Sufra's Advice Service was set up as a direct response to the Syrian refugee families resettlement by the local Council in our community in St. Raphael's Estate in 2018. And I joined Sufra just a year later, and since then, the Advice Service has grown immensely. We've gone from being a team of maximum two (sometimes just me on my own), to having 3 advisors and 6 volunteers and we're still looking to expand to meet the ever-growing demand.

Of course the demand has only risen. In the last few years, we have supported guests from Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, Iran, Ukraine and South America. We've provided shelter when the Council's door were closed, clothes when school uniforms were difficult to afford, and hot meal and company to share them with.

We've supported a mother and daughter, when no woman's shelter would take them because of their immigration status. And when the mother became sick, we visited her in hospital for days and made sure her daughter had a meal and got home safe every night - and eventually we got her her immigration status. Or our elderly guest from Nepal, who has become our adopted Uncle, he is undocumented and without family. He relies solely on Sufra for his accommodation, for his meals, transport costs for hospital appointments and just for someone to check up on him once in a while. In return, he consistently volunteers for us and also checks up on us. After an exhausting day at an Advice Drop-in, his smile makes everything better.

And there are hundreds of stories like this. The truth is, these aren't just our service users, they are our community. We support them, and in return, they support us. They become the volunteers that hold up our organisation. And in these difficult times, there is one thing for certain: refugees have always been here and will always be here, because long before they crossed these borders, their borders were crossed.

In the last few days, our Iranian refugee community have been shaken by the new unfolding tragedy. As an Iranian-Iraqi former refugee myself, this is the second war in my lifetime that my community has had to endure. All the while, our people here are dehumanised and our refugee community is scapegoated. And that's why our work now is more important than ever.

- Zena Kazeme, Advice Manager at Sufra