Somali Communities

[Chimera]

DUBAI

 

The largest African community in Dubai is the Somalis, driven out of their home by years of unrest.

 

Somali businesses line the streets of the city centre, Deira; internet cafes, hotels, coffee shops, restaurant and import-export businesses are testimony to the Somalis' entrepreneurial spirit.

 

Star African Air is one of three Somali-owned airlines which have headquarters in Dubai rather than in Somalia.

 

 

The Somalis seem to have cornered this niche market for West African jewellery: half a dozen of them are doing brisk business here. "My customers come from Senegal, Mali, Ghana, The Gambia, and from the east of Africa as well," says shop owner Farhia Islow Adam

 

 

Dubai's proximity, economic climate and infrastructure has served Somali business well. The Somali Business Council in Dubai has a membership of about 200 companies. (Unofficial numbers could be much higher, though.)

 

 

Dubai 12 May. 06 ( Sh.M.Network) Many Somalis including educated people, businessmen and professionals have been pouring into UAE, particular in Dubai, Somali professors teach at the biggest universities in the Arab country.

 

 

Also in other settlements in UAE there were in creasing numbers of Somali families shifted from Europe, Australia and north America and see the UAE as an Islamic country and at the same time as a country that had a long relationship with Somalia and had more considerations to Somali society.

 

[RendezVous]

Second degree adverts..

 

Why don't you pay for proper advertising materials..employ Northerner and me to do some proper research for you..

 

Northerner: Our Territory

[Chimera]

 

TWIN-CITIES

 

Located in the Twin Cities are the unique marketplaces known as “Somali-Malls”. These large indoor spaces, often containing a few dozen individual businesses each, consist of a network of seemingly random yet intriguing causeways that wind through overflowing fabric, jewelry, and coffee shops. The markets are abundant in life and activity, usually house a central mosque, and also contain space for the offices of many Somali-owned sole-proprietorships and businesses.

 

the Somali refugees in Minneapolis, one of a twin cities in Minnesota State (the other is St. Paul), made an unprecedented economic miracle and added colour and extravaganza on the sleepy neighbourhoods.

 

An estimated 20,000 Somali refugees ended up in the US State of "10,000 Lakes" some 10 years ago with only their clothes on their backs. Today the city of Minneapolis is galore with hundreds of Somali owned and operated colourful stalls inside several malls that offer everything from Halaal meat to stylish leather shoes to men's and women's latest fashion, gold jewelry, money transfer or Xawaala offices, banners advertising the latest Somali movie, video stores fully stocked with nostalgic love songs not found in the mainstream supermarkets, groceries and boutiques.

 

Evidently, the Somali community is hungry for movies with familiar contexts and characters. These movies does not, however, reach the screens of other Somali communities in the US and Canada due to distribution bottleneck. Several bilingual newspapers and radio stations, including SOMTV and MAYTV, inform, educate and entertain the Community on hourly basis. SOMTV, however, exhibits as the most watched channel in the twin cities.

"We're doing our very best to be objective and at the same time invite our audience to send us their own versions on controversial issues," Mohamed Hussein "Shino", Assistant Director and Producer of SOMTV told me during an interview. The East African TV is another choice for Somali and other African viewers in the city.

 

One of the interesting aspects is that the scenario could instantly transports you back to peace time Mogadishu, half a world away.

 

Walking through the thriving malls, and past well-tended houses isn't a lot different than walking along the narrow streets of Bakaaraha and Sinai open air markets in Mogadishu

 

"They arrived here without a single penny in their pockets, and immediately started everything from scratch," said Yoseph Budle, former Editor of Juba Weekly newspaper, and a man who has gone through the mills of the knotty Somali media in North America. His resourceful data of the Community lifestyle is amazing, and I was privileged to know him. Mr. Budle now runs his own Juba Enterprises, a travel and insurance agency and doubles as the Director of Somali Intellectual League with the motto "TO EMPOWER THE MIND."

 

While stalls selling all kinds of merchandises are still dotted all over the well-appointed meandering malls, they include a mix of coffee shops; restaurants video stores and money transfer offices.

 

"I want to get lost in the crowded Somali malls saturated with small colourful stalls," says a young shopper who was brought to America by his parents when he was still a toddler, and prefers to express himself in a mixer of English and flawed Somali. He is wearing the ghastly oversized pant and a huge chain around his neck, in imitation of the mainstream youths in America.

 

 

Mainstream Americans and law enforcement agencies seemed to be taking the hubbub and sometimes ear-splitting Somali music emanating from video stores in stride and most neighbours are now in buoyant mood, saying the rhythm of the Somali love songs helps them take their afternoon nap!

