For 18 months in 2018 and 2019, a brightly painted minibus toured the Swedish counties of Stockholm and Gothenburg, offering cultural activities focussed on well-being to newly arrived asylum seekers. The project was coordinated by IofC Sweden and funded by the county authorities.
In 2018, 21,502 people applied for asylum in Sweden: a third of them women. But most efforts to help people settle and integrate have mostly attracted men. The IofC project focused on women.
The project offered study circles, a Peace and Culture Café and a wide range of cultural activities. It helped to organize three festivals, including the Light in the Darkness festival in Skeppsholmen, near Stockholm, in autumn 2019. ‘It’s about finding a home in yourself and in the new place you end up, becoming a light carrier for yourself as well as others,’ said its initiator, Nik Dee-Dahlström of IofC Sweden.
In all about 800 asylum seekers have taken part in the project.