Culture - Community - Challenge

Debbie Wright takes two minutes with Kailean Khongsai, Community Worker, and Kim Khongsai, Centre Manager at Southall.

Kailean

(First published in the Spring 2010 A Rocha UK magazine. Receive the magazine by becoming a Friend of A Rocha.)

Where do you hail from?

Kailean: We both come from Manipur, in North-East India. Manipur is one of India’s 28 states and is on the Indo-Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) border. The state is mostly wooded and mountainous with a central valley containing the city of Imphal, where Kim comes from.
Kim: We would often cross the bridge over the Meena River to do our shopping in Burma. We are one of the tribes of North-East India – we call ourselves Kuki. Christians make up nearly 30% (according to the 1991 Census) of the total population who are mostly Hindu.

Kim

How have you arrived here working for A Rocha in West London?

Kailean: I came over here in 2006 to study a Master’s Degree in environmental waste management at Glasgow Caledonian University. My first degree is in Botany and I am passionate about God’s creation. Friends in Glasgow told us about A Rocha, I could hardly believe it, a Christian organisation as passionate about God’s world as I am. There were a few false starts, but in the end I was offered the job of Community Worker and Kim the job as Centre Manager. It has been a complicated journey, but we always trusted God’s guiding hand.

You live in the Centre with other team members and visitors passing through all the time. How do you cope with so many people around?

Kim: We really love it: living in Glasgow was quite lonely and quite a culture shock. Where we come from in North-East India, there is far less emphasis on individuality and independence – we live and focus on the family, and on our community. Here at A Rocha we again live as a family, living and working together side by side, caring and sharing with one another.

As a Christian community worker, what have been the challenges?

Kailean: As I’m still very new to the Southall and Hayes areas, taking up the responsibility of building bridges amongst faith leaders and trying to form the youth action forum are very challenging. However, I quite like the idea of community cohesion through environmental local projects – so I enjoy my work.

And you have found English food interesting…

Kailean: For the first year in Glasgow,I found the food incredibly difficult, and very bland. We are used to hot and very spicy food for all our meals – pasta, bread and sandwiches were no substitute at all. Living in Southall though has huge advantages, we can get every kind of herb and spice that we can buy at home.

What else have you found challenging?

Kim: Of course the English weather and in winter the very short days.

So far away from home, what helps you?

Kim: Our faith and living amongst other Christians. My favourite Psalm is 121: I look up to the hills.
Kailean: Our family Psalm is 90, contrasting God as eternal and the fragility of human beings.