"Australia is the multicultural country," says Sophea Chea, the founder of Angkor Flowers and Crafts, a beginner's floristry class for refugee and immigrant women in western Sydney's Cabramatta.

Part of the beauty of living here, she says, is being among a diverse group of people.

Fifteen women from a range of countries — Peru, Iran, Iraq, Chad, Cambodia, Laos, and others — sit in rows of desks in the little Angkor studio, smiling in their uniform aprons. Bright bunches of flowers cover the table tops in front of them.

They say hello to me and chat amongst themselves while they wait for the lesson to start.

"They're facing very similar issues," Ms Chea tells me.

"They have different skin colours but the barriers are similar."

Angkor Flowers is a social enterprise — a for-profit business which reinvests its revenue in a social mission — Ms Chea set up in 2014 to address some of the challenges many migrant women face after coming to Australia.

Women participate in a beginners' floristry class at Angkor Flowers in Cabramatta, in Sydney's west. ( Supplied: Angkor Flowers )

At a time when immigrants are routinely attacked by politicians, where 457 working visas are framed by Opposition Leader Bill Shorten as foreigners "taking the jobs" of locals, and where, according to recent polling, migrants face pervasive discrimination, Angkor is a program determined to show that migrant women are flourishing in Australia.

Using a cross-cultural symbol of beauty and a natural spirit-lifter — flowers — it aims to give women the confidence and skills they need to contribute to and belong in their local community.

'I didn't understand what anyone was saying'

Ms Chea is a migrant herself, originally from Cambodia, and she's seen some of the hardships of adjustment in others as part of her resettlement work in the social sector. The main problems, she says, are the women's poor English and lack of job readiness.

"In our countries, a lot of women [are] pressured to be mothers and homemakers and to not pursue professional careers," she says.

"So when they come here, they have limited opportunity to work."

When Ms Chea first came to Australia, she says, it took a long time to get used to life here. "Even though I was educated (Ms Chea has an MBA from Western Sydney University), I didn't understand what anyone was saying."

Ms Chea says she felt subtle discrimination when she first arrived in Australia. ( Pexels: Kristina Paukshtite )

When Angkor began, it worked only with migrants from South-East Asia. But today, the program has been opened up further; this is the first class where migrant women from all national backgrounds are welcome.

The diversity in the room is a testament to Angkor's success.

It keeps growing in scope as a result of financial support from Fairfield Council, and the School for Social Entrepreneurs (Angkor received a $10,000 grant from the Macquarie Group Foundation late last year), as well as from the profit-generating online flower delivery arm of Ms Chea's business.

But this year also marks a new commitment for Ms Chea.

"We want to reach as many communities as possible," she says.

Australia's preoccupation with migrant 'integration'

Australians are accustomed to thinking about how migrants fit in with the community.

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton's recent condemnation of Australia's policy to accept Lebanese migrants settle here in the 1970s is an extreme example of this preoccupation with integration.

"If we feel there are problems with particular cohorts, particular nationalities, particular people who might not be integrating well and not contributing well," Mr Dutton said last month, "then there are many other worthy recipients [of residency]".

Mr Dutton's comments invalidated the contributions of Lebanese-Australians. And further, his assumption that there is a monolithic Australian "culture" that migrant groups must adhere to is plainly untrue.

The most recent census data show that a quarter of Australians were born overseas and over 43 per cent have at least one parent who was born overseas. When you integrate into Australian life, you're integrating with migrants.

Sorry, this video has expired Peter Dutton suggests the Fraser government made mistake by resettling Lebanese refugees

Still, Australia does a mixed job at embracing multiculturalism. According to the most recent annual Scanlon report on social cohesion, 91 per cent of Australians feel like they belong here and 83 per cent believe multiculturalism makes the nation stronger.

Yet one in five non-Anglo Australians who were born overseas reported experiencing discrimination during 2016.

Ms Chea says she felt subtle discrimination when she first arrived in Australia.

People she met during her studies and in her professional life treated her differently, which she believes was because her English wasn't perfect.

"Many other migrants and refugees feel the heat of discrimination in some way," she says.

Of course, discrimination is a problem for everyone

A research paper from the Economics and Econometrics Research Institute published earlier this year found that the costs of investing in refugee integration programs such as Angkor Flowers are more than recovered in the long-term as refugees join and expand the labour market.

Indeed, most of the women who have participated in the Angkor program in the past two years have gone on to the advanced program, where they can learn more sophisticated skills and gain trainee work as part of Angkor's online business.

'In our countries, a lot of women are pressured to be mothers and homemakers and to not pursue professional careers,' says Angkor Flowers founder Sophea Chea. ( Supplied: Angkor Flowers )

As part of the continuing course, Christine Huynh, who is originally from Vietnam and started at Angkor last year after seeing Ms Chea and other recruiters at the local school, has learned business management fundamentals and is planning to start her own floristry business.

"I don't know how good I am [at floristry]," Ms Huynh laughs.

"No, I'm being too humble. I really want to do something in this field. For me, it opens up an opportunity for more work now that my kid is an adult."

When Huynh began at Angkor, she was also grieving the loss of her father.

"This course gave me what I needed," she says. "The sense of belonging and the three worry-free hours per week has helped me deal with [my grief]."

The emotional impact of flowers

Interestingly, Ms Chea does not have a background in floristry herself.

"Why flowers?" I ask her.

"It's about the emotional impact," she says, without skipping a beat.

"For a lot of women, flowers play an important role in our lives. What I want them to feel is happiness and joy. I want to use flowers as a tool."

It turns out she might be on to something: research shows flowers are powerful "positive emotion inducers" in men and women.

In one study, published in the journal Evolutionary Psychology in 2005, women who received flowers reported more positive moods three days later.

Studies have shown receiving flowers can have a positive impact on women's mood. ( Unsplash.com )

And as Stephen L Buchmann, an adjunct professor of entomology and evolutionary biology at the University of Arizona, points out in his book, The Reason For Flowers, flowers have almost universal appeal, and have done for thousands of years.

"The floral beauty has beguiled us, along with the birds and the bees," he told NPR last year.

"Every culture that I researched has a love for flowers."

Not every woman in the class today will become a florist or business owner, and that's okay. Angkor aims to build a range of skills — especially English language skills — which are useful in a range of industries.

While in attendance, the women also have access to child care and the opportunity to forge friendships with others facing similar challenges as them.

"You're not intimidated," says Ms Huynh. "You're with immigrant women and you feel like you're one of them. We bring in food from our cultures to share."

Everyone has something to gain from this environment, adds Ms Chea.

"It makes them feel like they can do something. That confidence is a really important starting point," she says.

"They see that, because they can start this project, they can start other projects."