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'Having been in direct provision for such a long time I had started to lose confidence'

I needed an outlet that brought positivity to myself and others around me, writes Ellie Kisyombe.

SOME PEOPLE SAY they understand what’s going on with direct provision in Ireland, and some choose to ignore it. I think the way asylum seekers have been portrayed in the media has caused people to react to what they hear about these people and not to who they actually are.

They get scared because they feel ‘oh they are here to take our jobs, our money, our country, our social welfare, our housing’. These are unfair assumptions.

Unable to cook

I come from a foodie background, however, due to direct provision, I spent five years not being able to cook or eat any of the food I was used to.

My parents ran a food business in Malawi and I’ve family members that ran bakeries and confectionaries. It was great to grow up with them and learn about food and keep that tradition.

Our Table came about because food is a super tool that can connect two people who don’t speak the same language. If you want to connect with someone – have good food.

I met Michelle Dermody, the co-founder of Our Table, who was involved in the food business, which is what I wanted to do. Up to that point, it was very difficult for me to find a connection to the Irish community. When I met her, it was like a dream come true.

Building confidence

We set up Our Table so people can come and cook food, and build confidence to get employment. We began Our Table as a pop-up in the Project Arts Centre in Temple Bar in 2016 for three months. Those three months blew my mind.

I was invited by Darina Allen to go to Ballymaloe Cookery School and while there I learned so much I stopped doubting myself.

Having been in direct provision for such a long time I had started to lose confidence. Sometimes you can lose your way and lose yourself and I wasn’t really sure if I would be able to do this. Three years later, here I am.

I needed an outlet

Sometimes I chat with people that have followed my journey from day one. They say ‘Ellie, we’ve watched you, we’ve seen the government policies on direct provision and now you’ve made a platform to say things’.

When I came here eight years ago, it was scary. I’ve accomplished  things that mentally I didn’t think I would be capable of doing. I took a huge risk when I stepped out from my comfort zone and travelled to Ireland by myself. I’ll be honest, it was a struggle.

Often I felt angry, however, while some people may choose a self-destructive path when faced with adversity, I did not want to go that way. I needed an outlet that brought positivity to myself and others around me, hence the creation of Our Table.

I am currently writing two books, inspired by my journey here. They are about everything that happened to me during my stay in direct provision, and how I’ve overcome it, along with the people who’ve really loved and cared for me.

I want to highlight how the direct provision experience can affect people.

Malawi-born Ellie Kisyombe and her children have lived in direct provision for eight years as asylum seekers. Ellie co-founded Our Table with chef and food writer Michelle Dermody as a community-driven, non-profit project to highlight the need to end direct provision in Ireland. Their goal is to facilitate change through conversation over food. Ellie gave a talk at the Farmgate Café, English Market on 15 June as part of the Cork Midsummer Festival’s City of Ideas. Cork Midsummer Festival runs from 15-24 June, featuring 10 days of theatre, literature, dance, music, visual art and family-friendly festivities.

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    Mute Liam Byrne
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 9:24 AM

    The leaving cert has always been about learning off answers. It’s not about knowledge, but memory- why are they only realising this now!?!?!?

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    Mute Kieran Murphy
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 10:03 AM

    I predicted my whole leaving cert perfectly including the language exams so that’s either due to luck or the leaving is really too predictable

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    Mute Cormac Cahill
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 2:36 PM

    in my english exam i predicited 4 out of 4 of the poets to come up. was like a kid in a candy store.

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    Mute Siobhán K
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 10:34 AM

    It’s a mixture of luck and predictability. I’m doing my leaving in June, and I’ve already been told what is likely to come up in most subjects. The thing is, you learn everything, concentrate your energy on the predictions coming up to the exam and then hope to god on the day the paper is suited to you.

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    Mute Jack Kelly
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 11:55 AM

    I’m in Junior Cert and even now the exam seems to be predictable. Our teachers are always saying “Oh, that didn’t come up last year – it’s due up this year, make sure we go over this” or “this is definitely coming up this year – make sure to know this” and so forth. My friend, also a JC student, told me their teacher spent weeks on one section of history because it is likely to come up for us. Another friend’s class skipped the entire section because it’s not due up this year. A bit mad….

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    Mute Cormac Flanagan
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 9:30 AM

    So there not going to take place in June then.

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    Mute Iain Murray
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 1:59 PM

    Comment of the day!

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    Mute BJ
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 1:37 PM

    I wish they’d made mine more predictable!

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    Mute James Walsh
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 12:28 PM

    This is always going to be a problem because the Leaving Cert is one exam therefore its simply not possible to produce an exam paper that covers everything. Naturally students and teachers are always going to try and guess which sections of the courses are going to be examined. In effect the entire Leaving Cert course is a exercise in waste. Every exam probably covers at most 40% of what has been taught over the previous two years. Students spend vast amounts of time learning things that they are never going to be tested on.

    While its welcome that the problem is going to be looked at, realistically the only long term solution to this is to have a more holisitic approach to the syllabus. It would be better if subjects were also broken down in a more semester based approach rather than one two year course with one exam at the end. Such an approach would be involve continuous assessment, applied learning and peer review. It would require more resources to achieve this but the outcome should be better for students and that is where the focus should lie.

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    Mute Eoin Sheehy
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    Dec 22nd 2011, 1:55 PM

    Good Idea in theory but if it;’s like how the ‘revolutionary’ project Maths then it’ll be a disaster, didn’t have books for two months and our teacher still isn’t fully sure what’s on the course because there are parts in other books which aren’t in ours and vice versa!

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    Mute Daryl Walsh
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    Dec 23rd 2011, 10:52 AM

    As a leaving cert student up until last year, I understand where they’re coming from when they say predictable i.e the same section of the biology course can’t come up 2 years in a row, however.. You study the material for 2 years in order to be able to answer the questions that come up.. The course isn’t that big ya know so maybe it’s the actual structure of the leaving cert they should look at not the ‘predictability’ of it.

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    Mute Peter Costello
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    Jun 4th 2012, 6:34 PM

    Shouldn’t it really just ask all sections of each course and make them all part of the exam so that the entire course is covered. Or maybe the colleges should just have entrance exams instead.

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