In 1998, social-studies student Sylvia Sham found her calling taped to a takeaway shop window in Manchester's Chinatown.
'I saw a notice from Wai Yin Chinese Women Society [advertising] for a project manager,' she says.
The then 10-year-old charity had just three full-time staff and although a three-year British National Lottery grant received in 1997 had allowed the organisation to better identify the needs of the community, it was a long way from meeting demand.
'I thought it was a good opportunity for me,' Sham says, 'as a Hong Kong Chinese, to use the knowledge I had acquired in England to give back to the Chinese community.'
Sham grew up poor with her parents, seven sisters and one brother in Kowloon. She says the confidence to leave Hong Kong (she is the only one in her family who has) in search of a better life grew from her role as a Girl Guides leader while in primary and secondary school, after which she worked hard to save up for a ticket and an education in Britain.
In 1986, when Sham arrived at the University of Manchester as a mature student, she knew immediately that 'I preferred life in England to Hong Kong. When I finished my first degree, I wrote to different universities to try and get research grants to stay.'
This led to a full scholarship for a PhD at Manchester Metropolitan University, although she did not lose sight of her roots; the theses focus for both her degrees was the Chinese community in the northern English city.
