Exploitation, Racism, Economic Hardship and Eastern European migrants (Life at Coventry Jesus Centre)

Sometimes one gets a feel here of the underworld of exploitation, anti-feeling and racism that immigrants from Eastern Europe sometimes face on coming to the UK.

Recently, I listened to an Eastern European young woman sharing her angst after finding work in the UK: she spoke of, “negative attitude towards me, bullying, misunderstanding at work which has left me worried and stressed. People hate you because you are not English. They want you pushed out of the job, out of the country. This experience has been very difficult for me.”

Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovenia and Estonia all joined the EU in 2004 – giving them unrestricted access to the UK’s labour market. Citizens from Romania and Bulgarian, also members of the EU, now have unlimited access to the UK labour market too (from January 2014). Net migration to the UK from Eastern Europe EU states was almost 400,000 between 2004-2011.

Keeping an ear to the ground, there is a recurrent story: the promise of a job back home by an unscrupulous agent, arriving in the UK and finding it doesn’t exist or, if it does, wages are minimal and falling into the hands of or becoming indebted to exploiters. 

In September 2013 the BBC reported that Eastern European migrants employed in the Fens for leek picking were trapped in a widespread network of exploitation.  A four-month investigation found migrants were being forced to pay fellow countrymen bribes to get a few days' work in the field - and some were left to live on less than £1 a week.

Catalin, Vlad and Mihaela at Bright Flame

A while ago, two Romanian young men, Vlad and Catalin, turned up at Coventry Jesus Centre on a Sunday morning. They had been promised accommodation in the UK but, on arriving, found nothing; they had been conned and were facing the prospect of no income, no home. 

Fortunately, unlike so many, their story has a favourable ending; both were offered a temporary home at ‘Bright Flame,’ a Christian community house in Coventry. Both found work, decided Christian community was ‘for them’ and stayed. Vlad has since married Mihaela and ‘Bright Flame’ are finding them a brilliant addition to the community family.

Biryani and the Bard: A Kurdish Picnic Besides The Avon

It was their idea: a trip to Stratford. And so it was ... the other Thursday we took ten learners from Coventry Jesus Centre to Stratford – from Iran, Iraqi Kurdistan, Latvia and France. The Kurdish ladies were attired in their best clothes; indeed, I felt positively under-dressed. The best costumes in the theatre exhibition we were later to see were barely an equal match to theirs!

None of them had ever been to Stratford before. Everything was exciting! Everything was interesting. How good to see the obvious pleasure in their eyes at observing, for so many of us, quite ordinary things! It’s strange how you look at the old familiar sights with fresh eyes when you are with people who are seeing those things for the first time. The old heron sitting in the tree, the gracious swans and narrow, summer barges, the ancient, timber-framed buildings; even the word ‘royal’ takes on an exciting new meaning as RSC (Royal Shakespeare Company) has to be explained.

Threatened with a thunderstorm which never happened, we jumped off our transport and wended our way through the crowded streets up to Shakespeare’s birthplace, taking countless photos, and then onto New Place and back onto the riverside park.

Lunch was the best; it’s got to be the finest picnic I ever had; I’d bought some honey sandwiches but I certainly didn’t need them! Our Kurdish mama had bought a picnic for fifteen and more!  This was Siti from a previous blog The silver tray was bought out and we all were given abundant portions of biryani and a highly colourful dolma dish. It was a feast and the likes of such a splendid picnic can rarely have been seen before on that park besides the Avon. Passersby's heads turned - intrigued at the unusual sight.

After that, we walked along besides the river to the parish church to see the bard’s burial place, then back across the ferry - pretty exhausted actually.

For all our faults, the UK has a brilliant heritage; when you get to know these Iranians and Iraqi Kurds and what they have suffered, you realise just how fortunate we are on this little isle of ours. We have known civil wars about the very things they have – who is going to rule – but we’ve come out on the other side.

 But for all our rich heritage, we have so much to learn from our friends ... their appreciation, their pleasure at the simple things of life and above all their hospitality and open-hearted friendship. Teachers only have students for a short while.  For us, to know them for this brief spell in time is a privilege.