Finding Home in Glasgow: Yusuf’s Story

Yusuf came to Glasgow from Mogadishu in 2019 with two suitcases, a phone with a cracked screen, and the address of a temporary flat in Govanhill scrawled on a piece of paper. He was 24 years old. He knew no one.

“The first Friday,” he recalls, “I asked a man outside Asda where the nearest masjid was. He walked me there himself. He didn’t have to do that. I never forgot it.”

That masjid was Al-Rahmah.

A Stranger Who Became a Neighbour

Yusuf’s first weeks in Glasgow were disorienting in ways that are difficult to explain to someone who has never had to start completely over. Simple things — navigating the bus routes, finding halal meat, understanding a Scottish accent — required enormous energy. The cold was unlike anything he had experienced. The days in January were so short he sometimes felt the sun had forgotten Glasgow entirely.

But Jumu’ah was Jumu’ah. Whatever else was uncertain, that was not. Every Friday he made his way to Al-Rahmah, and every Friday someone shook his hand, asked his name, asked where he was from. Within a month, he had been invited to three different homes for dinner.

“In Somalia, this is normal — you feed a guest, you ask about their family, you make them feel they matter. I didn’t expect to find that here. But I did.”

Building a Life

Five years on, Yusuf works as a support worker with young people in the South Side. He volunteers at Al-Rahmah’s newcomers’ programme on Wednesday evenings, helping newly arrived Somali and East African families navigate the same early weeks he once found so overwhelming.

“I know what it feels like to not know anyone. I know what it feels like to break your fast alone. So now I make sure other people don’t have to.”

He laughs when asked whether Glasgow ever started to feel like home. “It took about one winter,” he says. “After that, I stopped minding the rain.”

Share Your Story

Glasgow’s Muslim community is made up of hundreds of journeys — from across Scotland, the UK, and the world. If you have a story you’d like to share, we’d love to hear from you.