Our new French partner

De L'Autre Cote are an organisation based in Aubervilliers in the northern outskirts of Paris. It began with a group of friends who all shared the desire to make a change in their communities and remove the idea that Aubervilliers is just a dangerous and forgotten place. Their aim as an organisation is to strengthen the community here and show people that regardless of the reputation of the community, they are a strong, successful, caring group of people. 

The group is led by Oussmane, Ghada, Noel and Firdaouce who spoke to us about some of the projects they run. This includes regular courses that teach people French, helping children in the local schools who have language or learning barriers to complete homework and offering a space to support people.

They work to help people from a wide range of backgrounds; inclusive of all ages, races, religions and social economic origins and we have seen this in action. They invited us warmly into their space and as keen as we were to hear about their work they were also incredibly interested in what we do. We have met some of the people they work with and this is young children, teenagers and adults from all different kinds of backgrounds. 

The leaders here want to link people from all over the world through lots of varying activities to help them gain self-confidence and unite people. It’s about making sure that young people especially but all people can build their futures, and gain skills that set them up for life.  One way they do this is by attending all the local events so they can reach out to people and integrate members of their group into the wider society. Insisting upon making sure that everyone is included; Jews, Muslims, Christians and people of no faith, they believe that peace begins with acceptance. Sometimes they go out late at night and try and help homeless people with food and accommodation, with the understanding that everyone is valued and everyone is worthy of love and support. Each person involved is a volunteer which means they have to juggle work commitments and volunteering- but they are all more than happy to do this as they have nothing but love for being able to help people in this way! 

They work with people with many troubles and said the most important thing to them is trust; gaining trust from the people they help, and showing them that they can put their trust in them. Working with the local council to help people means that they can reach a wider circle of people. The council will send them people that are in need of support and De l’Autre Cote will do everything they can, whether that is via education, emotional support or physical issues like accommodation.  Because they are operating in a multi faith and ethnicity area, one of their main focuses is on helping people with police brutality and harassment.  Other issues are young people at risk of radicalisation and supporting people inside prison. Every year, they celebrate women's day and the passionately oppose the gender inequality that currently exists in France and all over the world.

De l'Autre Cote also have links with Palestine. Aubervilliers is twinned with a town in called Beit Jala which is near to Bethlehem. In 2007 there was an exchange that involved people from Morocco, Algeria and Palestine. The aim of this trip was for the participants to learn as much as they could from one another so they were encouraged to do everything together, for example cooking, living, outings. They also participated in cultural exchanges like dancing, singing and sharing traditional stories. The leaders of the organisation communicate regularly with their Palestinian twinning partnersand they even visit Palestine when possible. Their big dream is to have peace everywhere and they are starting by spreading this dream with their community.