IRIS opposes the shameful and reckless ban on refugees issued as a revised Executive Order on March 6, 2017. We vow to fight it. (This banner still resides on the IRIS home page)
On Wednesday I drove from Greenwich to New Haven, a straight shot on I-95, about 45 minutes without traffic (if you speed a little).
I turned onto Nicholl Street and found the office for Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS) more easily than I found parking. There was one tiny space requiring that I parallel park. (I failed that maneuver during my driving test oh those many years ago.)
There were men across the street and women in hijabs in front of the building watching as I pulled in and out of the space, trying to make the car fit. I was anxious, but I summoned some courage and went for it, proud when I finally squeezed in without hitting the cars in front and back and settling finally not too far from the curb.
This was my first day tutoring with the organization that provides an array of services to refugees and immigrants from around the world. Those who come here find English classes, childcare services, assistance in locating doctors and receiving medical care, registering for school, and finding employment. IRIS helps with housing and takes furniture donations. In short, it provides much-needed resettlement services to those who need it most, those who come from the worst war-torn countries, from countries with horrendous human rights records.
(And I was nearly undone by fear of parallel parking? I chastised myself and got a grip.)
Having survived my first near crisis of the day, I locked the car, crossed the street, and entered the two-story, terra-cotta colored building. Still, I wasn’t sure what I would find: great sadness, people emotionally scarred by all they had endured?
Once inside, the first sound I heard was laughter. There were people everywhere, some standing, some sitting, in groups of two or three or more. I was immediately struck with the sense of good will permeating the place.
I asked a woman just ahead of me where the English class was, and she told me to follow her. We entered the classroom, a windowless space with two rows of long tables and with chairs on each side. There were various groups. The women in jihabs were together in a group with a woman volunteer. There were several twosomes—one volunteer with one student.
Danny, the leader of the group of volunteers, an instructor and an employment specialist, came over immediately and introduced himself.
He told me to take a seat, observe, and jump in when I was ready. So I sat. I observed. The woman who led me to the class was seated next to me now and already working with a woman from Africa. Danny asked me to work with the man next to me. “He’s quiet, but he’s very nice. Ask him his name and where he’s from.”
I’m not sure, but I think he said his name was Aman. At least that’s what I called him for the remainder of the session. He was a mature man, maybe 50. Although he was seated, I judged him to be tall, about six feet. I told him my name was Jean, and he repeated, JEEN, softly and methodically.
We then embarked on the exercises, consisting of identifying and copying numbers, letters, and words.
We worked with the words, up and down, with stand and sit. Others in the class were doing the same, some standing up, some sitting down at the volunteer’s request.
For a minute I was reminded of that old Sidney Poitier film, Lilies of the Field, when his character is teaching the German nuns English: “We all stand up. We all sit down.” There was none of the hilarity in our classroom that followed in the movie when the Poitier character has some fun with the unsuspecting sisters having them repeat, “Ah stands up, y’all.” Aman, I noticed, had skin the color of Sidney Poitier’s.
There may not have been hilarity in our class, but there was definitely an air of lightness in the room. People were interacting, there was chatter, laughter, and work was going on.
Aman softly repeated after me the names of the numbers and letters, slowly saying the words, wanting to be precise. And that precision carried over into his writing. Each letter was an exact replica of the sample provided on the sheet. If it wasn’t right, he erased and began again. If I wanted to go on to the next line, he wanted to finish the line he was working on.
I found a way to incorporate up and down when he was having trouble with writing the letter, W. I told him to go down, up, down, up with the lines. He got it immediately and repeated down, up, down up, again and again until he finished the line.
Soon the groups began to leave. First the women, then the pair next to us, and then the pair at the far end of the room.
Finally, Aman and I finished our work for the day, the last to pack up to leave. “Tell me again where you are from?” I asked.
“Eritrea,” he responded softly.
“Ah, Eritrea,” I said.
I didn’t know much, though—didn’t know anything really—about Eritrea until I looked it up when I got home. What I found was horrific. On the Council on Foreign Relations website I read a post from last September, citing a diaspora of about half a million people. With a population of six million, the report echoes a Wall Street Journal article calling the country “one of the world’s fastest emptying nations.” And why? A “long-standing system of forced labor, among other human rights violations that a UN commission said ‘may constitute crimes against humanity.’” Citing the same UN report, a Washington Post article puzzled over the report’s failure to produce mainstream outrage.
Eritrea. I know more about it now than I did. But I don’t know why Aman is here, what he may have escaped, or what his life was like there. Or if he ever knew peace in his homeland.
I also don’t know if I will be the one to work with him next week. If I am, I will ask him to repeat his name for me again, and this time I will get it right.
To contact IRIS, go to www.irisct.org.