 

 

"It's floodgate effect," a white taxi driver said, referring to the Somali business acumen. "I'm surprised by the inventiveness of the Somali people without bank loans or business degrees," he added. Yet, the Somali malls rarely attract the widespread spotlight enjoyed by what is dubbed as The Biggest Mall in America in the city.

 

 

In an effort to ease the city's unemployment problem, many of the Somali business people create jobs and boost state revenue. Those who are not running their own businesses are driving taxis or are employed by private companies or are in the civil service. Others opened their own neighbourhood groceries outside the congested malls where customers include non-Somalis.

 

 

"They're law abiding tax paying citizens with an almost clean criminal records," said Omar Jamal of the Somali Advocacy Center

 

 

Their kids are doing well in schools, colleges and even universities and have even introduced football (soccer in North America), a game that's not popular in North America. The Somali women are better in the business world as most of them have gone through hell and high water before landing on these shores, penniless. Most of the stalls are owned and operated exclusively by women.

 

"I love the passion of competition," said a middle-aged woman who hails from Kismayu. Just like their male counterparts they are motivated, creative and risk-takers who can survive in a cutthroat competition, where money generating and "can do" are the catch phrases. And at the end of each answer to a question they utter the famous word "Inshallah" (God Willing).

 

They upped the ante in business acumen without business degrees or schooling. According to Vice-President-in-waiting, John Edwards, "In America everything is possible."

 

[Chimera]

 

Somali Community in Japan

[Chimera]

Originally posted by RendezVous:

Second degree adverts..

 

Why don't you pay for proper advertising materials..employ Northerner and me to do some proper research for you..

 

Northerner: Our Territory

loool aight your on my payroll

 

can you do some research on the somali community in Japan?

[man_in_malaysia]

can you do some research on the somali community in Japan?

 

man i can do that i been there last three weeks...

[man_in_malaysia]

man u are informative i also saw ur other threads.. why dont try to make programme on all those INFO u collected so far..u can make money on all these stuffs u have ...try to be social entrepreuner......

[TenaciousSoul]

R u kidding me with somali community in Japan? lol

[rudy-Diiriye]

i know a few in japan...how do u say kamakize in af somali...! sushi cunay..!

[me]

I will be suprised if you can find a Somali community in ICeland, Greenland or Tahiti.

 

The rest we have had it.

 

I know of a Somali community in Brazil, Cuba & China. I also know of Somalis in Tajikistan.

 

Dave would you liek to ahve pictures of all communities or just the communities you didn´t expect they existed.

[Chimera]

man in malaysia i would appreciate it if you spied on our peeps in Japan lol and took some pictures of them

 

Me actually both!

 

the thing is a lot of chinese fled China because of political instability in China during Mao and before him and they started succesfull communities in the diaspora

 

there were allready chinese communities before but nothing compared to today

 

you have 60 million chinese in the diaspora who's GDP is estimated to be 1.5 trillion $

 

they know this because they kept track of all these chinatowns around the world

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinatown

 

and because of this CNN or BBC or whatever media outlet out there in the world can never paint a bad image of the chinese communities

 

the creation of a Somali merchant diaspora

 

Ethan Zuckerman has written a fascinating essay on expatriate Somalis who are investing in the country, either by returning home to start businesses or by opening Somali branches of foreign-based enterprises. The investment is apparently driven both by expanding economies in the Somaliland and Puntland enclaves and the perception that stability may be returning to southern Somalia. This favorable climate may or may not persist in the short term; for every positive sign of ports being reopened and piracy being suppressed, there are signals that the region may descend into another round of warfare. What this means over the longer term, however, is that the Somalis have become one of the world's newest merchant diasporas, and this could ultimately have a profound effect on the economy and politics of the homeland.

 

To be sure, the Somali diaspora is hardly a new phenomenon. The history of Somali migration extends more than a century and has its roots in precolonial nomadism. Nevertheless, it can be divided into three distinct periods, with the most recent period less than twenty years old. During colonial times, when Somalia was divided between British and Italian control, Somalis emigrated to the metropole either as students or as laborers. Beginning in the 1950s and continuing through the first two decades of independence, there was considerable Somali migration to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, with the immigrants initially arriving as oil workers and following the same path of social mobility as the south Asians. Most recently, beginning with the onset of civil war at the end of the 1980s, Somalis have left their country as refugees.

