UNHCR x YouTube
Finding connection beyond the crisis.
Welcome to the age of the permacrisis. These days, the world seems to produce a new emergency long before the last one has even had a chance to settle.
In 2022, the number of people forcibly displaced by conflict, violence, persecution and disaster passed 100 million for the first time. It is a figure so vast that it almost loses all meaning. More likely to leave people feeling powerless than moved to act.
That was the challenge facing UNHCR. How do you make a crisis of forced displacement on this scale feel personal again?
Created in partnership with YouTube, We Were Here was a short documentary series designed to change how we think and feel about refugees. It was not about pity. It was about connection. Instead of reducing people to what they had been forced to endure, we shifted the focus to who they were as individuals.
And what is the quickest way to connect with someone you don’t know? Through shared interests. Fortunately, that is what YouTube is built for.
When people are forced to flee, they have to leave almost everything behind. But some things, like passions, always stay with you. They become a way of holding on to who you are when everything else has been thrown into uncertainty.
So we built the series around those passions.
Working with a team of researchers, we found three groups of people living in camps and temporary shelters around the world with remarkable passion, skill and creativity.
We then paired each of them with a well-known YouTube creator who shared their passion. These creators brought more than a point of connection. They also brought a like-minded audience already invested in it. This meant the films could begin with curiosity, rather than hardship.
In each episode, the participants came together to share stories and exchange knowledge through what they loved. The crisis was the context, not the subject. What mattered was the common ground between them.
Published on the creators’ YouTube channels for World Refugee Day, the series reached millions of viewers, helping audiences connect with someone they might otherwise have thought of as only a statistic.
The series was produced in collaboration with award-winning directors Alma Har’el and Laura Checkoway.
Episode 1 – Simone x Mohammad: In Jordan’s Azraq refugee camp, YouTube inventor Simone Giertz meets Mohammad Waheed, a retired Syrian teacher known locally as the camp’s toymaker. Together, they build a toy helicopter, finding common ground through invention, imagination and the simple joy of making something fly.
Episode 2 – Jax Jones x Fo Sho: In a village near Stuttgart, DJ and producer Jax Jones meets Betty, Siona and Miriam, three sisters from Ukraine whose up-and-coming hip-hop trio was interrupted by war. As they create a track together, they discover how questions of home and belonging have shaped both their music.
Episode 3 – Gaz x Bemeriki: In a Ugandan refugee settlement, vegan chef and gardening enthusiast Gaz Oakley meets Bemeriki Dusabe, a permaculture expert who has spent 16 years teaching fellow refugees how to grow food with limited land and resources. Together, they explore how gardening can become a source of nourishment, independence and resilience.