Connecting Through Storytelling. Changing Lives Through Stories. Training Disability Support Workers.
The Home of The Untold Stories.
Why Is Intercultural Storytelling Different From Other CALD Services?
Intercultural Storytelling is different from other Services because we use the power of personal narratives to build understanding and community between people from diverse backgrounds and those in the wider community, going beyond traditional support and or education services. We use writing, art, music, performance, and storytelling to share unique lived experiences, fostering empathy and community connection in a more personal way. We do not only help people tell their stories or train disability support workers, but we also address issues like stigma and shame around disability and mental health, language and communication barriers, and cultural bias and stereotypes by creating an environment where people living with disability and those without disability can openly and safely share their experiences and cultural practices without the fear of being judged.
We use storytelling approach when training disability support workers to equip them with necessary skills needed to provide high quality care and support services to people living with disability including those from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds and refugee migrants with disability, to foster greater cultural competence and inclusion, and to enable support workers to become interculturally competent in their support role. Our training and workshop content is curated, designed and delivered in English, from first-hand lived disability experience and from CALD background perspective.
Our Founder and Managing Director, Esther Simbi has 20 years’ experience in the disability area, education and community services, and over 30 years of lived disability experience. We provide diverse services to people living with disability and those without disability under one roof.
Since 2023, Intercultural Storytelling has been creating an environment where people living with disability and those without disability can come together to connect with the community through storytelling in many forms, including singing, dancing, writing, painting, drawing, and through video and podcast.
We provide Consultation Services including writing, mentoring, NDIS Tribunal Advocacy, and job coach.
We provide services to every Australian with or without disability but with a special focus on CALD Communities, and the less privileged in society.
Here at Intercultural Storytelling, we believe that everybody has a story to tell and we are here to show them how.
Our Mission
Our mission is to ensure that people living with disability and those without disability from CALD backgrounds and from the wider community feel empowered to connect with the community and to express themselves through telling stories in many forms. We believe that everybody has a story to tell, and we are here to show them how. To also ensure that support workers are properly trained to better understand their role as support workers, to provide High Quality Care and Support Services to people living with disability including those from CALD Backgrounds and refugee migrants with disability, and for support workers to become interculturally competent in their support role.
Our Vision
Our Vision is to provide a welcoming, friendly, fair, equitable, and inclusive environment where people living with disability and those without disability and their families, carers, and communities including those from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) Backgrounds can feel welcomed, understood, included, valued, supported, celebrated, can feel that they belong, can feel that they have a voice, for their voice to be heard, and for them to reach their full potential.
Books
My first book, Beyond Calamity is an Award-winning book and it was published in 2019. My second book, Blessed was published in 2020. Please visit our shop below for more information on how to purchase my books.
To me, writing didn’t come automatically but I have had to work hard to make sure that what I have written down sounds right and it makes sense. Writing a book in English as a second language meant that I had to read out loud in a quiet place so many times to connect what I was reading to what I was hearing, from my mouth to my ears.
Sometimes, I have had to rewrite a sentence or a paragraph so many times for it to sound better. When I am sitting in my small writing room, ideas and words come as I write but then I realise that because I am writing about my life journey, where there are a lot of raw emotions involved, I feel like I have been taken back, and I am reliving the situation all over again.
Shop
Beyond Calamity (Award-Winning Book)
My Journey from Disability and Disaster to Possibility and Empowerment
From writing sums in the dirt with my finger at a poor village school in South Sudan, I, Esther Simbi rose above disability to become a Social Worker and Disability & Human Rights Advocate, an entrepreneur, and a Support Worker Trainer in Australia.
Giving voice to the voiceless is my passion. I believe that disability is not inability, age is just a number, and 'refugee’ is just a label.
From contracting polio at age four and surviving that, through nineteen years in refugee camps in Uganda, migrating to Australia in 2005, I started writing 'Beyond Calamity' in 2010 and was published in March 2019.
I hope my stories of life in South Sudan and as a refugee will move, shock but also inspire you.
Blessed
The follow-up to Beyond Calamity, my second book continues the story of my life journey as a woman and as a single mother with a disability from a refugee background living in Australia.
Contracting polio at the age of four, as a child I escaped the Sudan civil war and spent almost two decades in refugee camps in Uganda before being resettled in the suburbs of Adelaide. In this book, I write about the dangers and hardships for women in the refugee camps, finding my feet in a new country, navigating family and relationships, living with post-polio syndrome, the grief of losing a child, and raising two daughters while juggling work, studies, writing and political aspirations.
