Amsterdam is a city of migrants, but rarely do they speak up and share their stories. Migrant Voices is a storytelling project collecting testimonies of first-generation migrants living in the city. Stories are told through text and podcasts. Migrants speak about why they came to the Netherlands, the lives they built, and the impact they have on the city and country. When many in the Netherlands and around the world turn their backs on migrants, we listen to their voices.
Amsterdam is a city of migrants, but rarely do they speak up and share their stories. Migrant Voices is a storytelling project collecting testimonies of first-generation migrants living in the city. Stories are told through text and podcasts. Migrants speak about why they came to the Netherlands, the lives they built, and the impact they have on the city and country. When many in the Netherlands and around the world turn their backs on migrants, we listen to their voices.
Originally from Suriname
Living in Amsterdam for 42 years
Radio DJ and community organizer.
Urmy Bilkslager comes from Suriname, “the most beautiful country in the world.” She has lived in the Netherlands for 42 years, but her love is still Suriname.
“In Suriname, I was living the life that God gave us to live. Here is not our life. But in Surinam, you live a life that you're supposed to live, and not you alone, because you're born there. Even you come there for a visit. You come there, you're going to feel the same thing.”
Growing up in Suriname, people spoke of the Netherlands as the solution for a better life. Arriving in the Netherlands, Urmy was surprised to see the country wasn’t the utopia she was promised.
“I see a lot things here that I think of now because [Dutch colonists] act like it was so beautiful but I see things here that I never see in Suriname.”
So Urmy dedicated herself to teaching people in Suriname and in the Netherlands about the beauty of her land and culture .
Urmy began this group to benefit her community. 40 years later, she is still creating community programs to better her life and the lives of others from Suriname.
“In Suriname we believe the message with the mouth is faster. It's, believe me, it's faster. I open a radio in Amsterdam to make the city better. That mean people that look like me, they can have all the information they need to know. It can touch the people because it is a bit different.”
Urmy is proud of the work she has done in the Netherlands and the beneftis it has brought. But she feels her time in the Netherlands is coming to an end. Her heart has always lived in Suriname.
“Surinam is my home, and Netherlands is my house. I want to return so fast I can. I'm telling you, I have enough. I have to go back home in Suriname to give all the things that I learned here from the house I live in. And believe me, it's a package of good things.