"My home is hot right now as my wife has served me an ultimatum". he cradled his coffee cup and leaned back into his seat We all turned towards him. "Why is that?" Alan one of the coordinators, an elderly man with kind eyes asked. "She insists my friend has to leave" Ovie replied with a rueful smile. "Your friend?" Alan prodded I bit down at the smile tugging on my lips. I did not want anyone to miscontrue the smile. I was smiling because in front of me was an African male caught in a conundrum. Pressed enough yet weighing his

"You saw how clueless I was when my baby began crying. The women here had to step in and take over. If I was back in Nigeria I would never take a baby out of the house on my own.  said a frazzled 'deji as he started contributing to the discussion" The Nigerian in me sensed his panic earlier when his baby began fretting. He kept rocking the buggy to lull the crying child without any success. A British woman tentatively intervened. This caused other women to chip in. Much as I wanted to help, Chemo was being a bitch and getting

"My young son shat on himself because someone was in the toilet and he could no longer hold it in" I quipped in a low voice laced with pain as I recalled that incident. I saw curious surprise on some of the faces in the room. It was a session where the topic was how to help new arrivals integrate into the community. The large divide in the room was so wide. Some of the attendants has never had any interaction with a black person outside of the office. And seemed clueless on anything to do with the BAME community. "He was

I shuffled wearily into the hall and sat on the first sofa by the door. Camp was taking its toll on me. The seat closest to the door was vacant and I made a beeline for it. A middle-aged female sat there. I plopped myself beside her. And as it happens, we eventually got talking. She drove in to camp from the Netherlands with her mother. "Netherlands?" That far? I thought #Newwineunited was only for people here in the UK" "No. People come from all over" "So where are you originally from?" "Nigeria" I smiled wearily " I hear it is beautiful"