I was born in Uganda, married in Zimbabwe and came to the UK in 2001. Back in Africa I worked at senior levels as a community development worker and as a consultant for disability and development NGOs. For over 10 years I worked on highlighting the plight of people living with disabilities in Uganda. I am now a naturalised British citizen, and have been working with Poverty Alliance for more than five years as a Fieldwork Development Officer.

When I first came to Scotland, I was not allowed to work, but chose to engage in volunteer work with a range of organisations including Glasgow Women’s Library, Scottish Refugee Council, Integrating Toryglen Community, Karibu Scotland, and Oxfam. In the process I gained a lot of experience in engaging service providers and policy makers in the Scottish and UK Parliaments.

Once you’ve recovered from whatever made you leave your country, you want to be part of the new country you live in. I had worked all my life, I really didn’t want to stay at home, that’s not me at all. However, I was stuck in the asylum process for seven years before I was allowed to work due to the government’s policy of not allowing asylum seekers to work, a policy which still stands today.

It was not easy to find full time employment having been out of the labour market for seven years. As a single mother, child care was one of the initial challenges. I was able to overcome these through the support I received from Bridges Programmes Equipped for the Future training course.

I work with community groups raising awareness about poverty issues and social exclusion, making sure that people are aware of government policies that may have an impact on their lives. I also work with service providers around user involvement in projects.

Scottish people are very generous, friendly and welcoming. However, our main obstacle to belonging is the negative coverage of migration in parts of the media, which feeds on the stereotypes. Challenging media portrayal of migrants has to be an on-going part of our work.

I would like to support a political system that acknowledges the contribution I’m making to this country because I’m a citizen. And I want to feel and behave like a citizen of this country, including exercising my right to vote.

I am still not sure that everybody who sees me on the street think I’m Scottish, let alone British? Many still label me as a migrant, as a refugee, as an asylum seeker, or sometimes even as an overstayer from Africa. That’s what many see. They don’t see a human being, a woman with skills, qualifications, and experience to contribute like anybody else. So gaining a real sense of belonging is another journey that we still have to work on.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

I was born in St Petersburg in Russia, an absolutely beautiful city. I come from a very interesting family, where the most intriguing thing was the world of my mum’s theatre company. I have lots of memories from my early years of hanging out backstage with the actors and technicians. It was a very exciting and surreal setting for a young kid to find himself in, but I didn’t really question it. As a child you just accept things as they are, which is one of the beautiful things about being so young.

In 1989, my mum and my stepdad Eduard Bersudsky co-founded Sharmanka: a theatre of kinetic puppets made from wood and scrap metal, which perform to haunting music and synchronized light. This fascinating new world was where I began to learn the basics of technical theatre. In 1993, when I was 13, we were invited to exhibit in Germany. When the big truck arrived to collect the exhibition, it seemed that just about everything we owned got loaded in. I clearly remember my mum telling me to put my bike in the truck too. “I won’t be needing it in Germany, I’ll just use it when I get back”, I said to her, to which she simply replied: “Just put it in the truck”. Nothing specific was being said, but once we were in Germany, it became apparent that we would not be returning to Russia.

We left because my mum knew that there was no chance for Sharmanka’s unique art form to survive in the country that was, in many senses, falling apart. She was determined to take it somewhere it could grow and be exposed to the bigger audiences, as she believed it deserved. That’s what I think got her through all the hurdles of borders, languages and cultures. She wanted a home for this art form and this eventually became Glasgow.

My family’s life seems to have been affected by an incredible number of coincidences, shaped by wonderful people and unexpected events, or perhaps it’s a bigger plan that we don’t have control of. Either way, for the next few months all I remember is different countries zooming by, as we made our way through Europe. Eventually, various winds brought us to Scotland: a country we fell in love with immediately, and where we hoped to build our new home. We felt very welcomed by everyone we met. It doesn't matter how prosperous or beautiful a place is, the people make it what it is. Scotland was a place of opportunity for us.

I took a Technical Theatre course at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and loved the course so much - it just felt like the place I was meant to be. When I left, I toured around Scotland with various theatre companies and I couldn’t get enough of it. We took theatre to lots of fantastic local communities and I saw so much of the bonny Scotland this way too.

Theatre lighting had fascinated me since I was very young, so I decided to dedicate more of my time to it and gradually built up my name. I worked hard, which is so much easier to do when it’s something you love and believe in, and people recognised it. Creative work is great, but in many senses it’s like a rollercoaster, and can drive you crazy. I am very lucky to have had amazing mentors in my life whose teachings have given me a great set of tools. So, every now and then I balance my creative work with various technical jobs and other challenges, such as recently cycling the length of Britain.

