There are many negative stories that find their way into the press about immigrants coming to the UK and living off the state. Not always headlining are those that come here, work hard and become a valuable part of society. Kosta Kolimechkov, an osteopath, is one of those who arrived in London from Bulgaria many years ago and built up his own successful business
Kosta Kolimechov is proud of the fact that, as an immigrant, he has supported himself since he came to London aged 23. He has never taken benefits and he has never ‘taken a job from someone else’. In fact, he has created his own successful therapy practise offering osteopathy, physio and chiropractic in Richmond.
As a young man in Bulgaria Kosta excelled at rowing, training hard in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria.
‘Unlike the UK, there were no grants or loans to cover training, so I worked two jobs to be able to continue my passion.’ One of those jobs was as a personal trainer and led Kosta to meeting the man who would help to change his life. ‘This client was rather over-weight and I gave him the hardest training sessions I could to work on his abdominals. It got results and he offered to pay for my ticket to England so I could take part in the World Championships in 2006 at Dorney Lake [near Windsor]. While he paid for my ticket what he really gave me was hope. He believed in me.’ And why England? ‘The weather is great for rowers – it’s never too hot and unlike in Sofia, the rivers don’t freeze over in winter!’
Kosta only knew three words when he came to England – please and thank you.
‘Before I arrived I thought I had a job lined up to support me during rowing training, as a self-employed PT with a personal training company in Hyde Park, but they decided my English wasn’t good enough.’
Devastated but undeterred, Kosta found a place to stay in Fulham. He arrived on the doorstep with two suitcases and his limited English, only to find that the room wasn’t available for two weeks – and he had nowhere else to go. The landlady gave him the address of a hostel. Worried about losing all his possessions, Kosta asked her if he could leave his cases there for the two weeks. ‘She agreed, but as I turned to go, she offered to let me sleep on her sitting room floor until the room was available. Andrea became my second mother, helping me with my English and introducing me to her friends. Those friends became my clients as a personal trainer. I wasn’t making much money, but it was enough to pay the rent.’
It was a chance meeting with an osteopath that led Kosta to train at the British School of Osteopathy. He visited the then renowned osteopath, the late John Prescott, to help strengthen his back muscles for rowing – ‘I hadn’t even heard of osteopathy before I met him.’ Kosta was so astounded by how much his back improved, he decided to train as an osteopath himself, encouraged by John who became his mentor. As Kosta already had a Masters in Sports Science from Bulgaria, he wasn’t eligible for any grants, so he spent every day working as a PT, rowing competitively and studying for his degree, cycling 10 miles each way to the College of Osteopathy and graduated in 2014.
And while he has never quite given up on his dream of being an Olympic rower, he now runs his own osteopathy business, Manual Therapy, in Richmond.
‘I will always be an immigrant. It doesn’t matter how much money I have, how many degrees, how much work I provide with my business, I will always be a foreigner here. But I’m OK with that. I wouldn’t be here without the goodness of the people I met along the way. Each one of them gave me hope.’
Find out more about Kosta and his work as an osteopath: Manual Therapy London
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