Dave's Story: "love, kindness and necessity when the state failed us all"

I answered a call to go and stand outside one of the volunteer hubs as a just-in-case deterrent to any unwanted interest.

Inside that hub was a flawlessly professional, large-scale logistical command centre, run entirely by volunteer women, and what they achieved for Belfast in the face of the hatred that brought us here will never leave me.

No-one gets to just stand around - within half an hour I was driving a displaced Muslim woman to a medical appointment. She was panicking all the while that they’d turn her away if she was a few minutes late, which said a lot to me about the difference between vulnerable people’s experience of bureaucracy in lieu of actual help, and the kind of immediate and effective support being provided by the likes of Anaka and others when it was needed most.

I stayed on to taxi people to their vandalised houses, to run groceries for people who even in “friendly” areas were now terrified to cross the threshhold.

One woman asked for nothing more than a bottle of Calpol and had to be persuaded to open the door even a crack to take it.

I came back and ran groceries over the weekend, and the welcome and help I got in Halal grocers was humbling.

I was only able to offer that small amount of help because of the coordination and direction of those awe-inspiring volunteers - women - who stepped up out of love, kindness and necessity when the state failed us all.