Zozan Yasar is a Kurdish journalist from Turkey. Denied access to education, Zozan taught herself to read and write and went to university to get a degree before working as a journalist. As a Kurd, she struggled to officially register her Kurdish name with the government in Turkey. After arrests and harassment, she was eventually forced to seek asylum in the UK.
“I remember the day I applied for asylum in the UK so well. Instead of a new beginning, it felt as if it was the end of everything for me. Nobody, I thought, will ever know what I have left behind. Nobody here can understand what it is like to feel you have lost all hope. The thought that all the fights I have had in my life will start once again.”
Fast forward a few years from that day and Zozan’s smile shines as brightly as her yellow jumper. Her asylum claim was granted quickly by the UK authorities. Now she is busy and determined to build that new life in the UK, even if the sadness for what she left behind is never far away.