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Their apartment is strikingly bare, but Shikh Omar Jalal, his wife, Eman Aarabi, and their five children feel comfortable in their new home on Donald Street. They’re nestled among about 400 other Syrian refugees who have recently moved into two apartment towers just north of St. Laurent shopping centre.
They’ve made friends, and get regular news from back home. The only drawback to life on Donald Street is, they admit, it might be difficult to learn English when surrounded by Arab speakers. “No English around!” says a laughing Aarabi, whose bubbly laughter is never far from the surface.
The family has found some things difficult to figure out. The three oldest kids — Hala, 11, Eman, 9, and Jona, 5, — watched for weeks as other children hopped on a yellow bus each morning. The kids begged to go, too, but the school system remained a mystery for the family.
Like most of the refugees living on Donald, the family was brought to Canada by the federal government as part of the massive resettlement effort that moved 25,000 Syrians into the country between November and the end of February. They were housed in a downtown Ottawa hotel for a month. Settlement officers from the Catholic Centre for Immigrants helped them select an apartment and provided the furniture. The Donald Street highrises were a popular choice because the landlord set aside 150 units for Syrian refugees and offered a break on rent.
The couple was told a worker would visit to explain how to enrol the kids in school and answer any questions.
Four weeks passed.
Then Jalal met a woman in the hallway — one of a band of volunteers who have been helping refugees at the Donald Street towers. She drove the family to the Ottawa public school board reception centre for children who don’t speak English, and the kids were quickly signed up to attend school.
The settlement officer arrived at the apartment the very next day. She gave the family a folder labelled “Client Support Service Program: Empowering and Embracing Government Assisted Refugees.” Aarabi hands it over, looking puzzled by the contents. There’s a “client charter” and a page-long list of rights and responsibilities. Refugees, for example, are expected to show up to appointments on time and “remain compliant with the Resettlement Assistance Program Client Agreement.” The settlement officer must, among other things, return phone calls “within an appropriate time frame (except weekends or public holidays).”
There is also a list of services, translated into Arabic, ranging from second-hand stores and groceries to health centres. The settlement officer was polite, the couple explains through a translator, but they aren’t sure when she’ll be back.
Staff at the Catholic Centre for Immigrants are helping 1,136 Syrian refugees sponsored by the Canadian government who have arrived in town since Christmas, triple the number they usually handle in an entire year. All the refugees have now found a place to live, many on Donald.
Jalal shakes his head at the folder and laughs. He whips out his cellphone and pulls up WhatsApp, a popular instant messaging service. A volunteer has created group posts in Arabic for Syrian refugees in Ottawa. “Good!” Jalal says enthusiastically, giving the universal thumbs-up sign. He’s learned, he says, how to get a driver’s licence. It’s a key piece of information because he wants to find a job as soon as possible.
The WhatsApp posts were created by Eyas Haj-Obeid, an engineer by training who grew up in Syria but has lived in Ottawa for 17 years. It reaches about 135 refugees, he says. “They all have cellphones.”
Haj-Obeid posts things that are practical for families finding their way in a new city: Directions to a nearby Canadian Tire store that has a great sale on televisions. Information about OC Transpo’s cheap family weekend pass. The time and place for a free clinic offered by Ottawa dentists. Names of Arabic-speaking pharmacists. The fact that anyone can can get free books, and use the Internet, at the nearby library.
Such crucial information circulates quickly among the families, few of whom speak English.
Haj-Obeid is among a band of volunteers who have jumped in alongside settlement agency staff to help the refugees, supplying everything from household supplies to baby clothes. Many of the Syrian families are young, with lots of children and more on the way. Haj-Obeid knows of two babies born already, and five women who are pregnant.
Eyas Haj-Obeid is one of many volunteers who have been helping the government-sponsored Syrian refugees.
Haj-Obeid’s group, Resettlement and Family Services Samaritan and Ansar, organized in the past few months, is run by a core of half a dozen volunteers. Key among them are Tariq and Shabana Baig, who showed up at the Ottawa airport in December when the first group of Syrian refugees arrived and handed out Canadian flags and stuffed teddy bears.
