On the first day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Salam Lab organized an Aid Point at 3 Radziwiłłowska Street in Kraków.
We co-created R3 — as the volunteers call it — together with the teams of the Zustricz and UAinKrakow Foundation and the support of JCC Krakow, Szlachetna Paczka, Internationaler Bund Polska and Teatr im. Juliusz Słowacki in Krakow.
We would like to inform you that the Help Point at 3 Radziwillowska Street is only open until the end of October 2023. We are happy to have been able to help so many people during these 15 months.
3 Radziwiłłowska Street, Kraków
pomoc@salamlab.pl
+48 12 323 66 20
Monday-Friday 9AM-5PM
Since the beginning of the Russian aggression, R3 has acted as an emergency shelter for women and children evacuated from Ukraine.
Since the opening of the Point, we have provided accommodation to 3,583 people. Radziwiłłowska 3 also acted as an information point and a space for providing basic medical, psychological and legal assistance. We helped find flats and supported relocation.
We worked on site and by the hotline. During the first two months of operation, we made almost 17,000 connections.
We celebrated Women’s Day together, trying to cheer up our beneficiaries, at least for a moment.
Like all people, refugees are all equal. There is no room for racism in Salam Lab.
Not only Ukrainians came to R3 Aid Point. Among the many were refugees who ended up in Ukraine during the invasion, but were of different nationality: families from Syria, Nigeria, Pakistan, Afghanistan. Many Georgians who moved to Ukraine during the war in their own country, also came to us.
We supported each and every one of them as best we could.
During this time, we were supported by nearly 600 volunteers as well as 30 employees. From the very beginning, they tirelessly provided us with help and advice. We thank them for everything.
In May, Radziwiłłowska 3 Aid Point slightly changed its function.
We continue to operate as a basic information and assistance point as well as a housing and relocation support center. However, we no longer offer emergency accommodation at 3 Radziwiłłowska St.
People who report their accommodation needs are directed to the apartments from our database of trusted people, hotels and organisations or are sent to other aid centers. We are still the operator of accommodation, hotline and reception support. So far, we have found a long- and short-term apartments for 11,090 people.
We also provide free psychological support to all those in need. Our assistants support beneficiaries in offices, when making doctors’ appointments or enrolling children in schools. They also arrange benefits and welfare payments for people with refugee experience, such as one refugee and her son with a disability. We were by her side throughout the process of applying for Polish confirmation of the degree of disability: during medical interviews, submitting documents, and meetings with the commission. The beneficiary, who initially did not even know that she could receive benefits from the state, found out about this possibility and, thanks to us, submitted the documents.
We listen to many stories of refugees every day, and each of them is different.
We helped Mr. Andrzej to finance injections for sick knees. He says that when he “gets married after all the operations, he will invite all the volunteers to the wedding”.
Some people join the life of the Aid Center themselves and become volunteers, such as Ms Tatiana from Kharkiv. Or they set up the Salam Library on R3, like a programmer who became a librarian, that is, the second Mrs. Tatiana – from Kiev .
We have created a meeting place that unites people of different nationalities.
We would not have succeeded without our partners
Biedronka Foundation
Thanks to the contract with the Biedronki Foundation, which runs the “Welcome and help – accommodation” program , we have effective tools to help.
The program focuses on providing free and temporary accommodation to the refugees most in need as well as women and children from Ukraine. The Foundation provides operational support to organizations such as Salam Lab, which look after people in the refugee crisis, while working for groups particularly vulnerable to social exclusion. Biedronka funds and donates accommodation through the eTravel platform.
Thanks to our cooperation with the Foundation, we can provide refugees with short-term stays in hotels, guesthouses and accommodation centers throughout Poland.
AirBnB
The second important partner for us is AirBnB. The company provides flats and apartments for short-term rental to people fleeing Ukraine before the war.
Thanks to our cooperation, Salam Lab can independently book apartments on the AirBnB website for our beneficiaries from across the eastern border. Our team managing the relocation of refugees has the option of making reservations on the entire platform for up to 30 days.
Chamber of Commerce of the Polish Hotel Industry
We would also like to thank the Chamber of Commerce of the Polish Hotel Industry, which enabled us to provide three-month accommodation for refugees in the Hilton and Conrad hotels.
As the Russian aggression against Ukraine continues, refugees still need support in starting a new life in Poland. Thanks to our benefactors we started a longterm social integration project for selected families that we call “Żyj w Krakowie”.
Thanks to companies and institutions such as AirBnB, the Biedronki Foundation or the Chamber of Commerce of the Polish Hotel Industry, we can provide families, couples, women with children and other refugees with safe accommodation.
Thank you to our donors!
Our activities would not be possible without the support of our patrons.
We are grateful for the donations made to us, among others by Mercy Corps, Alight, Americares, Bayer Foundation, Air Liquide Foundation, Dentons Foundation, JCC Kraków.
We would also like to thank the IKEA company, which equipped our space with furniture to make it a real meeting place.