 

It is the last of these periods that has turned the Somali diaspora into one of the world's great transnational communities. Unlike the relatively small number of Somalis who participated in the first two periods of emigration, the war refugees number more than half a million. During the past twenty years, they have fanned out along three main migration routes: west to Europe and the United States, north to the Persian Gulf and southward to South Africa. The first two of these routes terminate in established Somali communities, with much of the migration going to the United Kingdom, Italy and the United Arab Emirates, but the third has opened up new frontiers for expatriate Somalis. Also, many emigrants never reach the end of the line; the vagaries of poverty, transportation and hostile immigration authorities cause many who take the western route to finish their journeys in Egypt and Libya, while those who take the northern route fetch up in Yemen and those who migrate south often settle in Kenya and elsewhere along the east African coast.

 

These refugee communities are far-flung, but they share certain characteristics, and one of the common threads is a growing presence in business. This trend is most pronounced in Dubai, where Somalis are the largest African community and where an established population has existed for two generations. Thanks to this well-settled community and a favorable business climate, Dubai has drawn many refugees who were businessmen in Somalia and who were able to get away with some of their money and business connections. The Somalis have established a significant presence in the retail, hotel and import-export sectors, and their economic success has in turn established Dubai as the center of global Somali commerce. The Somali Business Council is based in Dubai, as are a number of large companies with satellite businesses in Somalia itself.

 

The other Somali refugee populations haven't prospered to quite the same extent as those in the UAE, but they have also found niches in commerce, often starting businesses to supplement meager or nonexistent refugee allowances. Mulki al-Sharmani's study of Somali refugees in Egypt, for example, found that many Somalis had established small retail and service businesses, primarily aimed at a Somali immigrant market. In South Africa, which has a Somali population estimated at more than 7000, Somalis have settled in Western Cape province and become known for operating "tuckshops" or convenience stores. These represent two of the early stages in the development of merchant diasporas; like most such communities, first-generation Somali expatriates typically begin by selling to members of their own ethnic group and progress to small general-market businesses.

 

Commercial success, of course, has its own hazards. Merchant minorities, especially foreign ones, tend to be resented by the local population, and the newest and least-established merchant minorities are often the most vulnerable to stereotyping and violence. In South Africa, 26 Somali merchants have been murdered in the past month, and the local Somali business community believes that its members are being targeted for racial reasons. There have also been reports of "meetings held by business owners... to plan the removal of Somalis from their townships," and although many officials (and the ANC) have condemned the killings, others blame them on "the uncontrolled access that migrants from the rest of Africa have in South Africa." As the Somalis establish themselves, develop local political connections and progress to more lucrative areas of business, they will likely become more secure, but at present their concentration in marginal businesses in economically depressed neighborhoods renders them

 

However uneven the patterns of development, the fact remains that Somalis are becoming known throughout the world as businessmen, and their dispersion has enabled them to establish companies as nomadic as themselves. The Somali Telecom Group, for instance, was founded by expatriates in Rockville, Maryland, but has since moved its head office to Dubai. It initially organized most of its operations from abroad, but as it has become involved in creating a Somali telecommunications infrastructure, it has created satellite companies in Somaliland and Puntland (where there is functioning commercial law) and established ad hoc business networks in central Somalia. It's often hard to tell what makes certain cultural groups succeed in business, but in the Somalis' case, their traditional attitudes toward mobility may be part of the reason why they can establish themselves quickly in new countries and adapt to the anarchic conditions in their homeland.

 

What remains to be seen is how the growing Somali commercial diaspora will influence the future development of Somalia. Merchant diasporas don't always invest heavily in their homelands and even those that do, often stay out of local political life. Those that do involve themselves in homeland politics sometimes have a negative impact; in several countries, hard-line nationalist groups are reinforced with diaspora money and political support. Others avoid these pitfalls, though, and the Somali business community, which has become increasingly politically organized over the past three years, has a chance to make a positive impact. As members of a relatively new diaspora, the Somali expatriates retain strong ties to the homeland and might be more inclined to invest in it than second or third-generation emigrants would be. The Somali diaspora is also broadly representative of the country rather than being confined to particular ethnic or interest groups, and would hence play a less partisan role in national reconstruction. In many cases, the business community in Somalia itself has taken a leading role in mediating conflict, and if stability ever returns to the center and south of the country, the global Somali comerce created by the civil war may ironically play a part in the reconstruction.

[Caano Geel]

^ dude, very interesting, but please reference your posts. It would be useful to follow up and verify the information.

thanks

[me]

Pictures of the Somali community in Holland. There used to be up to 40.000 Somalis in Holland, but many of the nomads moved to the UK, now there are about 10.000 Somalis in Holland. (Source pictures http://www.nedsom.com )www.nedsom.nl )

 

 

 

 

 

[Chimera]

caano geel

 

source1

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[Chimera]

me nice pictures

 

thanks!