The group has helped 205 families, including 75 at the Donald Street apartments. Each family got kitchen equipment, groceries, a bag of personal items, such as soap and toothpaste, and comforters to replace the thin blankets issued by the Canadian government. The group invited the refugees to welcome receptions at an Ottawa mosque, and arranged for a salesperson to explain Canadian cellphone plans.
Shabana Baig says she feels it’s her duty as a Muslim to help in the face of the largest refugee crisis since the Second World War. “Where am I standing in history? They will write it down, how we invited them, how we helped them.”
An immigrant from Pakistan, she doesn’t speak Arabic herself but is a powerhouse at collecting goods, volunteers and money. She enlisted all her “lady friends” to help, initially stashing everything from furniture to pots and pans in her basement. “I stood at the door of the mosque, asking for money when people came for prayers,” she says, laughing.
Shabana Baig, far right, was at the Ottawa airport to welcome the first large group of Syrian refugees when they arrived Dec. 29.
The refugees have now all moved from hotels to homes, but they still need a lot of help. During a visit with Jalal and his family, a couple of friends dropped by their apartment. One man wondered how he could enrol his children in school, while another, walking with a cane, said he had diabetes and needed to find a doctor.
“They keep calling me,” says Haj-Obeid, who is the only member of the volunteer group who speaks Arabic. One parent phoned about a child with a high fever, and he translated for the 911 operator. One man had a leaky ceiling and no idea who to contact to fix it. Someone else phoned him from a bank, unable to communicate with a teller about paying a bill.
Language is the main barrier for most of the newcomers, he says.
Jalal says all the Ottawans they have met have been welcoming. “As soon as (people) find out we’re from Syria, they are very kind, very happy to see us,” he says, with Haj-Obeid acting as translator.
The family has scraped by on the $1,500 a month given to them by the Canadian government. Their rent is around $1,200 including utilities. They have not had to use the nearby food bank in Gloucester, where many of the refugees have turned to feed their families.
Jalal was a prosperous jeweller in Syria, and Aarabi an elementary school teacher. After fleeing their home in Damascus when civil war broke out, the couple spent four tough years in Egypt, surviving with UN help.
Jalal wants to find work as soon as possible. He breaks into a lively argument with Haj-Obeid. “You must study English or you won’t get a good job,” scolds Haj-Obeid good-naturedly, telling Jalal the Canadian government wants him to learn English and will pay for it. “I can learn English on the job!” replies Jalal.
Many of the refugee men have that attitude, says Haj-Obeid. After spending years in camps or in squalid housing in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, unable to work much or at all, they want to start supporting their families in Canada, and if possible send money to those left behind in desperate situations.
On his way out of the highrise, Haj-Obeid is greeted by several men seeking help. One asks if he can find him a sofa, since the one provided by the government has collapsed, and he just threw it in the garbage.
Haj-Obeid’s group has started collecting furniture, because the couches, tables and beds supplied by the government are “falling apart and breaking” after only a couple of months, he said. “Unfortunately, the government threw the money in the garbage when they bought very bad, very cheap furniture.” Officials at The Catholic Centre for Immigrants are aware of the problem, and are collecting photo evidence so they can send a letter of complaint to the federal procurement office that bought the furniture.
Jalal and Aarabi says they aren’t concerned about their couch with busted springs, or the bed frame whose broken leg is propped up with a soup can. They need to learn English, and make sure their kids get a good education, Jalal says.
The Syrians will struggle, but they’ll do fine, says Haj-Obeid. And they’ll transform the Donald Street neighbourhood, he predicts.
“We have a Chinatown, a Little Italy,” says Haj-Obeid. “And now, a Little Syria.”
***
A few floors up in the same Donald Street highrise, Alex Hay, his partner, Yasmina Tirib, and his mother, Joan Fairweather, give a tour of the apartment their refugee sponsor group has rented for a Syrian family. A tiny red table with two chairs sits in the living room, perfect for the three small boys they hoped would live here.
Members of their sponsor group, SalamOttawa, rushed like mad when they were told in early February that their refugee family had been approved to come to Ottawa, Hay says.
