On 27 July 2015 Imad Alarnab realised he was out of options. He had to flee Syria. And so he left his whole life behind. That day.
A successful entrepreneur and chef with three restaurants, a chain of juice bars and a handful of coffee shops in his home city of Damascus, Alarnab had to leave everything he had spent years building up: his business, his home and his family.
He arrived in the UK 16 months ago and last month, pop-up start-up Appear Here joined forces with London-based catering company The Hampstead Kitchen to give Alarnab space to showcase his culinary skills with a two-week pop-up restaurant.
The Appear Here team used its property listing site to find a converted first-floor flat on east London’s famous Columbia Road, E2, listed by a private landlord. They covered the costs of fitting out the space and the £230-a-day rent for the duration of the pop-up while the Hampstead Kitchen covered the cost of the food.
The Appear Here team is now working with landlords and investors to secure space to expand the Syrian Kitchen concept.
In a week that has seen Syria suffer some of the most horrific atrocities in recent memory, Alarnab’s story is a small ray of hope emerging from the terror. “I remember that date so clearly,” Alarnab says of his departure. “I knew I had to leave that night. And so I did. And I didn’t know what was going to happen.”
Seeking a sanctuary
With no idea what sort of route he could take to reach sanctuary, or whether he would even make it out of Syria alive, he knew it wasn’t safe to bring his wife and three daughters. “It was too dangerous,” he said. “Climbing under trucks and hanging on for hours? I had heard about these things happening, of course. But I had never done it myself. I didn’t know what I was doing. My only choice was to go ahead and send for them if I made it somewhere safely.”
Alarnab describes his 64-day journey from Damascus to London as “not easy at all”. One can only imagine this is something of an understatement as he tells the whole tale, which involves dodging armed border controls, travelling across ten different countries including nine hours in the back of a car boot with seven other refugees and clambering under huge articulated lorries as a last-ditch attempt to get out of Calais.
But he made it. He arrived here in the UK 16 months ago, sent for his family and got a job as a secondhand car salesman. And then, by chance, he met Appear Here’s founder and chief executive Ross Bailey, who visited the refugee camps in Calais last year. “I met Ross through friends and I invited him over for dinner. I cooked for him and he asked me what I was dreaming of. That’s when I told him about the small, cosy, Syrian restaurant. He called me up the next week and said, ‘What are you doing on March 9th?’ And that was it.”
Space to cook
With support from Unicef and Appear Here, Alarnab was given a space to cook and serve his food on Columbia Road for two weeks. A tiny doorway back-lit by a rickety, candle-lined wooden staircase is the only sign of activity from the outside. But up those stairs and round a corner, a first-floor flat – stripped back and comprising an open-plan kitchen and single-table dining space – became the temporary home of Imad’s Syrian Kitchen. It was a sell-out within 24 hours.
Alice Ratcliffe, head of marketing at Appear Here, said: “We’re looking for future space. Ideally it needs to be somewhere with A3 and a high lunchtime footfall. Imad wants to focus on falafel for the next one, doing a buffet/wrap bar. These spaces are never easy to come by in London, so we’ve got our eyes peeled.”
For Bailey, finding Alarnab the space was a no-brainer. He says: “When we started Appear Here, our mission was to find anyone with a great idea the space to make it happen. And Imad fits that mission. To us it wasn’t about London being a place of refuge. It was about how we can make London and the UK his new home.”
“This pop-up was just the first step for Imad and we’re already on the hunt for his next pop-up space. This is a well-trodden path for entrepreneurs in London, looking to build their business from scratch. If the success of his first venture is anything to go by, I imagine it won’t be long before Imad is able to do something longer term.”
As for Alarnab, he remains overwhelmed by the support both from those here in the UK and from people he met on his journey.
“People have been generous and trusting in a way that I am not sure I would have been before if I was in their situation,” he says. “People who didn’t know me let me stay in their homes on my journey here. Would I have done that for a man I had never met? I don’t know. But I am so grateful…Honestly I just wanted to build a new life for my daughters where they could feel safe, go to school and build their own future.”
Listen: Imad Alarnab finding the space to start again
To send feedback, e-mail emily.wright@egi.co.uk or tweet @EmilyW_9 or @estatesgazette
