Irenie Ekkeshis, Founder of New Citizenship Project

I started lobbying and the more people told me it wasn’t possible the more driven I was to find ways around the problem, to take on those challenges and prove those individuals wrong. I guess that’s me, that’s the way that I am.

Winning an award was just incredible, it was a moment of lightness and joy and happiness in what had been a really really awful time. I guess it spurred me on, it opened a door for me. It said this is the way that life is going to go from here, it was about opening up to the possibilities of this new way of being and new way of working that I’d never considered before. In this weird way (obviously I lost my vision and I had a terrible time), the fact that I’ve been able to turn it into something positive and set my life on a new course (which otherwise I wouldn’t have done), is a wonderful thing.

I really like that, that spirit of not tying ourselves down to, or defining ourselves in opposition or aggressively against something. It’s much more about identifying the point where pressure could be released and releasing it and then stepping outside of the system again.. buccaneering if you like. I wouldn’t fit in to the traditional campaigner model but I think I’ve achieved more because of that.

Irenie Ekkeshis, Founder of New Citizenship Project