I want to see my full potential. I’ll rest when I’m 80. I will happily sit in a rocking chair then. But until that day I’m going to move, make and create as much as I have energy for.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

I was born and grew up in New Zealand, in Wellington. I was born in 1953, and left in 1973. Passing the half way mark, when you realise that you’ve been longer in the country you’ve come to than in the country you were born in, is a very significant moment. Then you have those big questions such as what do you call ‘home’. I still refer to Wellington as home. But, of course, home is where my family is, and my family is here, so what you call home is a loaded decision, I think, and it can vary depending on whom you’re speaking to.

When I went to England I was predisposed to love what I found there, because I had read English literature for as long as I could recall. My head was full of descriptions of English landscapes, English art, English buildings, English history. I came to study English literature, and when I was about to leave Oxford, I met the person who later became my husband, who is Scottish, so it was a very fortunate crossover.

In 1999 I saw the advertisement for the position of Director of the Scottish Poetry Library and I thought, that’s an extraordinary job. I won’t have a chance for it but I’ll try. And then I was appointed! I’ve been there ever since. I’m very privileged to be right at the heart of literature, and Scottish creativity in that sphere. I feel passionately that I need to be an advocate for Scottish literature and Scottish poetry.

A poem – for example at weddings or funerals – can say things for us that we can’t articulate for ourselves but that we recognise. It’s immensely consoling to recognise our own emotions or ourselves, we immediately feel that we’re less isolated, less peculiar, less stupid, because our emotions have been shared and expressed by somebody else.

We hate the idea of people who are no longer very mobile, and whose mental faculties are diminishing just sitting in chairs, left alone for most of the day or watching television that they don’t understand. The sessions the Scottish Poetry Library offers to care homes are a combination of storytelling and reminiscence and poetry. People have a lot of poetry buried in their minds. They can still recite a bit of Burns, they can recite a bit of Wordsworth. If your mind is going and I say to you “What’s your name?”, it may be a horrible moment before you remember what it is. But if I say “Here’s a poem by Wordsworth about daffodils and I’ll read it for you”, they’ll say, “Oh, I remember that my mother grew daffodils”, or “I remember that we learnt that poem when I was 7”.

Migrants are always going to be in a difficult position because when times are hard, as they are now, then people look for other people to blame, or say that the country is not big enough to contain them. I was very heartened by the example of the Glasgow Girls who banded together and went to Parliament and said you can’t deport our friend who’s an asylum seeker. When my daughter was in a primary school, which was in a very ethnically mixed area, I was struck by the fact that she never identified somebody by their skin colour, which would not have been the case when I was a child. My mother would ask “Who is your friend?” and I’d say, “She’s an Indian girl called so and so”. I don’t think they do that now, and that seems to me a hugely positive change.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

I was brought up in Suwalki, the coldest place in Poland, situated near the borders with Russia and Lithuania. I studied Geology at the Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznan and later worked at the Poznan University of Technology as an academic teacher and consultant in Geotechnics and Engineering Geology. In 2006, my husband Bartek and I decided to move to Scotland. We now live in Paisley together with our two daughters, Ola (ten) and Natalia (three and a half).

The beginnings weren’t easy. Although I had a good command of English, when I arrived I couldn’t understand anybody. It seemed to me that people spoke with a Scandinavian accent. I felt quite lost. But those difficulties with understanding Glaswegians didn’t put me off. I was a frequent visitor in libraries where I was reading books about Glasgow, and where I had opportunities to talk with people who didn’t speak with such a strong Scottish accent. One day I went with my little daughter to the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and, all of a sudden, we were surrounded by officials and cameras, and announced 2 millionth visitors. It was pure madness. We were featured in the BBC and in all newspapers. Since then we just loved Glasgow.

Just three months after my arrival I found a job at the University of Glasgow working in the Geology Department. When I was finishing this contract I was awarded with a stipend to do a PHD at the University of Paisley, now the University of West of Scotland. I was chosen to do a PhD and conduct research on sandstone decay causes and patterns.

Glasgow has plenty of beautiful buildings, but sometimes they’re not very well maintained. Doing my PhD I’ve been looking at the causes of stone decay, and I came to the conclusion that most of the problems are caused by the lack of maintenance. I think that it is possible for building owners to stop immediate problems without a lot of money just by cleaning the gutters and pipes. If people stop water leaks over the facades it'll stop the deterioration as water won’t penetrate the stone. The results of my research will be applicable to inform future repairs and conservation works on buildings and urban regeneration programmes.

