Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

#WeWelcomeRefugees

What a Newborn Baby Taught Me about America the Beautiful

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A baby girl named Eileen Aldake was born this week. Like every name, hers has a story. And like almost every story, this one includes painful chapters, as well as chapters brimming with joy and hope.

My husband and I first met Eileen’s parents and siblings a year and a half ago in the Lincoln airport. They looked travel-weary that afternoon, a little bit like deer caught in a blinding headlight.

They’d been on the run, persecuted by ISIS in Iraq. They’d lost friends and loved ones to genocide and left others behind, unsure when, or if, they would see them again. Their community had been fractured into a thousand shards. They’d traveled more than 6,000 miles to arrive in a foreign land as refugees, their belongings packed into six suitcases.

Since that first chaotic day we met the Aldakes in the airport, we’ve gotten to know them, not just as our “sponsored family,” but, as the weeks and months have passed, as people we now call friends. We’ve played soccer in the park, shared watermelon and platters of dolma, colored princess and unicorn pictures, cheered Real Madrid while we sipped sugary chai tea.

We’ve watched as their kids have learned English and settled into their new school. We’ve witnessed Afia juggle the demands of four young children while taking English classes and learning to drive. We’ve observed Azzat manage near full-time work as a translator along with full-time college, steadily making progress toward earning his degree.

I can’t imagine doing even half of what they have accomplished over these last 18 months. They have not only survived in this foreign land they now call home; they have thrived.

A few weeks ago Brad and I sat in the Aldakes’ living room enjoying a plate of homemade kulicha, as we so often do when we visit. We were talking about the baby, due to arrive in late June. When Azzat asked me what my favorite girl’s name was, I told him if we’d had a girl ourselves, Brad and I had planned to name her Eileen, after my maternal grandmother.

Azzat turned to Afia, and they conversed in Kurdish for a few seconds. Then he turned back to Brad and me. “It’s Eileen then,” he announced. “We will name the baby Eileen.”

Brad and I protested. “No, no, no,” we insisted. “We were just making conversation! We should definitely not name your baby!” This was an important decision, we said. Didn’t they want to choose an Iraqi name – maybe a name that had special meaning in their Yezidi culture?

Azzat stood firm. “Eileen,” he said. “She will be called Eileen.”

On Sunday morning of this week, Eileen was born. Azzat texted me from the hospital to get the correct spelling of her name for the birth certificate. On Wednesday of this week we celebrate the Fourth of July, the day each year that Americans remember our nation’s defining principles and values and the rights we cherish so deeply: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

How fitting it is that tiny Eileen Aldake made her way into the world this week, of all weeks.

Eileen Aldake, born to Iraqi Yezidi parents who arrived in this country as refugees seeking asylum, is an American citizen, named after my maternal grandmother, the daughter of Irish immigrants. How apropos that we celebrate both the birth of this precious baby and the country that offers her and her family freedom, security, opportunity and religious liberty.

How often I take those “certain unalienable rights” for granted. The Aldakes, persecuted for their religion and culture, have a much greater appreciation for these rights than I, from my position of privilege, ever will.

Back when I was in elementary school, I was taught that America was a melting pot – a blending of many different peoples and cultures into one entity known as “America.” Turns out, that metaphor wasn’t quite right. We are not a country comprised of an indistinguishable mass of people. America is not a bland blurring of watered-down sameness.

Rather, we are a tapestry, an infinite number of threads – cultures, ethnicities, traditions, music, food, fashion, languages, religions, customs – woven together to create a vibrant, rich, varied, eclectic, beautifully unique America.

America is America because of our defining principles and our “certain unalienable rights,” this is true. But America is also America because of our people. This country has always been and continues to be comprised of immigrants (with the glaring exception, of course, of the indigenous people, who we drove from their own land, and the African-American people, who we brought here enslaved and against their will). Our immigrant heritage is in large part the very reason America is what it is today.

