Ballymoney: Refugee community garden grows green shoots for integration

A group of Syrian men have created a community garden for the people who helped them when they first moved to Northern Ireland.

The four men have been working on the project in Ballymoney, County Antrim, for several months.

Bassam Khalil moved to Portstewart, County Londonderry, in 2019.

This was after he spent almost eight years living in a tent in a Lebanese refugee camp.

Before coming to Northern Ireland, Bassam said his life was "very bad" and that there was "no future and no schools" for his children.

"But here, there's everything. Everything has changed.

"It's very quiet and lovely by the sea - the people are very kind."

Bassam and the other three men came to Northern Ireland as refugees under the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme.

Since the summer, they have worked on transforming a patch of waste ground into a garden at the Building Communities Resource Centre (BCRC).

Bassam said that as the BCRC organisation had helped them with English and settling into the community, they felt it was important to do something in return.

Fergal Quinn, BCRC's ethnic communities officer, said the men wanted to give back after being received and welcomed into the community.

"Every Friday we met and every Friday, without fail, they would be here wanting to do as much as they could," he said.

"And they're getting something from this too. We appreciate it so much."

Fergal said it is about helping to create a natural integration into the community.

"Community works best when it comes together. This empowers them - that, without you, we wouldn't be standing next to this beautiful garden."

Conservation volunteers also helped with the project.

Project officer David Fleming said: "The purpose is not just for the BCRC but for the whole community, the shops here, the community around Ballymoney and outlying towns.

"It brings people together; gets more socialising, more friends helping each other out if you're in trouble."

Jonathan Hanna, a general manager with a manufacturing company which also wanted to be involved, said there is a lot of diversity among his firm's 300-strong workforce.

He said with new employees joining from places such as India and eastern Europe, it was important for the company to be involved "to get relationships built and make people feel welcome in the local community".

"We want to give something back to help out, so a lot of people got involved in their own time to design some of the equipment - they made it outside of work.

"Hopefully our own team members who are part of this community group can use it as well."