The best way to share the feelings of our Refugee Welcome volunteer mentors is to hear from them. Following are comments from a few of the UUCville folks who have been working so hard to help our sponsored Afghan family adapt through a hard transition to life in America, and in Charlottesville. [Some have been edited for length.]
I have found a renewed love for this congregation, first for your commitment to help this family with money and furnishings, and then for joining to mentor them for six months as they become acclimated to Charlottesville. What a wonderful, creative team of ten settlers [formerly called planners] and nine mentors I have joined! They are eager to help when an emergency arises, and have the skills to make such a difference. We vary from social workers to artists and IT workers, and three retirees. When one of us can’t perform a task, another steps forward. As a team, we are much greater than our parts.
–S.B.
When it comes to UU principles, the 2nd and 5th resonate most with me as relates to this project. It was compassion that compelled us to volunteer—seeing in the news last August so many flee Afghanistan as everything was falling apart and knowing we could help Afghan refugees that would be resettled within our own community.
Our task of providing support and mentoring to our sponsored family, to do it right, is complex and nuanced. We are succeeding because we are closely following our 5th principle by using a democratic process, internally as a team while we coordinate our respective efforts, and in our interactions with our sponsored family where their priorities, perspectives and points of view come first.
–K.R.
Our sponsored family is enthusiastic about our helping the families stranded at the hotels and have returned unneeded items that may be of use to them. They are also impressed by the sewing machine project. Currently the father is making the mother a new pair of pants with their sewing machine! I’m going to let the older son drive because he got his learner’s permit and we’re going shoe shopping as well as grocery shopping. It should be interesting.
–C.L.
The father was very happy to meet another Afghan family with small children [at ESL class]. The son told me that in the summer he hopes his mother can attend too. The father told me through the older son (whose English is quite good) that he will really practice English more after he passes his driver’s license test. He is practicing with his wife, and they were much better at mastering the simple words I had given them.
I gave them the Ipad my neighbor donated, loaded with two free language apps, which are marvelous for ESL learners. She got a pencil and paper and began to try to copy the alphabet as she proceeded through the writing app. You can write on the Ipad with your finger, tracing the correct strokes. She was very good at this! I believe she will be reading and writing English by the year’s end.
I showed her how to use the picture dictionary to find the words, “I drink tea” and “You drink tea.” I pointed to an image of a person driving, and asked, “Do you want to drive?” She laughed, and said she rides a bike. I learned from the older son that Afghani women are learning to drive, but afraid people will laugh at them. I asked if they were afraid to ride with a woman driver, and they laughed, “Yes!” but I think they were just kidding. I laughed too.
The family is settling in and relaxing just a bit. The mother was on the phone with their daughter in Afghanistan when I arrived, and it was a happy exchange. I learned that the older son studied computer languages and another one more common in Afghanistan. I think their success at [language learning] gives them hope that they will be able to find work and housing. It was a very good day.
–S.B.
These are just glimpses of the feelings and experiences of a few of our mentor volunteers. The work they’re all doing is from the heart, and as you can see, has truly embodied our UU principles. Our heartfelt appreciation goes to all our mentors who are selflessly navigating obstacles of language, culture, bureaucracy and even trauma, to support this family that is teaching us so much.