Getting out of the house and being in a different place costs money. So our accommodation often feels like a prison
My wife and I are staying with her family this week – her sister, parents and grandparents, all of whom are seeking asylum for the same reasons as us. In our home country we all lived together, but now they are accommodated 30 miles away. We don’t see them often because it costs too much to get here. The travel is £8 each way and we live on £41 a week each, which has to cover food, toiletries, cleaning products, clothes, everything. We have to save a little each month to afford these journeys.
For me, that’s one of the hardest parts of being an asylum seeker – getting away, making one day different from the next. Nobody is forcing you to remain in your accommodation, but the cost of doing anything else, of going anywhere else, sometimes makes you feel as if you’re in prison.
As told to Anna Moore. Paul is in his 30s and is an asylum seeker living in the north of England. Names have been changed
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