007 JANA ALAGARAJAH Show Notes

JANA (JANAGAN) ALAGARAJAH was born in Sri Lanka to Tamil parents. In the 1990s they fled to London on an emergency visa from Amnesty International. Jana was 3 years old. He grew up in the UK and is a doctor of medicine. In 2016 he cycled the Pacific Coast from Vancouver to Tijuana with an urn and a pannier full of tea. He raised over £3,000 for the Save The Children’s Child Refugee Crisis Appeal and through drinking tea (a strong link to a shared humanity) he facilitated discussions with people along the Pacific Coast with the aim of debunking some of the myths surrounding migration. He believes most people have some kind of migration story in them.

 

THIS IS JANA’S UNIQUE STORY ABOUT LONDON, THE WORLD AND LIFE.

 

“It’s a hard city to be in unless you have your tribe,

Or you have a sense of the people that you can trust,

And people that you enjoy spending time with,

Whoever you are, there’s going to be a space for you.”

 

BACKGROUND

Jana was brought up in the multi-cultural community of Tooting and then Kingston-upon-Thames. He currently lives in West Norwood and works in London in the field of medicine. He tries to visit Sri Lanka once a year to discover more about the culture and the land of his birth. He has a strong need to travel and discover more of the world.

 

JANA’S LONDON MUSINGS…

He loves to swim at Brockwell Lido all year round and enjoys the park for picnics in the summer.

His form of transport is 100% bicycle.

He loves to eat street food at Herne Hill Market – he also worked there.

He loves pub food around a roaring fire. One of his favourite pubs is the Canton Arms, Stockwell.

For late nightlife he enjoys Café Cairo, Clapham North.

He likes the ridiculous sounds of words e.g. dungarees

Dinner out he would go somewhere familiar like The Garden Room West Norwood.

Jana likes to walk in Sydenham Woods – ancient woodland a part of the Great North Woods.

He likes to cycle along the Embankment cycle path.

He is a cinema goer and likes The Ritzy in Brixton.

He’s a fan of Brockwell Park Community Greenhouses Trust.

 

JANA’S MUSINGS OF SRI LANKA…

His one memory is of his grandfather cutting coconuts from the trees and of his grandma singing to him.

He would suggest visiting Tallala beach, near Matara; also Jaffna is interesting to get a sense of Tamil culture.

Go hiking in the Knuckles mountain range it’s beautiful, wild and dense.

Tamil food is different to Singhalese although both have coconut and chilli in many of their dishes. Try

stringhoppers (a kind of steamed noodle made from rice flour), hot curries, and sambols.

Jana’s grandparents were comfortable with their sense of identity and he feels he got a stronger understanding and sense of Sri Lankan identity through them rather than through his parents who were more affected by the war.

 

JANA’S OTHER MUSINGS…

He is too restless to pick a specific place to live but feels he has to be by the sea, and loves South America.

He has a total wanderlust. Coming in to Travelling Through for him was how DIY enthusiasts see a DIY shop.

 

The Galapagos Islands had a big impact on Jana. It gave him a sense of what the world could be without humans. He had a scary experience getting caught up in a rip tide while hanging out with a green turtle.

 

JANA’S FINAL THOUGHTS…

“Be open

In London I don’t think people judge you at all,

It’s a really open city,

And you can kind of be yourself essentially,

Which I think is a major strength,

Get involved with all the cool things going on.

Volunteering is a great way to meet new, interesting people.”

  

JANA’S SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS…

Jana can be found on Instagram: @regfugeecycleride

Jana’s Just Giving page was: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/refugeecycleride 

You can DONATE to SAVE THE CHILDREN at https://www.savethechildren.org.uk/

 

ABOUT THIS PODCAST...

Podcast Host Emma, and Travelling Through can be found at: https://www.travellingthrough.co.uk/

The Travelling Through Jingle was written and produced by the lovely Mariska Martina https://www.mariskamartina.com/

Show notes 007 JANA ALAGARAJAH can be found at this link https://travellingthrough.podbean.com

Thanks to The Great North Wood Pub – in West Norwood - for hosting this podcast recording https://www.thegreatnorthwood.co.uk/