Stark Ad Shows What Life Could Be Like If a British Girl Became a Refugee
New ad shows what it would be like if a war like that in Syria came to the U.K.
— -- The young girl experiences getting shot at, being separated from her mother and fleeing by sea.
It all takes place in Save the Children’s new video called “Still the Most Shocking Second a Day” -- a sequel to its 2014 video “The Most Shocking Second a Day” that showed what it would be like if Syria’s war came to the U.K.
This time, the video asks viewers to imagine that the same young British girl and her mother are fleeing a refugee camp in the U.K. and going to an unspecified location outside of their home country.
“I’m quite privileged,” 13-year-old Lily-Rose Aslandogdu, who stars as the young refugee girl in the video, told ABC News. “Filming this made me realize how many things I take for granted like seeing my family every day, having a good education and not worrying about leaving through the front door and something happening."
Wars, conflicts and persecution have forced about 60 million people to flee their homes worldwide and half of them are children, according to the United Nations. It is the largest refugee crisis since World War II.
Since September 2015, two children have drowned every day on average trying to cross the eastern Mediterranean to find safety with their families in Europe, according to UNHCR, the United Nation refugee agency.
For the video, Lily-Rose had to film a scene where she is fleeing by sea. In the video, she falls into the water and is later found unconscious on the shore.
“In the boat, it was kind of difficult because I don’t like the sea,” Lily-Rose said. “But it was only acting so I had a choice. They [refugee children] don’t have a choice.”
Lily-Rose, who grew up in Essex, said that it was difficult to relate to what it is like to have to flee your own country. She prepared for the role by talking to a real Syrian refugee family in Leeds.
The daughter, a young girl, had experienced her school being bombed eight times and shootings at check points, the family told Lily-Rose.
“What I really wanted to get across is the real vulnerability that refugee children are in -- especially when they are alone -- but even if they are with an adult,” Jess Crombie, deputy director of creative and digital at Save the Children, told ABC News. “They don’t know where their next meal is coming from, where they are going to sleep at night or who is a friend and who isn’t a friend.”
The video shows a second in each day of the young girl’s life and her ups and downs. In one short scene, her mother is singing her “Happy Birthday.” In another, the girl is alone, freezing in the snow. A third moment shows a man wearing a balaclava holding a gun to her head. All the events in the video represent something that actually happened to real refugee children.