I am really excited that I am specialised in natural building materials analysis. My passion for ecological buildings together with the skills gained during my PhD studies come in really handy nowadays when the world needs low carbon buildings! I am proud that I am able to help prevent deterioration of sandstone buildings that are such important part of the Scottish heritage!

To be honest, at first, I wasn’t a footballer, I was a hyperactive street fighter boy! I am an only child. My dad passed away when I was very young and my mum brought me up on her own. We weren’t a wealthy family but we had an easy and happy life. My background is in football and in Iran I played at three different levels of national youth team.

I was very lucky to be sent to Glasgow because Glasgow is a city of football. I was looking to find a football club and a man whom I met in a shop told me that he’d introduce me to a semi-professional club. I went there and half an hour later they asked me to join in. Playing and coaching with the Shettleston Juniors FC was very useful for me, as a stranger it helped me to adapt to my new life. I am now very close with that community. Even at Christmas I wear the Santa Claus outfit, and the club invites people with additional needs from the local area and I give them presents. And that makes me happy.

As a foreigner, on my first day playing football here I wanted to cry. Because I couldn’t talk to my teammates, I didn’t know the language. Everybody was shouting at me, and I thought that maybe they didn’t like me. But they liked me. They wanted me. They needed me in the game. But the language was a problem.

When I went to college, I had one good thing – I wasn’t too shy to speak. I didn’t think that people would laugh at my accent or because I didn’t know how to say something. When I finished my intermediate English level my teachers pushed me to enrol into the Football course at The North of Glasgow College, and I’m happy there. I work there. I am a college football coach now, so that’s totally changed my life.

Usually we work in the rough areas. We go there to bring football and other activities to avoid drugs, alcohol and fight. You see, in my job I tell the kids you can’t stop the violence by violence. If the kid shouts and you shout back at him maybe he’ll do something worse than that. I’ve seen a boy who was 19 years old and nobody’s ever cuddled him. He wasn’t a happy person. But in football he could make at least 20 friends.

Kids have a lot of energy, they don’t want to stay in front of the TV and eat chips, and get bigger and bigger. They come and play, and they use their energy, they go back home and they don’t fight. They go to bed. When kids are happy – my job is done.

I’m not from Glasgow but I’m a part of Glasgow. I came here, these people, this government, this country saved my life, and I’ve been respected here. I help the kids and it is the best way I can be useful to this country, because I have to be! And I love my job, and I love my life!

I don’t want to be a saint, I want to be a simple man. I can’t save the world, no. But if every year I can save only one young life from the alcohol and drugs, my job is done.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

My parents are actually from Edinburgh. They migrated to Australia before I was born. In early 1970 there was a strong push from state governments to recruit more teachers from the UK, and my parents are both teachers. They initially went out there just for a couple of years, but they stayed although my dad still has a real longing for Scotland. Throughout my childhood we travelled to Scotland now and then, so being Scottish was part of my identity growing up.

I graduated in Law and Asian Studies degree in Australia, then spent some time in Japan teaching English. I worked as a lawyer for a short time, before moving into the Australian civil service, working for the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. My job was focused on issues around women in work and industrial relations.  I realised that I can only work on issues that I believe in - my day to day work has to fit with my personal values.

Having decided to work overseas for a little while, I responded to an advertisement for a post in Blantyre, South Lanarkshire in 2005. I took up the two year post with Oxfam working on issues around gender and poverty, and I wasn't really expecting to stay any longer in Scotland. But then I met my husband...

I then worked in the legal research team at the Scottish Parliament, before moving to my current post with the Glasgow City Council. I work for the Leader of the Council, providing policy support, with a focus on health, social work and communities.

The council has committed to developing an anti-poverty strategy for the city. My job has been to figure out the priorities, make sure the right people are talking to each other and that we involve people with direct experience of poverty to inform us on how to take the work forward.

I think Glasgow’s museums and parks are something to be really proud of, and the fact that they are free is really important. It makes a clear statement that public facilities are for everybody, which is admirable, because most cities don’t do that.

One place I love in Glasgow is Linn Park, just around the corner from me. I’ve taken my two boys there almost every week since they were tiny babies - now they are two and four. We go in every season – to pick brambles, to have snow fights or just to feed the ducks. They can run wild and burn off some of their unrelenting energy!

