My name is melody I’m from Nigeria. I lost my parents at the age of ten. When I came to the UK I was at the age of 12. My granny asked me if I would like to travel. So, I thought I was travelling around my country, it turns out I came to England.
My mum’s friend took me to her friend’s place. The second I started doing all the cleaning and it turned out to be a habit that they had to be telling me to be cleaning up the house every day. And if the place is not sparkling clean, I end up being told to do it again.
She liked pulling my hair, she always said this word to me, useless. I was beaten loads of times. I wasn’t allowed to go out, so I was just stuck in the house.
The first time when a man came into the house, I went to open the door and I was being asked why not make a cup of tea for the guy. And then while I was in the kitchen cleaning up he came and touched me. Different men would come into the house and I was being getting raped and stuff, so I got chucked out because I refused to sleep with one of the men that came to the house.
And I was right at the front of the door, begging and asking can she please let me in because I ain’t got nowhere to go. Then she’s not letting be back in because I refused to do what she was asking me to do.
And I stayed in the streets for eight to nine months. I had to begging for food, slept on buses, slept in cemeteries, slept in the phone booths. I stayed in the street and so three guys pushed me, stopped me and next thing I was being pulled and dragged by one of the guys and raped again.
At first, I went to a lot of different agencies to see if they could help me but none of them seemed to be bothered or had much interest to help me out. Until a key worker actually tried to find a way I could get my status to start working. And she spoke to her manager and my manager said that she should bring me down to Refugee Council in Bristol. And then I came down to the Refugee Council to see one of the advisors and she was really really great. She was there for me all the way through. It took a while for me to kind of build up that trust until I could see that she’s someone I could reply on, someone I could talk to. So, she’s been there like a friend, a mother, a sister. If it wasn’t her, I don’t know what I would do or where I would be by now. I trust her a lot, more than anyone else.
Narrative as told to Refugee Council. All credit given.
