Celebrating 50 Years Of Bangladesh

Submitted by Dawn on

Date of event/s

Sun, 7th November 2021

Location

Birmingham Hippodrome Theatre, Hurst Street, Southside, Birmingham, B5 4TB

About this event

The celebrations continue with Freedom 50 Riders on the 7th November at the Hippodrome. The day will have stalls and cultural activities and for the evening we have live music and dance at the Hippodrome. The day is free and the evening headline is Khiyo with Sohini Alam. Tickets are only £10.00 follow the link below to book tickets.

Unashamedly Bangladeshi

Submitted by Dawn on

50 years on since Bangladesh has become a sovereign nation and we, British Bangladeshi, have had a footprint in the UK that stretches back four centuries. It started with the expansion of the East India Company in Calcutta in the 17th-century, with merchant seamen known as ‘Laskars’. They were recruited to serve the ships and on occasions, they would jump ship in one of Britain's ports. There were also ‘ayas’ – servants and cooks brought back by returning employees of the East India Company, however, this was in very small numbers and there is little account of their presence in the UK.

Show me the money… health inequalities

Submitted by Legacy WM on

A recent Guardian article about COVID-19’s effect on the Bangladeshi community [https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/jun/19/preparing-for-death-coronavirus-england-bangladeshi-community] made me reflect on Legacy WM’s work.  To set this in context, 2020 marks ten years since I first set up Legacy WM, with a view to collecting stories of Bangladeshi people in Birmingham.  I did a project called ‘Bangla Food Journey’ (www.legacy-wm.org/bangla-food-journeys/) whilst undertaking research for the project I discovered that

Here to serve

Submitted by Legacy WM on

The onset of the pandemic has had devastating impact on society in general and Lozells in particular.  The Birmingham Mail wrote an article entitled ‘Lozells at the epicenter of coronavirus deaths in City warns councillor’, and our experiences within the community have sadly bourne this out.  I spoke to Cllr Waseem Zaffar at the start of the lockdown several weeks’ ago. He shared with me that in just one household an elderly man had died, and his wife had passed away the next day.