They rented the apartment, bought furniture and checked out nearby schools. They found Arabic-speakers who could translate and figured out how to apply for health cards. They even bought two OC Transpo Presto cards for the parents so they could ride the bus, Hay says.
They’re ready. The only thing missing is the refugee family, and there’s no telling when they will arrive.
The apartment has sat empty for two months. Members of the group are discouraged and frustrated about the lack of information from the Canadian government about when to expect the refugees.
“The whole thing feels awful,” says Hay. “We do feel let down. We’re left holding the bag, and in our case, the rent.”
From left, Syrian refugee sponsors Joan Fairweather, Yasmin Tirib and Alex Hay in the apartment they rented. It sits empty while they wait for their family.
When their application was approved by immigration officials in early February, SalamOttawa assumed the family would arrive shortly. “We were in a tizzy,” said Hay. “All the apartments may be gone! We thought the responsible thing to do was to act quickly (and rent an apartment).”
Now, faced with the prospect of “no news, and no news about when there might be news,” the group has begun searching for other Syrian refugees who might want to rent the apartment.
And even worse, members say they worry about their refugee family, a couple with boys ages 2, 3 and 5. “We just can’t wait for our family to come,” says Fairweather. “Then we can pour our love and attention on them.”
Her son calls the situation a “very strange imbalance. These little groups of Canadians are sitting here in comfort, impatient and frustrated. On the other side of this relationship is a family in some level of dire need. It’s distressing.”
Syrian refugees in Canada
27,005: Syrian refugees brought into Canada between Nov. 4, 2015 and May 8, 2016;
15,268: Number that were government-sponsored;
9,416: Sponsored by private groups; and
2,321: Privately sponsored under the blended visa office referral program; the government and sponsors split the cost for the refugees’ first year in Canada.
Syrian refugees in Ottawa
1,516: Syrian refugees who have arrived in Ottawa since Nov. 4, 2015;
1,121: Sponsored by the Canadian government;
220: Sponsored by private groups;
175: Privately sponsored under the blended visa office referral program, under which the government and the sponsors split the cost for the refugees’ first year in Canada; and
153: Number of privately sponsored refugees “in the inventory” who are waiting to come to Ottawa.
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They’ve made friends, and get regular news from back home. The only drawback to life on Donald Street is, they admit, it might be difficult to learn English when surrounded by Arab speakers. “No English around!” says a laughing Aarabi, whose bubbly laughter is never far from the surface.
The family has found some things difficult to figure out. The three oldest kids — Hala, 11, Eman, 9, and Jona, 5, — watched for weeks as other children hopped on a yellow bus each morning. The kids begged to go, too, but the school system remained a mystery for the family.
Like most of the refugees living on Donald, the family was brought to Canada by the federal government as part of the massive resettlement effort that moved 25,000 Syrians into the country between November and the end of February. They were housed in a downtown Ottawa hotel for a month. Settlement officers from the Catholic Centre for Immigrants helped them select an apartment and provided the furniture. The Donald Street highrises were a popular choice because the landlord set aside 150 units for Syrian refugees and offered a break on rent.
The couple was told a worker would visit to explain how to enrol the kids in school and answer any questions.
Four weeks passed.
Then Jalal met a woman in the hallway — one of a band of volunteers who have been helping refugees at the Donald Street towers. She drove the family to the Ottawa public school board reception centre for children who don’t speak English, and the kids were quickly signed up to attend school.
The settlement officer arrived at the apartment the very next day. She gave the family a folder labelled “Client Support Service Program: Empowering and Embracing Government Assisted Refugees.” Aarabi hands it over, looking puzzled by the contents. There’s a “client charter” and a page-long list of rights and responsibilities. Refugees, for example, are expected to show up to appointments on time and “remain compliant with the Resettlement Assistance Program Client Agreement.” The settlement officer must, among other things, return phone calls “within an appropriate time frame (except weekends or public holidays).”
There is also a list of services, translated into Arabic, ranging from second-hand stores and groceries to health centres. The settlement officer was polite, the couple explains through a translator, but they aren’t sure when she’ll be back.
