大象传媒

A hostile zone?

Over 200,000 Syrians may have thought they had successfully escaped the fighting in their country and found a safe haven in Jordan. After all, they could enter without a visa and both the Jordanian authorities and international NGOs were standing by to help.

But at camp Zaatari, near Mafraq in the Jordanian desert, Sakhr Al-Makhadhi has met many refugees convinced that they now have to escape a second time. They have criticisms both of living standards and their status - and some of the Jordanians in charge of the camp are losing patience.

A rainbow of faiths in one

Brazil has been famous for centuries for the way its people have pulled together religious inspiration from a range of sources - European, African, Native American, and more recently, New Age (or at least space age.) The country has hundreds - perhaps thousands - of religious communities which operate nowhere else in the world, and aren't shy about incorporating whichever cosmology or ritual suits their purpose.

Rajan Datar's recently been to a particularly inclusive site near Brasilia: the headquarters of the Valley of the Dawn cult. This is a place people flock to for enlightenment - but could Rajan leave his own scepticism at the door?