BLOG: A volunteers experience volunteering for BIADS

I am Suhair from Sudan. I volunteered at Barnsley Independent Alzheimer’s and Dementia Support (BIADS) for three and a half months. I have always been interested in working with elderly people. Back in Sudan, I used to take care of my grandmother and grandfather. I cleaned and ironed their clothes and prepared water for them to bath. When I learned about the opportunity to help elderly people here, and I already had the experience, I loved the idea.

What I loved the most was the way people treated me. I felt comfortable and calm while helping them, and it was a big gain for me personally as well.

The Barnsley accent in Yorkshire is the hardest in the UK, I think. My English is acceptable, but because of the accent, I couldn’t understand people at the beginning. Through my volunteering at BIADS, I slowly started to understand the accent, and my English improved in a noticeable way. I met kind and friendly people who helped me learn how to fix my English and how to communicate better. My social connections improved a lot. At the beginning, I was very shy, but over time I started to talk more and became brave. I started to speak without fear and learned patience from working with people who have dementia. You have to be patient, calm, and thoughtful about your behaviour when working with them.

In a week, it will be my first year in the UK. When I first arrived, my friends and relatives in other parts of the country made me feel scared about living in Barnsley. They said, “We’re sorry that you live in Barnsley.” They told me that people there don’t like others and that they are racist. I was terrified of racism. However, after volunteering at BIADS, I found the opposite. People were very welcoming and loved others. Everything I had heard about Barnsley was wrong. After almost a year of living here, I have never faced any racism.

At first, I volunteered every Tuesday. Because they liked me, they offered me an additional day, so I started volunteering every Tuesday and Thursday.

I enjoyed every moment of volunteering there. I loved singing and listening to music with others, chatting, and being part of a social group. The thing that helped me the most was people’s kindness, and that is why I continued despite the accent challenge. People don’t necessarily love places; they love people. No matter where you are, if people treat you kindly, that place becomes your favourite.

My hope for the future is to become fluent in English and study something useful to me. I would like to be a nurse, but language is still a barrier. I have applied for a customer service course that starts soon. I will study the course and work in the shopping industry, and at the same time, I will continue improving my English. When I am ready to achieve my dream of becoming a nurse, I will start the process.

I am no longer volunteering at BIADS. I was moved to another area in Barnsley, and I now live around an hour away from BIADS, so I can’t volunteer there anymore.

I recommend volunteering to people seeking asylum and refugees because we are new in this country and need to integrate. Integration happens through volunteering. I am happy to be in Barnsley, and I hope to keep improving and becoming better over time.

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