I’m 25 and I come from a small town in Bulgaria called Kazanlak. I had planned to go and study abroad and the UK seemed very suitable at the time. I picked Glasgow because I wanted to live in a big city and take advantage of the cultural scene and all the events that are on, just everything that a big city has to offer.

My first impressions... it may sound a little anecdotal but, literally, it didn't stop raining for the first three days after I came here, so all preconceptions of Scottish weather and Glasgow came to be true at once.

My university experience was very positive. I studied Psychology. I was working throughout my course, doing part-time catering work to support myself. I also volunteered with a telephone helpline offering emotional support to people in distress and having suicidal thoughts.

Finding permanent work was difficult after graduating, it took me a year and a half. I think knowing a person at the organisation I am now working for helped me in settling into this job. I am a home support worker and I support people with special needs and disabilities in their own homes with practical and emotional aspects of their daily lives. I work around the specific needs of the person. It is a very personalised support to enable individuals to live independently so they can fulfil their potential, follow their goals, and just have happy lives.

When you become part of somebody’s life, it is very rewarding. You develop a personal connection with the person you support, and that’s what keeps motivating you. You can immediately see the results of your work, and the positive difference it makes to somebody’s life. I find myself, even on my days off, still thinking about things at work. You can’t completely shut off. This job makes me feel more part of the community. I'm a lot more involved with the local people and I get to see more of their everyday lives. Because living in the West End, communicating with other foreigners and students here, you can get into a bit of a bubble and not really get to know much about how Scottish people live.

I'm really impressed with how many resources are being invested in Scotland to provide support and I think it makes a huge difference for the people we care for, their families and communities. In Bulgaria these type services are not well developed and most of the state funded support happens in care homes. Most people with special needs would usually be cared for by their family and very little support would be available from specialists. Now that it is necessary to make budget cuts to social services in Scotland, it is important to ensure the admirably high quality of care that has been achieved in this country isn't sacrificed.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

I was born in Malaysia, of Chinese ancestry. I came to the UK in 1973 as an accountancy student studying for ACCA in Birmingham Polytechnic. I felt a lot of excitement and had many expectations on my arrival to this foreign country, especially of seeing real snow. On one of my many trips around the country I met my future husband, Leong, in Glasgow. We have been married for 37 years now and have two grown up children, Han and Ying. We have lived in Kirkintilloch for the last 28 years.

In the late 1980's Linda, a lady in Kirkintilloch, became my first ‘student’ by chance. She fell in love with this slow, gentle exercise which she saw abroad during her holidays. Soon I had a few more ‘students’ who were friends and who wanted to learn this Chinese exercise too. That is how I started my Tai Chi teaching journey.

I was first introduced to Tai Chi when I was 12 and my Dad had a stroke. A relative came to our home to teach him and the whole family joined in. I was not a very healthy child and not at all sporty. But after I started learning Tai Chi, my health improved tremendously and I still continue my learning from teachers from the East.

For me, Tai Chi is not only very enjoyable and interesting but is also very beneficial to my mind and body. Through my years of teaching I am pleased that the students have benefited physically, improving their health, balance and confidence as well as reducing stress and high blood pressure along the way. There is usually a very relaxed atmosphere in class and we often have a good laugh too. I have taught many different groups of students: from children in primary and secondary schools, middle aged adults, retired people (my oldest student is now 91 years old), a deaf and blind group, nursing home day care clients and other health groups. I feel very privileged and honoured to meet so many interesting and amazing people.

Through teaching Tai Chi and Qigong to Scottish students, I impart to them what I know of Chinese social, cultural and historical stories which relate to the names of the movements we do as well as Tai Chi philosophy. I am very pleased that most of my students are interested in the Chinese way of life, our culture and philosophy. Through exchanging our different stories, we learn of each others' culture. And more than this, over time, as I do not have all of my family here, many of my students have become my friends and part of my Scottish family.

Deep inside us, we are all the same and I am very honoured to be accepted by most Scots I meet. I consider myself an East/West Chinese person and have learned to adopt the Scottish humour and friendliness in my everyday life. Overall, I consider myself lucky to live happily in this beautiful and peaceful country.

I left Jamaica in 1955 when I was 14 years old. My mother had 8 or 9 sisters; I can never remember how many they are. They all lived in the same house, managed by my grandaunt. One day in 1948 I was told that my mother was going to London and I was to live with my aunts. In 1955, my mother sent for me. The idea of going to London on my own at 14 years worried me a little bit, but I had to go because my mother wanted me to come to live with her. So my aunts got my passport, a ticket to travel, a suit, and a small suitcase, which I still have. Before I left for the plane, my grandaunt wrapped me in newspaper because she said London was cold. That the trip by plane and ship took nearly two weeks was not considered by her...

