Kee Khobor Stories
Kee Khobor will feature blogs, poems, vlogs and podcasts. The reflections will be shared publicly throughout the year, with our official launch on 26th March 2021.
The various identities of the Bengali community in the UK will be explored and celebrated. We will facilitate an open exchange of ideas and give voice to views, some of which may otherwise not be heard.
The project will leave a legacy that provides stewardship for future generations to not only have pride in their identity but to own it and derive strength from it, and give younger people who may be struggling the confidence and opportunity to belong to something wider.
The reflections will provide an opportunity to look ahead to the future development of the community and not only stay relevant as a community within a changing society but be inspirational to the development of wider British society.
I wasn’t born in the UK, but I certainly feel more at home in the UK than anywhere else.
Growing up as a British Bengali Muslim girl in an inner-city area of London was tough. Most girls like me struggled with identity due to conflicting eastern and western cultural expectations. It was difficult to fit in during the primary years of my life as I couldn’t speak English. My family lived huddled in a room in a flat above a shop and I spent the first few months of my life in the UK staring out of a window, watching the world go by.
Easy like Sunday morning
‘She humoured us. We would call her every time, as it was so rare to see a person wearing a sari on the television. Sometimes white people would stare at her in the town centre and I felt embarrassed that she dressed differently and stood out, but she didn’t care and eventually neither did I.’
Supporting Family with Mental Health Illness
Hear from our good friend and British born Bangladeshi, Dr Jolel Miah talk about his experience supporting family members from a young age with their mental health journies, the stigma and discrimination in mental health and what society can to do to support people with mental health issues.
Born in the UK but made by Bangladesh
I was gently pushed forward. As I handed the bag of rice to the Prime Minister and said please help Bangladesh and our people. He smiled down at me and someone took the bag. I had done my job and was helped to turn around and walked out of the crowd.
A woman who is changing her world through law, art and her children
She was the first in her family to go to university and allowed by her dad to live away from home. This was a big ask of a man from his generation and background, but he believed wholeheartedly in her. She felt she was leading the way, not only for her younger siblings but for the Bangladeshi community that surrounded her. Like her father, she was willing to go against the expectations that the world had on them. Together they were brave and pushed boundaries.
The Matriarch
Photo: Syed Rifat Hossain
Mamoni was shorn of all adornment, dressed in a creamy white saree with no border, the parting in her hair bereft of the meandering stream of vermillion, looking bloodless and stark. What you noticed from a distance, was the blank canvas of her forehead, no longer marked by the pomegranate red kumkum powder, painstakingly shaped into a perfect circle every morning by Mamoni’s deft fingers