I give a frank account of relationships, racism, financial insecurity, the stigma of having and living with a physical disability and being a single mother, and the practical aspects of day-to-day life, like budgeting, preparing meals and getting around.
Book Signing
Check our events calendar for more information about our book signing and community connections events where Esther Simbi might be speaking at.
Book Clubs
Join our book clubs.
Writing Workshops
Check our events calendar for more information about our writing workshops.
Drumming Workshops
Music Therapy
Storytelling
Public Speaking Coaching
Leadership and Mentoring
Celebrating People with Disability
Community Connections, Engagement, and Participation
Networking Events
Individual Support in Disability Training
Intercultural Competency Training
Stigma and Shame Training
Disability Community Education
Ethiopian Coffee Ceremonies
Consulting Services
NDIS Tribunal Advocacy
Event Planning
Esther Simbi's Story
Meet our Founder and Managing Director, Esther Simbi
Hello,
My name is Esther Simbi, and I am a former South Sudanese refugee. I am no longer a refugee, but I identify myself as a migrant with a disability from a refugee background. I came to Australia in July 2005 after spending 19 years in three different refugee camps in Uganda. I am the youngest of six children from a humble background, the first one in my family with a university degree, and a single mother of two beautiful daughters. I live well with a physical disability, and I have been the Face of NDIS for CALD communities since 2021. I am a polio survivor, and I now live well with the late effects of polio. I am a social worker, a mediator, an award-winning author, a motivational speaker, a cultural awareness/cultural competence trainer, a disability support worker trainer, a disability community educator, a disability and human rights advocate, events manager, organiser, and coordinator, entrepreneur, Executive Board Member of Amicus Global, a member of the Rotary Club of Campbell Town, a current Annual Gold Member of SOL Results, and I am also a part of the SOL Results Platinum Coaching Program.
With 19 years’ experience and over 30 years of lived experience of disability, Esther writes about Living Well with Disability, and she now shares her experience to help others tell their own personal stories of live and resilience. Because she beliefs that everyone has a story to tell.
For the past 19 years, I have been tirelessly and selflessly raising disability awareness and educating the community in Australia and globally through speaking at many government and non-government events including community events, online and in person about Disability Inclusion and Promoting Diversity in the Workplace, Cultural Competency, Inclusive Leadership, Inclusive Hiring, and Inclusive Workplace Culture.
If I am not working or writing, I am watching a good African romantic and or Christian movie, catching up with friends, spending time with family, attending or speaking at community events or listening to Gospel Music.
I chose to tell my story in the form of books to raise awareness on disability and the types of disability, stigma, and shame, living with a disability, living well with a disability, and parenting with a disability, as well as refugee issues. I want people to know that disability is not inability and that even if they have a disability, they can still live a successful life whatever that looks like for them and that no matter how hard things get in life and no matter how dark the world around us gets, there is always light at the end of the tunnel if we don’t give up in the middle of the tunnel.
Why Choose Us
You should definitely choose us because we are unique in the way we create an inclusive environment from first hand lived experience where people living with disability and those without disability from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) Backgrounds and those from the wider community can feel confident in their ability to share their experiences, and to transform their personal stories into written manuscripts, eBooks, and audio-visual content, thus promoting cultural understanding and diversity.
You should also choose us because our founder, Esther Simbi is an award-winning author with over ten years of book writing experience.
We also provide disability community education through delivering workshops and disability training and assessment, and we promote disability, intercultural, social inclusion, as well as promoting community connections, engagement and participation, and we also celebrate people living with disability through our annual intercultural disability inclusion networking events.
Our training and workshop content is curated, designed and delivered in English, from first-hand lived disability experience and form CALD background perspective.
Meet Our Team
Esther Simbi
Founder and Managing Director
Netra Dulal John
Business Manager
Do not take my words for it but please read the testimonials below.
The feedback I have received from people about my first and second book has been overwhelming and encouraging. People said that my first and second books are inspiring and powerful, not only for women but also for men and for children over ten years of age. People said that Beyond Calamity and Blessed are well written and that they were written from the heart. Others said that ‘if you read Beyond Calamity and Blessed, your life will never be the same again’, that the way you view, and approach life will change for the better.
People said that the first thing that strikes you when you see Beyond Calamity and Blessed are the beautiful, eye-catching book covers, and the unique and attention-grabbing book titles and subtitles.
Contact Us.
About us
Do you have a story to tell but you do not know where to start?
Do you have a disability support company and you would like your staff trained, but you do not know where to start?
Why not give us a call or send us an email.
How to get involved, sign up for our writing workshops and mentoring program, public speaking coaching program, support worker training sessions, workshops and classes or get in touch with us for consultation.
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