Staff at the Catholic Centre for Immigrants are helping 1,136 Syrian refugees sponsored by the Canadian government who have arrived in town since Christmas, triple the number they usually handle in an entire year. All the refugees have now found a place to live, many on Donald.
Jalal shakes his head at the folder and laughs. He whips out his cellphone and pulls up WhatsApp, a popular instant messaging service. A volunteer has created group posts in Arabic for Syrian refugees in Ottawa. “Good!” Jalal says enthusiastically, giving the universal thumbs-up sign. He’s learned, he says, how to get a driver’s licence. It’s a key piece of information because he wants to find a job as soon as possible.
The WhatsApp posts were created by Eyas Haj-Obeid, an engineer by training who grew up in Syria but has lived in Ottawa for 17 years. It reaches about 135 refugees, he says. “They all have cellphones.”
Haj-Obeid posts things that are practical for families finding their way in a new city: Directions to a nearby Canadian Tire store that has a great sale on televisions. Information about OC Transpo’s cheap family weekend pass. The time and place for a free clinic offered by Ottawa dentists. Names of Arabic-speaking pharmacists. The fact that anyone can can get free books, and use the Internet, at the nearby library.
Such crucial information circulates quickly among the families, few of whom speak English.
Haj-Obeid is among a band of volunteers who have jumped in alongside settlement agency staff to help the refugees, supplying everything from household supplies to baby clothes. Many of the Syrian families are young, with lots of children and more on the way. Haj-Obeid knows of two babies born already, and five women who are pregnant.
Eyas Haj-Obeid is one of many volunteers who have been helping the government-sponsored Syrian refugees.
Haj-Obeid’s group, Resettlement and Family Services Samaritan and Ansar, organized in the past few months, is run by a core of half a dozen volunteers. Key among them are Tariq and Shabana Baig, who showed up at the Ottawa airport in December when the first group of Syrian refugees arrived and handed out Canadian flags and stuffed teddy bears.
The group has helped 205 families, including 75 at the Donald Street apartments. Each family got kitchen equipment, groceries, a bag of personal items, such as soap and toothpaste, and comforters to replace the thin blankets issued by the Canadian government. The group invited the refugees to welcome receptions at an Ottawa mosque, and arranged for a salesperson to explain Canadian cellphone plans.
Shabana Baig says she feels it’s her duty as a Muslim to help in the face of the largest refugee crisis since the Second World War. “Where am I standing in history? They will write it down, how we invited them, how we helped them.”
An immigrant from Pakistan, she doesn’t speak Arabic herself but is a powerhouse at collecting goods, volunteers and money. She enlisted all her “lady friends” to help, initially stashing everything from furniture to pots and pans in her basement. “I stood at the door of the mosque, asking for money when people came for prayers,” she says, laughing.
Shabana Baig, far right, was at the Ottawa airport to welcome the first large group of Syrian refugees when they arrived Dec. 29.
The refugees have now all moved from hotels to homes, but they still need a lot of help. During a visit with Jalal and his family, a couple of friends dropped by their apartment. One man wondered how he could enrol his children in school, while another, walking with a cane, said he had diabetes and needed to find a doctor.
“They keep calling me,” says Haj-Obeid, who is the only member of the volunteer group who speaks Arabic. One parent phoned about a child with a high fever, and he translated for the 911 operator. One man had a leaky ceiling and no idea who to contact to fix it. Someone else phoned him from a bank, unable to communicate with a teller about paying a bill.
Language is the main barrier for most of the newcomers, he says.
Jalal says all the Ottawans they have met have been welcoming. “As soon as (people) find out we’re from Syria, they are very kind, very happy to see us,” he says, with Haj-Obeid acting as translator.
The family has scraped by on the $1,500 a month given to them by the Canadian government. Their rent is around $1,200 including utilities. They have not had to use the nearby food bank in Gloucester, where many of the refugees have turned to feed their families.
Jalal was a prosperous jeweller in Syria, and Aarabi an elementary school teacher. After fleeing their home in Damascus when civil war broke out, the couple spent four tough years in Egypt, surviving with UN help.
