Category: Uncategorized
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‘We sat in tearful silence, just holding hands across the table’
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez, Unsplash I FIRST met Aisha at an English conversation class at an asylum hotel in Berkshire. A middle-aged woman from Sudan, it was her first time in the drop-in class, organised by a Care4Calais volunteer group. Aisha had been in the hotel for two weeks with her 16-year-old son after…
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War leaves no one untouched
Kurdish Iranian refugee and Exodus journalist Souran Soleimani reflects on the war between Iran and Israel Picture: Tasnim News Agency Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license I WAS born in a land where war wasn’t just a word. it was the weather. The sky spoke in sirens, the ground trembled with explosions,…
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Understanding migration: Resilience, determination and hope in the face of adversity
By Tamirat Astatkie MIGRATION, a global phenomenon affecting millions of individuals, has become an increasingly complex and compelling issue in recent years. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), approximately 281 million people, which accounts for roughly 3.6 per cent of the world’s population, currently reside outside their country of origin. Many…
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Sanctuary scholars named in Big Issue’s top changemakers
By Helen Ball FIRST thing on a Monday morning earlier this year, some of the Exodus Team had the pleasure of meeting two sanctuary scholarship students from Warwick University who have been named on The Big Issue’s 100 Changemakers of 2024 List. The list celebrates the people and organisations who are creating positive change and…
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Refugee reflections: we must never allow the cycle of kindness to be broken
These days, I sometimes feel a deep sense of sorrow and sadness and I cry in my loneliness, so hard that my shoulders are shaking, much like the day when two of my little students, Hiva and Bavān, lost their eyes and legs on the path to the rural school. They had stepped on a…
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‘You have a choice: live or die – you decide that you will live’
“THE militia came to my village at midnight. They all had guns, and I saw them shoot peo- ple. They shoot people for nothing. When I saw that I realised my life was nothing to them, that I was nothing. That’s why we had to leave.” John, the South Sudanese refugee on the left in…
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‘They are now part of our family’
Today another of the young refugees Care4Calais supports will have a warm bed after a few weeks of rough sleeping. Despite speaking good English and doing all the right things, A, a refugee from Sudan couldn’t find a place to rent or work in the short time he had between his grant of refugee status…
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Civic award for ‘outstanding contribution’
CARE4CALAIS has been presented with a prestigious Special Civic Award by Wands-worth Council in recognition of the incredible support its volunteers give to refugees in South-west London. Seema Khan and Carey Sedgwick, of Care4Calais’ South-west London group,accepted the award from Wandsworth Mayor Cllr Juliana Annan at a special ceremony in Wandsworth Town Hall. The judges…
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‘How cycling helped me to overcome isolation’
My name is Yonatan and I am an asylum seeker from Eritrea living in the UK. Life as an asylum seeker has not been easy, and I have faced many challenges since arriving here. One of the biggest obstacles I have encountered is isolation. As an asylum seeker, I am not allowed to work, and…
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‘Seeking asylum is a leap of faith towards a better future’
Things happened unexpectedly. I’m six months pregnant, almost homeless and a victim of domestic abuse. My world is a wound and hopeless. Seeking help is a brave decision that I made with the help of my lawyer. I applied for asylum in April 2021. I was an early bird, excited to attend my initial interview…
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