Introductory post: getting ready to leave

Working in Teesside in the North East of the UK I met some remarkable people from the asylum seeking and refugee community. Over the years I have listened to them telling their stories and witnessed the effort by them to integrate in to the host community. There are some parallels to my story but also sections in our narratives that are not similar. Listening to the stories, I tried to imagine the village/town and family life in the household of the refugee in the hope that I can assist in some small way to make things a bit easier and/or better for them to integrate in to the North East. For telling their stories are important: they need to establish their presence here to have a symbolic place in this society in Teesside. If people do not know where they are from and what they did, they do not fell that there is place/space here where they can fit in They need to explain they are teachers, mechanics, dentist, nurses etc. which would place them in a status level in the society. Perhaps the same level as ‘back home’, perhaps not; as they are unemployed here (asylum seekers are not allowed work). This means that they have find a different path up the social status ladder. In other words: start all over again.

This process includes a lot of explaining and also, as mentioned, narratives. With this journey I am embarking upon, I hope to be able to at least take in the geographical environment so that I can relate in some way to the stories and be able to understand it with an insight which will be constructive in the interaction with asylum seekers and refugees from East Africa. Then my friends and I can compare our stories.