The day after I arrived in London, my mother woke me up early and told me to get ready. Fortunately for me, as we were leaving, there was a man at the door asking my mother where she was taking me, and she said “to work”. The man told her, “You can go to work but he can’t, because he’s not 15”. I had to go to school. I was 14 years and 11 months - one month changed my life. My mother was very upset because she had found me a job in a grocery shop. It had cost her £86 to bring me to London and it took her seven years to save that money.

In 1958 Professor Chapman gave me a job as a junior technician at Queen Elizabeth’s College in London. One day he called me into his office and said “I don’t think you’re as stupid as you try to make out. I think you should go to university.” So I went to Leicester University in 1961 to do an Honours degree in Botany. The beginning of my career was a matter of chance and circumstances. What I’ve learnt in life is that no matter how able you are, it is the people you meet that determine what you achieve in the end.

What people need is a cup of kindness. Burns was speaking metaphorically in Auld Lang Syne. Whisky in Scottish culture is just like Russian vodka, or American bourbon, or French wine. When somebody asks you to take a drink with them that is an act of kindness... this drink of kindness does not have to be alcoholic. But how many migrants have been asked to join in such a drink? If somebody is not prepared to eat or drink with you, then you’re not part of the system. I think you get that relationship of kindness in a society if somebody sees you as equal.

In 1707 there were hardly any Scots in Jamaica, by 1800 there were about 300,000 slaves in Jamaica, and about 10,000 Scots, mainly men. Three quarters of the surnames in the Jamaican telephone book are Scottish, so many Jamaicans have some Scottish blood or history in them, whether they like it or not. So as I tell many Scots, your ancestors were not in Jamaica doing missionary service alone! Many Scottish people are fascinated by this history, because their historians never told them. Why should historians hide the truth? It is the truth that sets people free to be fair to all.

I retired in 2005 as Professor of Grain Science in the International Centre for Brewing and Distilling at the Heriot Watt University. I am proud that many of my students have made successful careers in the malting, brewing and distilling industries worldwide. I still do experiments at home in my kitchen! However, I now spend most of my time on the boards of various charitable organisations and give lectures to the community on Scottish/Jamaican/Caribbean history. This history is outlined in my book, The Enlightenment Abolished.

Interview by: Migrant Voice

Photo by: Karen Gordon

I am a medical doctor with work experience in the Scottish hospitals, with the Scottish government and within Scottish communities. I came from southern Pakistan and graduated there as a doctor of medicine in 2003. After working in hospitals and with communities in Pakistan I decided to get a postgraduate degree in Public Health Medicine. I came to Scotland in 2007 to study at the University of Glasgow.

Inspired by the Scottish public health network, I decided to get work experience in Scotland. After about a dozen interviews, I was selected for the position of Public Health Adviser in the NHS, a job that I really wanted to do. As a public health adviser, I developed policies and intervention working with the Scottish Government and NHS boards on topics like ‘Healthy ageing in Scotland’, ‘Dementia’ and ‘Sexual health’.

After working for about four years in public health, I decided to come back to hospital based work in 2012 with the aim of joining the GP training programme. I like to work in communities and I'm a medic, so this programme was giving me a blend of my experience from public health and medicine. I was selected for GP training; it wasn't easy, but I was lucky. I am working as a specialty trainee at the moment and looking forward to becoming a GP in a few years.

It is sad that some sections of media are hitting hard on immigration recently, forcing authorities to draw policies without considering the long term impacts. Hospitals in the UK are struggling for doctors these days. Where I work just now, we are short of doctors to the extent that my consultants have to do night shifts to cover for vacant middle grade doctors positions. A few months ago I was working in a very critical unit in Glasgow where we had to do several unpaid extra hours as the department never managed to fill doctors’ vacancies.

I also work with Police Scotland as a community adviser. I am an amateur calligrapher and my work has been exhibited in the Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Arts. As an immigrant to this country, I believe I got opportunities to contribute in diverse areas not only based on my skills, but due to the fact that Scotland has a strong policy of equal opportunities.

I love Scotland because of its rich tradition of tolerance, freedom of expression, generosity and hospitability. I would not like to see any of these qualities going downhill in future. I'd like the communities who are settling down to integrate in the local Scottish landscape. It has to come from both ways.