Karlshorst, Berlin - 26 November 2017

1. Wide of refugee teenager bringing bike to Garage10

2. Wide of Bernd Pickert, founder of Garage10, setting up tables

3. Tilt up of Pickert repairing bike

4. Wide of Pickert and volunteers repairing bike

5. Close of hands repairing bike

6. SOUNDBITE (German) Bernd Pickert, founder of Garage10:

"Many of my neighbours were active, wanted to help, wanted to do something. Many brought used clothing. I also wanted to do something. I thought maybe I could do something that was different than just bringing old clothes. And then I realised that we're pretty far away from the action. It's about two kilometres to the train station. I thought if the people here had bikes, that would be good. And I realised that people wanted to donate bikes, had old bikes that they didn't need anymore that they wanted to donate, but didn't allow themselves to because the bikes were broken."

7. Refugee bringing bike into garage

8. Various of refugees and volunteers repairing bikes

9. Close of child's hands repairing bike

10. SOUNDBITE (German) Bernd Pickert, founder of Garage10:

"For us two things were always important. First it's good for the people to have bikes because then they can move. And the second was that when you work together on a bike, even if you don't share the same language - I don't speak Arabic and a lot of the people here don't speak English, just Farsi or Arabic or whatever. But when you work together on a bike, then you can figure it out. You don't really need a language. It just works. And that's how you can get to know each other. Make connections."

11. Various of volunteer and two children repairing bike

12. Various of Garage10 volunteer Emin Alku oiling bike wheel

13. SOUNDBITE (German) Emin Alku, Turkish refugee and Garage10 volunteer:

"I saw them when I was walking through the garden. Every Wednesday and Sunday they are open and are repairing bikes. I saw it once and asked if I could help Garage10 and repair bikes a little bit. He said okay, so every Wednesday and Sunday I am here."

14. Poster showing various tools for fixing bikes

15. SOUNDBITE (German) Bernd Pickert, founder of Garage10:

"At the start it was neighbours who had bikes to donate and brought them by. Then our project became a little more well known around here and construction companies came to us and said that in some yards and basements there are always leftover bikes when renters move out and leave their things behind. We collect those always. 'Do you want them?' And we said 'Of course'. And then we actually started picking up truckloads of bikes."

16. Pickert sorting through tools in front of bike wheels on wall

17. Pan of rows of old bikes

18. Volunteers shaking hands with child and Alku

19. SOUNDBITE (German) Emin Alku, Turkish refugee and Garage10 volunteer:

"For me the workshop is great. The people who sometimes come here are speaking Turkish, Arabic, a little German. I like helping them."

20. Alku working on bike handlebars

21. Alku walking past green bike

22. Various of refugees and volunteers working outside Garage10

23. SOUNDBITE (German) Bernd Pickert, founder of Garage10:

"Actually this is what it's all about. To establish connections between German neighbours and refugees. Especially to establish connections between normal people. We're neither police nor officials nor security, we're neighbours. And that's what it's about. That's the main goal."

24. Wide of volunteer and refugee children mingling outside

25. Wide of volunteers chatting outside

26. Wide of refugee child riding his bike

LEAD IN

A group of volunteers in Germany gather twice a week to repair bikes which have been donated for refugees.

Over 800 bikes have been restored so far in a project designed to foster ties between locals and migrants.

STORY-LINE:

A cyclist rides into garage number 10 in a refugee shelter on the outskirts of Berlin.

But this garage is special - because every Wednesday and Sunday volunteers gather here to help fix the bikes of refugees.

Surrounded by tools and spare parts, they get to work.

Bernd Pickert is a journalist by trade and began the Garage10 project in August 2015 when the refugee shelter in Berlin's Karlshorst neighbourhood first opened.

That year, over 1.1 million migrants entered Germany, according to the German Interior Ministry.

Within a few days of the Karlshorst housing unit opening, over 1,000 people - mostly from Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria - had moved in.

Pickert says that many of his neighbours were eager to help, but couldn't think of much more to do besides donating used clothing.

"I thought maybe I could do something that was different than just bringing old clothes. And then I realised that we're pretty far away from the action," Pickert says.

"It's about two kilometres to the train station. I thought if the people here had bikes, that would be good," he says.

While many neighbours had old bikes to donate, they didn't think it was a good idea because the bikes were often in need of repair.

So Pickert approached the Red Cross with his idea, was given garage space number 10 within the grounds of the refugee shelter and put a post on Facebook telling people to come by with their broken bikes.

Since the project began, Pickert estimates that over 800 bikes have been repaired and handed over to refugees.

While at the start the donations mainly came from neighbours, Pickert was also approached by construction companies as the project became more well known in Berlin.

Such companies often collected abandoned bikes in yards and basements.

The first time Pickert went to collect bikes from the construction companies, the Red Cross gave him two trucks and he managed to load them up with 60 bikes at once.

While bike repair is an important element of the project, Pickert maintains that the main goal of Garage10 is to foster connections between refugees and volunteers.

Residents at the shelter mingle and work alongside volunteers, putting aside their native Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and Pashto languages for a few hours to practice their German, while also learning the technical aspects of bicycle repair.

Emin Alku, a Turkish refugee, has been helping out at Garage10 since he moved into the shelter five months ago.

"For me the workshop is great," he says. "The people who sometimes come here are speaking Turkish, Arabic, a little German. I like helping them."

Pickert insists that the bikes are a means to fulfil a purpose: encouraging volunteers to get to know each other and work on something together.

"This is what it's all about," he says. "To establish connections between German neighbours and refugees. Especially to establish connections between normal people. We're neither police nor officials nor security, we're neighbours. And that's what it's about. That's the main goal."