Name: Mohammed Azam
I am married and have 4 Children grown-up. I enjoy sport and like old period dramas, Western and Sci-fi films also TV comedy programmes.
I started out as volunteer many years ago to get environmental issues improved on my own street and around my local area. Knocking on neighbours doors to get them to come-out and get them talking & involved; helping each other to improve their own part of their street, motivating them to take-up ownership of their place where they lived.
I enjoyed my time so much, working with my neighbours & the Community in my area; I went on and joined a local Community Centre, still as a volunteer. This is where I developed my experiences and personal skills in outreach and development work in the community. I started co-ordinating projects and went on to manage programmes across the city in networking, partnerships and good practices for hard to reach communities and their concerns & issues. I worked on environmental partnership work schemes. Developed and supported local groups. Training programmes. Whatever happens in our community, we can collectively bring about changes and thus improvement to our lives.
This all started because I and my neighbour wanted to keep our open-areas and street clean.
Name: Shirley Evans
I have recently retired after 46 years working in a Government service for the Department of Work and Pensions and I am separated from my husband.
I have two sons Andrew (Andres) 35 and Jon (Juan) 25. I also have two grandchildren still living although unfortunately had a third who died at ten weeks. My grandchildren are called Jamie (14) and Kayleigh (12).
I have been a Governor at a local school for 14 years and have enjoyed my time doing this.
I do voluntary work at a local tourist attraction one day per week and at BVSC each Friday. Although both placements are different I enjoy both of them very much and intend to continue with them as long as my health allows, which hopefully will be for a long time.
I read a lot, like to eat out, attend Zumba classes each week. I love to walk. I really like to travel and have been known to visit Benidorm on the Costa Blanca five times in one year. I also love to go to Florida especially with the grandchildren when I can have an amazing time, if finances allowed I would travel more.
Name: Neil Hatton
I am 40 years old and I moved to Birmingham in September last year to be with my partner. I had previously been working as a teaching assistant in Essex but decided this was not for me. Since moving to Birmingham I found myself at a bit of a loose end, so I have returned to volunteering until I figure out what to do with myself.
I say returned because before I was a teaching assistant I worked on a variety of different projects around the world, including a stint in Peru where I learnt to speak Spanish. As this was almost fifteen years ago my Spanish has somewhat degraded and now get by on what I call Spanglish.
In my spare time I like to fence at a competitive level, I was also competing in Ironman competitions until a rather nasty ankle injury put me out of training. I am huge fan of Star Trek and love Sci-fi and also enjoy computer games (so a bit of a geek:).
For photos of our lovely mugs please visit Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Si-Senior-Senior-Volunteering/447979978581421?ref=hl
