Oi be a Princess

December 4, 2020

“Oi be a Princess ” – the words of a young Gloucestershire child. A child growing up here in the county and learning about life and dreams and likes and dislikes.

The twang of the accent showing a real sense of living in this county.

Which goes to show that we can identify exactly as we wish. This child has only lived in the UK for a year and is settling in well. Making friends and finding their way.

It just goes to show the nonsense of racism and the pointlessness of it. As human beings we adapt to our circumstances and situations. We have the same hopes and dreams, the same desire to live and breathe and have our freedoms and safety.

So here is to all of us, however we identify, let’s ensure we give everyone else the same freedom.

Adele

In the footsteps of a footballer?

November 12, 2020

Hello

Would you like to follow in the footsteps of Gary Lineker and sign up to host a refugee in your home for a short or longer term placement? Please have a listen to this clip https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08xgnz1 .

At GARAS, we enjoy working with Refugees at Home, a charity which offers hosting placements for homeless asylum seeker and refugee individuals. When someone has come to the end of their current housing situation for a variety of reasons, offering a Refugees at Home placement is another option for clients to choose, often when choices are limited. One or two take these up each year. If you live in Gloucester specifically, hosts are always welcome! Please take a look at their advice for more information, thank you.

Hannah

Yet Again – can you help?

November 2, 2020

Here we go again, back into Lockdown, back to life as we don’t want it to be.

Life with reduced human contact, and any sense of normality.

This has and is hard for everyone. Its particularly hard for those who wait for decisions to be made on their lives here, who wait for interviews or court dates.

Who don’t know when they can see their solicitor or even if they have one.

And who like many on the fringes of life, do not have the resources to get through this as easily as others.

One significant difference this time is that we have been able to put the Internet into all asylum homes in Gloucester and Cheltenham over the last few weeks so that increases their ability to communicate with others and to be able to have lessons on line or watch the football! (Just be normal!)

This was possible because we got a grant to cover this for six months, but in order to maintain that post February we would like to encourage sponsors – the cost per month per household is around £32 so we would love to have sponsors to help cover the 34 households who benefit from this support.

Over and above that we would like to be able to provide more clients with equipment to enable on line classes or therapy sessions. If you have a laptop or tablet with a camera that you are not using and would like to donate it to someone who could use it, we can really use them. We will clean them up and pass them on to those in greatest need.

Adele