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Carlos initially came to the UK in 1991 temporally to escape from the political instability in his home country, Colombia. Later he found it was impossible for him to go back and his family in Colombia were at risk. That was the point when he decided to claim an asylum and stayed in the UK. ‘I never imagined that it had to be in my life, for the rest of my life,’ says Carlos. He now works for the Unite to improve the life of the migrant workers.

‘Against my will, against my expectations and my family. Leaving my ideas and people. Leaving smallest things, such as the sun and hear the birds, animals, green, your own air, the wind and everything. Once you have to leave there, it is really hard to stand by. You will miss everything. You miss more. Because you know that you cannot come back, whether there is a possibility for you to come back. When you come here because you want, it is different.’
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Challenges: Discrimination against Asylum Seekers

‘In 1994, being an asylum seeker was as if being a criminal due to the media. They portrayed us as a lowest in the society. I do not want to remember to feel that I was nobody or the third-class citizen. When you had to go to the public office, they ask you a lot of questions. When you say you are an asylum seeker, (they show specific face expression). Their face and treatment! Discriminatory treatment! “You are living on expenses of the tax payer’s money. You are not welcomed…” They do not tell you that, but they make you feel bad about you. Immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers, something must be very wrong with you- criminal, someone who is stealing from you and someone who is invading your home.‘

In the beginning, Carlos was working in an English pub in the outskirts of London, but after his family came to the UK, he moved to London. ‘I had to deal with everything, because my wife did not speak English. […] My wife was seriously sick. It was terrible. It was the time I could not do anything, just taking care of them. Sometimes I worked part-time, clearing job, cooking. I could not do a full-time, because I was taking care of my family. That was a difficult and hard times. […] There was a word in Spanish. ‘Todero (handyman, someone who can do anything)’. Who works in everything, because the situation is so hard, so you cannot say no. You already say yes, I can do it. You try anyway. If that is ok, you continue. It has taught me lot of things for living. So here we are. I’m still alive.’

Tipping Point

‘I felt at home when I was suffering one of the worst moments in my life, when my wife was at brink of death. I saw a solidarity and support from doctors, nurses and staff. They embraced me as if I was part of family. They offered me a drink, sat down, told me that everything was going to be fine. That was quite different from that ones at home. In Colombia, if you do not have money to pay the basic, maybe you die. Human warmness and caring, it does not happen in Colombia. You can die easily at the door of the hospital because nobody cares about you. […] Here you feel they are warm, sincere and caring. […] That something mutual and solidarity makes me feel comfortable.’

Belonging

Slowly, things got better little by little and Carlos and his family got used to living in the UK. ‘Culture, traditions and the language- everything was different from our background (in the beginning). The music was different. Now I would like the kind of rock, but before I could not take it. In Colombia, if you go to a coffee shop or a bar, you always listen to music- sometimes, romantic, sometimes ballade. Here you do not listen to music in a pub. You just talk and talk.
Now it is ok with me. I’ve been here for a long time, so I’ve gotten accustomed to it. Now for me the strange thing is to be in a pub with a sound of music. So you become gradually accustomed to it.’

‘Realistically, the UK is my home. But this is not because I want to, but because I cannot see other way. Like it or not, I have to make the most of it. […]. At the end of the day, this is the place because it offered me a chance to live and to be alive, and also the place which offered me a chance to work to care for my family and to care for myself.’

‘I do not really feel the sense of belonging. It’s a kind of ambiguity. I still feel as a foreigner- the sense of foreigner when I go and come back. At the immigration border, I feel completely a stranger. I do not know why, maybe because of a psychological trauma. When you confront an immigration officer, they look at you as if you were lying- ask you a lot of questions. It‘s a kind of feeling that someone is watching you- what you do, where you are going, what you did before. I cannot cope with that. I don’t feel well. […] I don’t have a sense of belonging, even though they have a British citizenship. I do not feel it.’

‘I’m more comfortable spiritually, because you know that you are doing a job to help others. That helped me. In terms of physically, personally I find it more difficult. Because (it is) such a challenge to go up and to improve. […] You do not find a job that you do not need to improve. […] Every single day, there is a challenge. You have to think a way to get better. By getting better, you prove as a worker and as a human being that you can do it. That makes me happy. (There is) a sense of myself that I can do it. How far can you go? You can go further. I want to go further than this. There are a lot of things to do.’