This is the MYgration Project. This is our story.

What do you see here?

On this page, you will meet various people who, for various reasons, have left their own country to come to the Netherlands. For some, this is an ongoing journey – they may have to migrate again. For others, the Netherlands has become a home.

The people you see here answer the question: “What is MY migration story?”. …and you can read and listen to their story.

MYgration is a collaboration between the Wijdoenmee! Initiative, the Haella Fund, Correspondents of the World, and Broadcast Amsterdam.

Public discourse around migration continues to be polarised in the Netherlands. On both ends of the spectrum, immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers are often spoken about in mainstream media, with resulting stories maintaining an us/them divide. MYgration seeks to bridge this divide through providing a space where people can share migratory stories in their own words and on their own terms. In doing so, MYgration offers a multi-dimensional portrait of the ‘migrant experience’. The MYgration series is part of a larger whole: listen to the stories online via the podcast, view the portrait galleries on this website - or visit the Westerpark to see the exhibition.

Whose stories do you read?

Zeynep Killi

Zeynep was born in Kürecik in Turkey. In 1985 she came to the Netherlands as a Kurdish political refugee.

Pavel and Evgenii

Pavel and Evgenii came to the Netherlands in 2018. They fled their home country Russia after threats from the Russian government regarding their gay marriage.

Ghada Bahri

Ghada taught English in Syria – while raising her six children. When her eldest son was at risk of conscription, they fled the country.

Shi Ying

Shi Ying came to the Netherlands from China with her parents in 2015. As Christians they were no longer safe and had to flee.

Asia Hussain

Asia was born and raised in Brabant. She feels like a migrant on several levels: culturally, ethnically, but also with regard to sex and gender.

Max Wattimena

Max came to the Netherlands in 1951 as a toddler, because his father had served in the Royal Dutch East Indies Army (KNIL).

Listen to the stories

The MYgration Project is organized by: