Digital Archive

Come to the desert

See how the sun is

See how barren the desert is

Come to the desert

See how the sun is

Don’t expect money growing on trees

Try to understand how it is to work in the desert

See how barren the desert is

These days the desert sun fears us

Ever since it felt the mountains in our heart

I have room for any amount of love within me

Though we toil here, we remain strangers

Though we toil here, we remain strangers

Listen, dear Nepal is within me

I have room for any amount of love within me

(Dalbir Singh, UAE returnee, translation adapted from Kesang Tseten's A Migrant Speaks))

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Migration is about aspirations for better opportunities, separation, nostalgia for home, and finding a home in the unknown. It involves missed milestones, sacrifices, and the chance to start anew in a foreign environment. It's about discovering what the world has to offer and what you have to offer the world. Migration is about nostalgia, about holding onto the familiar. It is about embracing growth, and evolving from the person who once left home. It is about homecoming, when home has changed in ways that no longer feel familiar. The complexity of migrants’ journeys is captured in our Digital Archives project, which highlights these nuances through migrants' own words.

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This platform also spotlights migrants' creations: talent is everywhere, opportunities are not. We hope that this platform will help their creations get more visibility and open up new opportunities for them to explore their passion.

(Art by Jeevit Khadka, currently in the UAE)