Voices of Resilience: Baraah Ramadan

When war broke out in Syria, 31-year-old Baraah Ramadan hoped that she would, somehow, still be able to live in her home and lead an ordinary life. However, when a bomb nearly struck her house, she realized she needed to flee to a safer environment with her husband and three children.

In this week’s episode, Baraah talks about how uniquely difficult forced migration is for women and mothers. She speaks about how remote working made it possible for her to be able to support her family while raising her children in her new-found home in Turkey. She walks us through the incredible ways she has had to adapt to her new environment in Turkey and how through all the turmoil, she was able to find her purpose in life: supporting and leading other women to careers in tech.

Baraah currently holds a BA in Information Systems Engineering from Syrian Virtual University and she works remotely as a program manager for Paper Airplanes. She invites us all to re-evaluate how we view refugees and to continue to bring their voices and experiences to the mainstream inorder to reshape the narrative around their existence.

What is Voices of Resilience?

The number of people who have been forcibly displaced continues to increase alarmingly; as of mid 2022, the UNHCR has reported that for the first time on record, the number of forcibly displaced people worldwide has surpassed 100 million. This is a staggering figure in itself, but another tragedy of the enormity of this number is that it often overshadows the fact that every one of those 100+ million is a distinct individual who has had their life irrevocably altered and their inspiring story tends to be buried under the statistics.

During the first edition of the Migration Summit in 2022, we hosted various storytelling sessions where we heard from displaced individuals, with the aim of humanising these statistics. Similar to these sessions, we are looking to amplify the voices of some incredible individuals who have overcome obstacles far beyond our imagination.

The aim of this podcast is to share the journeys of six individuals striving for the dignified life they deserve. Given that education and employment are often a pivotal part of the road to a financially stable, dignified life, this podcast will share insight on their journeys, with a focus on their education paths and livelihoods.

In this podcast, we hope to contribute to the shift in the narrative of refugees across the world and encourage stakeholders and listeners alike to take action. We do not want the label of refugee to define these individuals as powerless victims, instead, we intend to portray them as the determined individuals that they are with full agency to succeed in any way they desire, given the right resources.

This podcast series will consist of seven episodes. It will be released in January, in the run-up to the Migration Summit 2023 which will explore the theme “Co-creating pathways to learning, livelihood, and dignity”.