Hospitality network - February 2010 newsletter

Here is a newsletter from volunteers involved in developing a hospitality network for destitute asylum seekers in Bristol.

Dear friends,

First of all greetings from Easton and from all at BHN! We hope you all enjoyed the Christmas season and survived (or maybe even enjoyed!) the recent wintery weather. This is the first of what aims to be a quarterly newsletter for the Bristol Hospitality Network, to keep you up to date with our adventure in hospitality!

BHN was set up about a year ago with the aim of providing home placements for destitute asylum seekers; those left with no accommodation or any form of financial or other support after their claims for asylum are rejected. Such placements have lasted anything from a few days or weeks to months, as needed. Hosts have welcomed men and women of a wide age range coming from Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Ivory Coast, and other countries. Whilst hosting/being hosted is not always simple, it has always been an enriching experience for all involved.

Abdul

I met with Abdul, who was hosted by a young family in Easton, and we talked about his experiences. Previous to being welcomed into his host family, his life was very unstable. As he was not receiving any sort of support he was forced to rely on the generosity of friends and relatives and had to move house at least every few months so as not to burden his hosts, sometimes staying in very dingy (unheated and unfurnished) flats. After a meeting with Naomi and Rachael at Bristol Refugee Rights Welcome Centre they put him in touch with his current hosts. After a positive initial two week trial period, Abdul moved in on a more permanent basis and continues to stay there as part of the family a year later. He feels more settled and stable, his English has improved very quickly and he enjoys spending time with the family and helping on the allotment. It has obviously made a real difference in the lives of everyone involved.

While this work continues, the network has branched out with the offer of funding to buy a house, which will become a ‘welcome house’ to provide accommodation and a home for destitute asylum seekers. We are currently viewing various properties in the Fishponds Road area and while the buying process has not been as speedy and simple as we had hoped, there are several promising options. We hope to accommodate around eight asylum seekers as well as three live-in hosts who will help facilitate the community life of the house. We already have one host and we are on the lookout for the others. Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you or someone you know might be interested in this post.

Another item currently being discussed is the future link with Emmaus, an international charity with an established presence in Bristol that provides accommodation for homeless men and women in exchange for work at their second hand furniture workshop. Although we have not decided exactly what form our relationship with Emmaus will take, there is a sense that we hold very similar core values and vision and that access to their experience and expertise can only be a good thing for us at this stage.

Another exciting development that must be mentioned here is the Asylum Seekers Allotment Project spearheaded by Tim Lawrence. He has been donated four allotment spaces in Speedwell and has received funding to start a community allotment project. The hope is that those who stay in the welcome house will also spend a certain amount of hours per week helping on the allotment or similar projects and thus provide food for the houses. In this way we hope to move away from the charity model and towards becoming a social enterprise, recognising the need to work as essential for human dignity, not to mention the positive social aspects of working together as a group. A year ago the plot was a bit of a jungle. It is now over half cleared. We have discovered apple, pear, plum trees and a vine. There are dreams of a poly-tunnel and bee hives (asylum seeker honey here we come!), as well as growing the usual potatoes, beans, onions, leeks, human dignity and friendship! To help you catch the vision Tim recommends that we all watch the film ‘Grow Your Own’ based on a similar project in Liverpool.

Finally and very importantly we want to thank you so much for your involvement at whatever level, your interest, your support, encouragement, prayers, thoughts, time and kind donations. Without all of these BHN would simply not be possible.

With love and our thanks from the BHN team!