive to step into.

This week, I hope Casey can inspire you to lean into family that isn’t born to you, but the family that you’ve chosen. Sometimes they are the encouragement, the motivation, and the reason behind the work we do.

Happy Weekend.

Name

Casey Klemmer

Location

Samos, Greece

Soundtrack

My first Christmas away from home was spent on a small island in Greece, dancing to African music, drinking generic Greek cola and surrounded by LGBTQ migrants from all across the world. This group had confirmed the powerful reason for upending my life and traveling halfway across the world to do humanitarian work, and while I was dreading my upcoming move to Serbia, in that moment I felt encouraged and uplifted by this community I had come to love.

So how did I end up in Greece? From the moment I finished university one year ago, I knew I wanted to travel to the people I had studied for so long from afar. I found Samos Volunteers entirely by accident...a stray post on Instagram that led me to discover their small outreach program for LGBTQ refugees on Samos. My first day of work was an unlucky Friday, October 13, 2023, but I could not have been more lucky to stumble upon this organization.

During my first weekend on Samos I went on the most challenging hike of my life at the time, one that brought us up a mountain and down to a small rocky cove, and then up another mountain and down to a wide sandy beach. Woefully underprepared, I hadn’t brought enough water or snacks for the journey. I felt the support of my fellow volunteers - who barely knew me yet - as they shared their water, oranges, and Lidl pretzels with me.

As we climbed down the mountain toward the first cove, I saw a large black shape washed up on the beach. It was the first refugee boat I saw on Samos, and certainly not the last. Strewn about the beach were discarded items from the people who had used the inflatable dinghy to cross the Aegean Sea to the island, including abandoned shoes, childrens’ lifejackets, and waterlogged coats.

According to the Aegean Boat Report (an independent NGO monitoring the situation), 1192 people arrived on Samos in the month of October and most of them travel to Greece in these precarious and unsafe boats, hoping to make it safely to shore. While many of them arrive safely, a large number do not.

Having seen intimately the way people arrive on the island, I felt prepared (if also a little apprehensive) to begin working with the LGBTQ support group. The first few weeks there were no participants as the group continues through word of mouth and all of the former members had been moved to the mainland. So we waited. In university I studied the experiences of LGBTQ migrants, and had spent many years working with the queer community at home.

As a queer and trans man myself, I felt connected to the potential participants in a personal way. I will always remember the first meeting where two participants joined us. It was awkward. They had no idea what to expect from us or the group, and given the lives they were coming from their apprehension was understandable. But slowly, more people joined and I became a trusted figure. Each week we would catch up, laugh, dance, make art, and be in community together.

My leaving Greece was forced by circumstance. The 90 days allotted to me on a tourist visa were coming to a close, and with no long-term solution in sight, I had to find another NGO to volunteer with outside of the Schengen area while waiting for my time to reset. On my last day with the group, each member wrote me a card. I cherish these cards still. One person arrived the day I was leaving. In her card she left me some advice I continue to live by. She said, “Today I come to know you and it is time to say goodbye. Don’t let yourself be controlled by three things: people, money, or past experiences.”

I left in early January for Serbia. I didn’t enjoy my time there. The situation in Serbia is even more bleak and desperate than in Greece, and humanitarian work is difficult. There is no space for sustained relationships with the people on the move because they are just that: on the move. I spent two months volunteering in Serbia, and one month in Montenegro before deciding to return to Samos.

My homecoming! Returning to Samos truly felt like returning to a home. My friends were here to welcome me, the beaches and the sea here to comfort me, and familiar places and faces were all around. I returned to the LGBTQ group in April to find that it had continued to grow after I had left, with three members remaining from before and an average of 8-10 people attending every week.

This time I decided to add more structure to the group. Now we have an opening activity with one silly question and one deep question, and every other week we have an educational activity. We’ve had doctors come and present on health for the LGBTQ community, lawyers come to discuss the rights of LGBTQ refugees, and information sessions on LGBTQ identity.

And what was the powerful reason for moving to a timezone seven hours ahead of everyone I knew? It was the opportunity to confirm that the queer community can and does transcend racial, cultural, religious, and international boundaries. That I can be surrounded by love and hope from people who have the least incentive to be hopeful, and that my work encourages them to continue another day.

Today is May 17, 2024, International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia. All of these are phobias that members of the group are too familiar with. Many members have endured extreme trauma and abuse due to their identity, resulting in their migrations across vast distances to find community and safety in Greece.

If you are interested in supporting the work of Samos Volunteers and refugees on the island, check out their website here.

If you wish to continue following your curiosities, here is another link that Casey has supplied us with:

Aegean Boat Report