In a refugee camp in Bangladesh, children jump rope with chains of rubber bands. In wartime Gaza, kids fly kites made from discarded parachutes. And in Ukraine, youngsters tussle in make-believe war, imitating soldiers as the real conflict rages on.
These are some of the ways that children continue to create, imagine and seek joy even in the harshest circumstances. For them, play is not a simple pastime but a lifeline. Child psychologists say it helps them manage stress, express their emotions and regain a sense of control and normalcy when there's little safety and stability.
"It helped remove our sadness," says 12-year-old Asma Bibi, who lives in a Rohingya refugee settlement in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. She spoke in Rohingya and her interview was translated.
Bibi says her father and brother were both killed in their home country of Myanmar, where they were targets of ethnic cleansing. If it wasn't for the small, colorful playroom at her camp, set up by BRAC, an international group focused on poverty, she says her mind "wouldn't feel good."
Throughout history, play has offered much-needed reprieve and comfort to children living through crisis. The popular game Candy Land was designed in the 1940s at a polio ward in San Diego to keep children entertained during their recovery. About a decade ago, amid Syria's civil war, volunteers built a small, underground amusement park so little ones could play, shielded from bombing and shelling. NPR has also previously reported about how children in Nigeria who lost a parent at the hands of Boko Haram militants found moments of joy through play.
Today, as the world faces over 60 conflicts — the highest number since the end of World War II — play remains as important as ever.
"Children are resilient and they are trying really hard to be resilient and play should be seen as a form of resiliency," says Lauren Potthoff, a pediatric psychologist at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, who has worked with Ukrainian psychologists and children amid the war with Russia.
Healing and belonging
When Rohingya children began arriving at the refugee camps in Cox's Bazar in 2017, signs of trauma were evident in how they played, according to Erum Mariam, who leads BRAC's Institute of Educational Development in Bangladesh.
One child — she recalled — molded a clay house surrounded by many gates. When asked why, the child replied, "so that those who kind of torture us, they cannot enter," Mariam says.
More than one million Rohingya refugees who fled persecution from the Myanmar military now live in camps in Cox's Bazar — and over half of them are under 18, according to UNICEF.
BRAC has set up over 300 play labs across the camps. Parents also deeply wanted to contribute to the effort to enable their kids to play, Mariam says, creating jump ropes by tying rubber bands together and crafting toy blocks from pieces of bamboo — all to help their children find moments of joy after everything they had endured.
There has been one favorite activity above all: Kabbiya, a traditional Rohingya call-and-response game. It goes like this: A child will yell out a rhyme and perform a simple movement, like swaying side to side. Immediately after, the rest of the group will join in, echoing the chant and mimicking the caller's action.
Mariam believes part of the game's draw is that parents, grandparents and other community members can all participate. " When the play is rooted in the culture, it gives children a sense of belongingness," she says.
When Mariam first met children at the play labs, she says many were silent and withdrawn. When they drew, they depicted guns or scenes of violence. But over time, through play, she saw a different side emerge.
"Now, if you go into a humanitarian play lab, you'll find children laughing, giggling," she says. "Those images that they drew about the guns are not there."
Ayub Khan, 12, says he was haunted by the violence in Myanmar when he arrived at the camps several years ago. When he felt sad, he would run to BRAC's playroom, where he would play marbles or read poems. If it wasn't for the play lab, he said would've spent most days at home. Khan's interview was translated from Rohingya.
"I wouldn't have felt good," he says. "I wouldn't have felt peace in my mind."
How war comes into play
In Ukraine, where the war with Russia has raged for over three years, some children have turned conflict into play — creating a version of hide-and-seek where they pretend to be Russian and Ukrainian soldiers.
The game goes beyond simply chasing one another. Rather, the goal is to pretend to kill or torture members of the opposing side, according to Yaroslava Mozghova, head of programs for War Child Alliance in Ukraine. The international organization provides mental health support, as well as safe spaces for children living in conflict to learn and play.
" I believe that this aspect of Ukrainians and Russians looking for each other, that's what we created in 2022," she says.
Mozghova adds that she has also seen some children act-out being guards at a checkpoint — pretending to demand documents and deciding who can pass through.
While not all children are drawn to war-themed activities, Mozghova says she is not surprised by those who are, adding that it's natural for children to want to mirror their surroundings.
"Checkpoints or soldiers, that's a part of the world they live in," she says. "So they imitate this world."
Ruot Gach, a project officer at War Child Alliance, says he has also seen conflict shape the way children play at a refugee transit center in northern South Sudan. Aside from games like volleyball and dominoes, Gach says some children stage fake ambushes on one another while pretending to be government forces or rebel fighters.
According to Gach, this kind of play has existed for years and its a reflection of the five-year civil war that lasted in South Sudan until 2018 and the ongoing war in Sudan.
"This kind of experience that they came through from Sudan is still reflecting in their mind," he said.
It's not unusual to see children imitate soldiers or war if they have been exposed to violence, according to pediatric psychologist Potthoff. She adds that it's one way children try to "regain a sense of mastery" or control over difficult circumstances.
"That doesn't mean that they like violence," she says. "It means that they're trying to understand it. They're trying to process it."
Time to play
In Gaza, children are hungry, exhausted and mourning the deaths of family and friends, but their desire to play is still strong, says Georgia Tacey, a humanitarian expert on Save the Children's Gaza response team, who has traveled to Gaza multiple times over the past 18 months.
On the streets, she says she has seen young boys and girls make do with whatever they have at hand — forming soccer balls from shredded plastic sheeting and kites out of aid parachutes, and using firewood for the classic tower-building game Jenga.
Save the Children's team sets up games and crafts for children. Tacey says children would often dash to be on time for one of the scheduled play sessions.
"They're so desperate for that connection and for the distraction," she says.
Those who were unable to participate because space was limited would still linger outside.
" Children will just line up down the street just to listen to other children singing in that tent," she says.
Opportunities to play, no matter how brief, give children in Gaza reprieve from the responsibilities they are forced to take on because of the conflict, says Tacey — from caring for younger siblings to needing to be constantly informed by the news.
" I think it just shows that, you know, children are children wherever you go," she says.
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