small park BIG RUN

So many lovely moments and so people to thank!

Thank you to :

• the marshals
• the choirs and musicians
• the two 24 hour runners
• all the other runners
• all the walkers, hoppers and skippers
• the long distance travellers
• the walled garden and the cafe servers and cake bakers
• the exhibition curators and looker-after-ers
• the first aiders
• Heeley Trust
• the fun-runners
• the lord mayor
• the lantern makers and hangers
• the kite makers and flyers
• the fruit providers (Regather and Beanies), waterers (Derbyshire Lane Co-op) and milkers (Our Cow Molly)
• the numerous volunteers
• the leafleteers
• the masseurs
• the photographers
• Badil
• our interviewees
• the writers
• Sheffield PSC
• the DIYers

Let’s have more next year – #spBR23 -> 17th and 18th June 2023.

Last Saturday we were delighted to welcome Alexi Dimond , local councillor for Gleadless Valley ward, to open the run.

He spoke very movingly and powerfully about the importance of striving for justice for refugees in general and Palestinian people in particular . His full speech is here

Thank you Alexi.

Last time we held small park BIG RUN in Meersbrook Park in 2019, the final hour was coined Buskers’ Hour. And it’s back! Musicians are positioned around the run circuit to encourage weary final hour participants and kicking off the festive celebratory atmosphere for the end of run rally. It will be 11.00am-noon on Sunday 19th June.

With some runners near to completing the whole 24 hours, their services will be needed more than ever! We’re delighted to have eight groups of very talented musicians kindly donating their time, efforts and happiness to us.

These include highly talented singer-songwriters, a ten piece folk band, a community choir recently returned from Palestine, a Sheffield street band, a heavy metal acoustic duo. It’s going to be a blast!

This is the complete list. Thank you all!

1 Well Dressed Band are a community based folk band based in the Peak District
2 Cobalt Tales are a female duo based in Sheffield that tours the UK and festival circuit
3 Sheffield Street Band is a well known local collective of musicians
4 Julia Waldron is a wonderful singer songwriter/guitarist from Sheffield.
5 Megatron Death is inspirational heavy metal folk.
6 Tadhamon choir is an ensemble of singers very supportive of the Palestine cause
7 John , Guy, Rob and special guest are talented Meersbrook residents
8 Chrystine Moon is another fabulous local musician and singer songwriter.

Below you can see where they will all be playing on this map and also some lovely pictures of the musicians in their element!

Hope to see you there. Don’t forget to sign up! Or simply come along and support the participants and enjoy the fun.

The theme for small park BIG RUN this year is Palestinians as refugees. It is central to the Palestinian experience. No where is this better expressed than in our interviews with Kholoud and Sahar, who talk in such moving way about the right of return.

There are diasporas all over the world – the largest outside the middle east is in Chile. But overwhelming refugees are based either in Palestine – also known as Internally Displaced Persons – and surrounding countries

You can find out more about where Palestinian refugees live here and also from Badil, a refugee rights centre in the West Bank.

Throughout small park BIG RUN we will be showing a selection of films from Badil where you can find out more about life as a Palestinian refugee. See our programme

small park BIG RUN organisers were enormously privileged to interview two Palestinian refugees earlier this year. The accounts they gave were moving, fascinating, frank, honest and inspiring in equal measure. We are very grateful to them for sharing their personal and painful stories.

1. Interview with Sahar Awadallah
2. Interview with Kholoud Al-Ajarma

Sahar Awadallah and Kholoud Al-Ajarma both told of how their families were expelled from their homes seventy years ago – and are still dreaming, three generations later, of their return.

Sahar spoke of the insecurity she experienced as a child moving multiple times from country to country, with a bag permanently packed ready for the next upheaval. She spoke of her anger that she must seek permission to visit her hometown. And she also spoke of her annoyance at the double standards and hypocrisy that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has again revealed. Where it has now become OK to call for sanctions against a country accused of aggression and occupation – this was not the case for those calling for a boycott of Israeli goods who were often accused of racism and exceptionalism.

Kholoud told us of her life – where at first she didn’t realise she was growing up living in a refugee camp, she thought everyone lived like that! But slowly she discovered that although Aida refugee camp was her home, it wasn’t her homeland.

She spoke movingly of the tales her grandparents and parents would tell of their homes, now in Israel, where the cactuses tasted like honey, they ate fresh figs from the trees and they ate fresh bread from the oven. With weekly markets and friendly people all around. This memory stood in stark contrast to the refugee camp she found herself in, with its daily Israeli army raids and the smell of tear gas, rather than fresh bread, in the air.

Kholoud said that that although the stories her family told her seemed to be like fairy tales when she managed to finally visit their family homeland those stories turned out to be true. Beautiful countryside with space to live in, to return to, and air to breath.

You can listen to the interviews in full, by following the links below.

small park BIG RUN would like to thank both Sahar and Kholoud from the bottom of our hearts for their collaboration and cooperation.

1. Interview with Sahar Awadallah
2. Interview with Kholoud Al-Ajarma

You can find more information on refugees in Palestine here. And visit Badil (Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights).

The week before we start the run and for a few weeks after, Sheffield is hosting a couple of major events either about Palestine or refugees.

Palfest is an ambitious festival celebrating Palestine and Palestinian resistance, with Palestinian food, dance and music.

Meanwhile Migration Matters, running from the 17th to the 25th June, is a festival of dance and music and theatre celebrating sanctuary in Sheffield.

Check them out!