BORDERS based BBC Scotland journalist CAMERON BUTTLE has just returned from assignment in Jordan where he visited the refugee camps on the northern border with Syria. He gained access to the Zataari camp which is currently home to more than 85,000 men women and children. Here's his special report for The Border Telegraph.

I knew that the Zataari camp is so big it is now Jordan's fourth largest city.

But nothing could have prepared me for the sight of it.

After an hours drive through the crazy, swarming traffic of the capital city Amman you pass under the signs for the borders with Iraq and Syria and then the white shapes begin to appear through the haze on the distant horizon. It took another half hour to reach the checkpoints at the front gates.

There were people queuing to get in to see relatives, people queuing on the other side to apply for passes to get out on compassionate grounds.

We had waited days for our passes into the camp and the guards checked and re-checked our accreditation before allowing us in with strict

rules on where we could and couldn't film.

As we drove in all we could see were thousands and thousands of sagging tents and huts wherever we looked. Rags, towels and bits of plastic

sheet were strung up and tied down with rope and bits of string, any attempt to block out the sun or the gusting sand storms. Anything to make their miserable lives more bearable.

There is a resigned sense of permanence about the camp. No one in it ever thought it would get as big as it did. The first tents went up five years ago and then it had to be split into two districts. Now there are 12.

It has its own internal economy. Shops, stalls and coffee stands have sprung up alongside each other forming a small market that covers a

few hundreds yards.

There is even a shop selling wedding dresses because life does go on, even here. There are children all over, playing in the dust or the wreck of an old tent or in a puddle by a water standpipe.

I have been lucky enough to see my two children go through local nurseries and primary schools in the Borders. In Zataari Camp most of the children have known nothing but life in the camp. We visited the Little Hands Nursery run by Save The Children. The classroom was full of wee smiling faces, they sang songs and played games that taught them their alphabet. Then it was time to go, to wander back to their huts or tents in the desert sand inside the camp walls.

Another school for older children we drove past looked pretty rough.

Scuffles at the gate were broken up with sharp smacks round the back of the head. The pupils' clothes and shoes worn, tired and dirty.

I think I was expecting harrowing and distressing scenes. Instead I found it desolate, bleak and utterly hopeless. I struggled to believe how people could try and live any kind of meaningful life, day after day, year after year.

I couldn't help wonder what I would do if I was stuck with my family facing a future here. The camp is full of people from all walks of life from all over Syria. And the vast majority of them just want to go home to Syria, not live in a camp or have to start a new life in a strange country far away.

Few people would speak to us on camera, they were scared what might happen to their relatives left in Syria or indeed to themselves if they return. But wherever we went the people were polite, smiling and friendly.

I think the most depressing thing I saw on my visit was when we were leaving. A bus was sitting just inside the main gates with its old diesel engine belching out black fumes. I asked our driver where it was headed. He said it was for people who had had enough, they were heading back to Syria where the war and the fighting goes on.

You can see Cameron's reports on the BBC Scotland News website: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-34637470