KEY POINTS:
Forced out of Africa by politics, 23-year-old Brook Shifreaw is working to build a new kind of identity - the African-Kiwi.
She has just become the first African from a refugee background to gain a fine arts degree from Auckland University.
On Sunday, she will be part of a multinational troupe of young refugees called Mixit who will perform at the annual Auckland International Cultural Festival at the Wesley War Memorial Park in Mt Roskill.
And in her spare time she is building a website for all young African-Kiwis, www.nileflow.com.
"The Nile flows through several African countries. It's a metaphor that African people should be going in the flow, in unity," she says.
Ms Shifreaw was 11 when her father, a political activist, fled from the family home in Ethiopia to a refugee camp in Kenya.
"They were looking to kill him, so he just escaped. It was a confusing and scary time."
Ms Shifreaw, her three younger brothers and their mother fled to another city. Secretly, they stayed in contact with their father, but could not join him because they would not have been safe in the refugee camp.
Three years later, the United Nations resettled her father in New Zealand and brought his children from Ethiopia to Auckland.
The Ethiopian regime would not let her mother leave with them, but she came a year later.
"I saw my father for the first time in three years in the Mangere refugee camp," Ms Shifreaw says.
"It was quite shocking. He had changed a lot. When people have been through refugee camps, they change. And we had a brother that he had never met because my Mum was pregnant when he left."
Nine years later, Ms Shifreaw's parents and brothers have moved on to Australia, but she now works part-time for Mixit and sees her life being in New Zealand.
"Even before I came into Mixit I had this urge to do something for other refugees - to help the younger ones get through what I went through," she says.
Mixit, which started in 2006, brings together a fluctuating team of 30 to 40 African and Asian refugees with a few native Kiwis at The Auckland Performing Arts Centre (Tapac) in Western Springs on Saturday afternoons.
"We use all the arts - dance, drama, music, photography, software writing, and we're lining up now to do kapa haka," says director Wendy Preston.
"We are using the arts to strengthen personal skills, confidence and communication. We are also creating networks and opportunities, introducing young people to a range of local people."
Another African refugee performing at Sunday's festival, 21-year-old Somali hip-hop artist Zpeedie, has also been tempted by Australia but has decided to finish a business degree at Unitec and then plans to stay here.
"I've just come back from my fourth trip to Australia. The crazy thing is it seems like when I go to Australia a lot of things are happening for me, but when I come to New Zealand no one's interested," he says.
"But I didn't come all the way from Somalia to do music. It would be crazy for me to do music and leave my Mum and my four younger brothers here. She can't handle four boys without my help."
* Auckland International Cultural Festival, Wesley War Memorial Park, 13 May Rd, Mt Roskill, Sunday 10am-5pm.
RAPPING A LIFE OF STRUGGLE
Here is a story about my life and me
I was born to be a star man can't you see (yeah)
Ever since the start I been working hard
But sometimes working hard is not good enough
I been through struggle man I been through pain
I got food in the fridge now I can't complain
Back home they are starving so they need some change
So I send it just to save them ... got something to say?
Sometimes what u give is not what u get
Same person u help is gonna want u dead
Plus death can come anytime or day
So I work extra hard less time in bed
What you know about bein' stuck in a world where you're trying to achieve your goal
But everyone is trying to bring you down and when it seems to get close
'Cause you done your research you go back to the start like dyuuuum!
- from Zpeedie,
Everybody Has a Problem
ON THE WEB
www.mixit.co.nz
www.myspace.com/zpeedie
