As I stood in front of the large photo of displaced Kurds, I realised that exactly two years ago I was doing much the same thing. Typical me. Here I am again, standing in some exhibition about displacement. Two years previously, on World Refugee Day, it was a UNHCR thing that we randomly snuck into…
I hadn’t expected Auschwitz to be such a tourist destination. It was a grey and sombre Friday in November yet, apart from the absence of those ubiquitous key ring vendors, it felt as touristy as the Eiffel Tower. Groups of teenagers on school trips flirted loudly with each other and dropped litter. Coach loads of…
This article about about three new scholarship places for asylum seekers at Strathclyde University got me thinking again about the inspiring Glasgow Girls and the musical which was subsequently produced about their story. Read on for a blog post I wrote elsewhere after seeing the musical last year… A musical about asylum seekers – how…
Although Helen Bamber has been celebrated as an ‘iconic’ human rights defender, the most fitting way to honour her is to redirect our attention to the marginalised and silenced people to whom she devoted her life. We don’t have to look hard to find them… Read on for my reflections on the life and legacy of…
(originally published here on Breathe) When I ‘lived below the line’ last week, I was really only poor in the same way that someone who posted a make-up-free selfie on Facebook was brave. Nevertheless, taking part in a week-long challenge of living on £1 a day to raise awareness and funds in the fight against…
Last week I joined thousands of others around the world to ‘live below the line’ (£1 a day for food and drink) to raise awareness and funds for the fight against extreme poverty. Here’s how it went! Pre-challenge prep Tried really hard to rustle up a team of people to do this together. Epic fail. Even my housemate…
(Originally published here on openDemocracy) In the past 5 years, over 500 young people who migrated as lone children have been removed after spending their formative years in the UK. We have a responsibility for their long term safety and flourishing, says Emily Bowerman. A couple of weeks ago, a 19 year old girl called Yashika…
The jazzy presentation bombarded my senses with numbers: numbers of people who’d come to Alpha and numbers of ‘lives changed’; numbers of children in Sunday school and numbers of ‘lives changed’; numbers of people at the Christmas services (with the big name speaker) and numbers of ‘lives changed’. And so on. The local context was…
“It could be worse,” said the nurse as she shoved the needle in my arm. “Think of all those poor people in Kabul and Somerset.” I’d just confessed that I was more nervous about my jabs for Afghanistan than I was about the trip itself. But yes, it could be worse. I could be in…
(This post was originally published here on Threads. Feel free to comment there!) “The language in this passage makes me tremble, because it is so surprising,” said Saul Cruz from Armonia, reading out words whose familiarity has eroded their cutting edge. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Or, as…
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