Wish You Were Here
A Year of New Beginnings in The Peak District National Park
In February 2022, I was awarded a generous grant from Arts Council England to run a year-long project consisting of a series of events hosted by organisations who work in and for the Peak District National Park for the benefit of the refugee community in Sheffield. The award would enable me to commission artists to develop creative activities to complement an event hosted by one of the Peak District National Park organisations.
I collaborated with Voluntary Action Sheffield - New Beginnings and Sheffield Dialogue Society - two organisations who support refugees and asylum seekers with close links to City of Sanctuary Sheffield. Our first event took place on 26th March at Longshaw Estate National Trust and the final sharing evening took place on 28th January 2023. We created a book with memories, activities, walks and information. The book is the trace we left behind but also a route for others to follow in our footsteps.
At the moment of the first Covid lockdown in March 2020, I had just entered my third week of volunteering with City of Sanctuary Sheffield (CoS) for their newly established SPRING project. I was still learning about the processes a person has to go through when they have been granted their Right to Remain. I recall talking to a young man, aged 29, sitting in front of me with tired eyes. When I looked at his paperwork I saw that he had been in the asylum system since he arrived, aged 17. Twelve years in limbo!. I did not know whether to congratulate him or just focus on helping him to get his life in the UK starting. Preparing him for the next obstacles of finding a home - we had been told that it was likely that young single men would not be a priority for housing and that he may well be sofa-surfing for a while.
When the sanctuary centre closed during lockdown, the team at CoS asked some of us to become ‘befrienders’ - calling a number of clients every week to check if they were ok, needed help with anything etc. I had 3 clients. One seemed ok and didn’t require a regular chat but two were keen to get a call once a week or fortnight. At first I found it tricky, but CoS arranged for us all to have regular zoom meetings with the other volunteers, supported by Alexi (who, at that time, managed the volunteers) and Helen (who provided us with wellbeing/psychological support). The volunteers came from many different backgrounds and countries - some of them had been through the same asylum processes so understood much better how it feels to be in isolation. As soon as I felt it was possible, I met up with my two clients. I went for regular walks in the park with A and accompanied G to the local playground where her baby daughter V was introduced to swings, slides and climbing frames. During that time I learned much. When A eventually received his Right to Remain I was soo pleased for him. He moved to London to start his future and be nearer his beloved Arsenal FC . But three years on and G is still waiting to get her day in court, to make her appeal to have the Right to Remain in the UK with her daughter. It is so hard for her to stay positive and keep dreaming of a better future. She says that she is just holding on for the sake of V, that she hopes that, one day, her daughter will get all the choices she didn’t have herself. It isn’t even a hostile environment anymore, it is a cruel, inhumane and abhorrent system that has been getting worse over the years.
I thought that inviting the people from the refugee community out into Peak District National Park could give people some respite, even if only a tiny bit. Just to support people with doing something nice or fun in a natural environment, to help them feel relaxed, social, happy. The 6 organisations I contacted were all happy to host a day for different groups - sometimes just with adults but also days for families. The artists were commissioned to design complementary creative activities and added something different to these days. I know it isn’t always so easy to get your kids to come out for a walk in the countryside but if there is something fun to do when you also learn something about the natural surroundings, then that might make it easier. A barrier lifted so to speak.
So we made masks, told stories, made deer puppets, climbed trees, built dry-stone walls and made bird boxes. We cycled and made noise in the Monsal Trail tunnels. We walked along the Pennine Way and stood still to feel and listen to the wind, rain and the birds. We made prints, we drew flowers, we rubbed leaves. We made maps and learned about pollinating insects. We foraged a bit, tasting leaves and flowers that grew along the river bank. We wrote stories and learned new words. It was a year of being outside in an environment that didn’t feel hostile but welcoming and open.
The grant has been spent but the project continues. There is now a walking group and possibly a group that will go out to volunteer with the Peak District National Park Authority. Hopefully more days will be organised at Chatsworth, with Eastern Moors Partnership, Peak District Mosaic, Derbyshire or Sheffield Wildlife Trust, the National Trust at Longshaw Estate.
We are only a small planet and people will keep moving around it - it is in our nature to explore, learn, migrate, adapt, collaborate. I’m not really sure when we will see the planet as one mass of land and water that needs to be looked after to keep life alive? As long as governments keep dividing people into groups of ‘deserving’ and ‘non-deserving’, as those who belong HERE and those who do not, we will go against our own nature. ‘Wish You Were Here’ is about being on that page with us.