Jalal wants to find work as soon as possible. He breaks into a lively argument with Haj-Obeid. “You must study English or you won’t get a good job,” scolds Haj-Obeid good-naturedly, telling Jalal the Canadian government wants him to learn English and will pay for it. “I can learn English on the job!” replies Jalal.
Many of the refugee men have that attitude, says Haj-Obeid. After spending years in camps or in squalid housing in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, unable to work much or at all, they want to start supporting their families in Canada, and if possible send money to those left behind in desperate situations.
On his way out of the highrise, Haj-Obeid is greeted by several men seeking help. One asks if he can find him a sofa, since the one provided by the government has collapsed, and he just threw it in the garbage.
Haj-Obeid’s group has started collecting furniture, because the couches, tables and beds supplied by the government are “falling apart and breaking” after only a couple of months, he said. “Unfortunately, the government threw the money in the garbage when they bought very bad, very cheap furniture.” Officials at The Catholic Centre for Immigrants are aware of the problem, and are collecting photo evidence so they can send a letter of complaint to the federal procurement office that bought the furniture.
Jalal and Aarabi says they aren’t concerned about their couch with busted springs, or the bed frame whose broken leg is propped up with a soup can. They need to learn English, and make sure their kids get a good education, Jalal says.
The Syrians will struggle, but they’ll do fine, says Haj-Obeid. And they’ll transform the Donald Street neighbourhood, he predicts.
“We have a Chinatown, a Little Italy,” says Haj-Obeid. “And now, a Little Syria.”
***
A few floors up in the same Donald Street highrise, Alex Hay, his partner, Yasmina Tirib, and his mother, Joan Fairweather, give a tour of the apartment their refugee sponsor group has rented for a Syrian family. A tiny red table with two chairs sits in the living room, perfect for the three small boys they hoped would live here.
Members of their sponsor group, SalamOttawa, rushed like mad when they were told in early February that their refugee family had been approved to come to Ottawa, Hay says.
They rented the apartment, bought furniture and checked out nearby schools. They found Arabic-speakers who could translate and figured out how to apply for health cards. They even bought two OC Transpo Presto cards for the parents so they could ride the bus, Hay says.
They’re ready. The only thing missing is the refugee family, and there’s no telling when they will arrive.
The apartment has sat empty for two months. Members of the group are discouraged and frustrated about the lack of information from the Canadian government about when to expect the refugees.
“The whole thing feels awful,” says Hay. “We do feel let down. We’re left holding the bag, and in our case, the rent.”
From left, Syrian refugee sponsors Joan Fairweather, Yasmin Tirib and Alex Hay in the apartment they rented. It sits empty while they wait for their family.
When their application was approved by immigration officials in early February, SalamOttawa assumed the family would arrive shortly. “We were in a tizzy,” said Hay. “All the apartments may be gone! We thought the responsible thing to do was to act quickly (and rent an apartment).”
Now, faced with the prospect of “no news, and no news about when there might be news,” the group has begun searching for other Syrian refugees who might want to rent the apartment.
And even worse, members say they worry about their refugee family, a couple with boys ages 2, 3 and 5. “We just can’t wait for our family to come,” says Fairweather. “Then we can pour our love and attention on them.”
Her son calls the situation a “very strange imbalance. These little groups of Canadians are sitting here in comfort, impatient and frustrated. On the other side of this relationship is a family in some level of dire need. It’s distressing.”
Syrian refugees in Canada
27,005: Syrian refugees brought into Canada between Nov. 4, 2015 and May 8, 2016;
15,268: Number that were government-sponsored;
9,416: Sponsored by private groups; and
2,321: Privately sponsored under the blended visa office referral program; the government and sponsors split the cost for the refugees’ first year in Canada.
Syrian refugees in Ottawa
1,516: Syrian refugees who have arrived in Ottawa since Nov. 4, 2015;
1,121: Sponsored by the Canadian government;
220: Sponsored by private groups;
175: Privately sponsored under the blended visa office referral program, under which the government and the sponsors split the cost for the refugees’ first year in Canada; and
153: Number of privately sponsored refugees “in the inventory” who are waiting to come to Ottawa.
Related
查看原文...