How perfectly fitting, then, that baby Eileen is the daughter of Iraqi immigrants and, at the same time, named for my maternal grandmother, daughter of Irish immigrants who, too, traveled thousands of miles to seek out a better life. How perfectly “American” her name is: Eileen Aldake — two diverse stories, two diverse histories, threads woven together into a uniquely beautiful tapestry. How perfectly fitting that she was born this week, of all weeks, when we celebrate America the beautiful.

My birthday is this Wednesday – the Fourth of July – and I can’t think of a more meaningful birthday gift than the arrival of this sweet baby who bears the name of my Irish-American maternal grandmother. Not only am I deeply touched that our friends named their precious baby Eileen, it’s also a gift this week to celebrate tiny Eileen Aldake and her dear family, who are the embodiment of so much of what makes America truly beautiful.

The Real Story of What Makes America Great

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The moment he spots me through the glass doors, he breaks into a run, bounding down the steps, coat flapping, backpack spilling papers, arms open wide. Yazin’s hug nearly knocks me off my feet onto the cold concrete. His two sisters trail after him, a flurry of long, dark braids, beaming smiles, and exuberant chatter. They both have hugs for me too.

All three vie for my attention, interrupting and talking over one another during the five-minute drive from the elementary school to their apartment. Dara loves math. Yara loves her teacher. All three of them love school. When they were all out sick with the flu last week, Dara tells me, they couldn’t wait to get better so they could get back to the classroom.

Mun, their four-year-old sister, has burst out of the front door of the townhouse and is standing on the steps in her socks before I’ve even turned off the ignition at the curb. Afia, their mother, kisses me on the cheek, motioning for me to take off my coat. When I tell them I can’t stay, the kids’ faces fall.

I promise I will visit for longer next time. “Don’t forget, we have to go ice skating one of these days,” I remind them, waving as I close the door behind me.

I wish so much that America could know this family. I wish so much that everyone could see, as clearly as I do, that the intimidating, frightening picture of immigrants and refugees our president paints from his lofty podium is simply not the whole story.

Not even close.

We hear from our president about drug dealers, murderers and rapists crossing our borders. We hear about terrorists killing and maiming our neighbors with guns and bombs. We hear that immigrants are threatening our livelihood and our lives. No matter that statistical evidence does not support his claims, that’s the storyline, and we believe it because fear sells.

What we don’t hear about are the beautiful, thriving children who love school and have mastered English in a year.

We don’t hear about the father who works hard during the day and attends community college classes in the evenings to earn the lab technician certification he already holds but which is not valid in the States. The father who drives his children to school and doctor’s and dentist appointments. The father who tells me, “I wish there were 35 hours in a day so I could get it all done.”

We don’t hear about the mother who is caring for her family, learning to drive, diligently attending weekly classes, practicing her English. The mother who kisses my cheek and hugs me warmly and serves me sugary chai and a plate piled high with homemade kulicha. The mother who prepares a four-course luncheon feast for my family on her birthday.

We don’t hear about the families who literally ran for their lives, who lost virtually everything they owned, who saw friends, neighbors, loved ones massacred, kidnapped, sold into slavery. The families who step foot from an airplane 7,000 miles from their homeland with their belongings packed into six suitcases. The families who left mothers, fathers, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins behind, possibly forever.

A couple of weeks ago, when we visited the Aldakes in their home, Azzat’s mother was live on the smart phone screen, propped on a table in a corner while we ate lunch on the living room floor. This is often the case when we visit, and at first, we thought it was odd – why was Azzat’s mother always on Facetime, hanging out on the phone screen in the living room?

But now I understand. She lived with them in Iraq; the kids’ name for her is the Kurdish word for “mother.” This phone screen is a way to stay close, to be with her in the ordinary, everyday moments, in spite of the thousands of miles between them.

Last winter, Azzat’s mother came within weeks of emigrating to the United States – the two-year security screening process was completed, her paperwork was approved, her bags were packed. When Trump issued his travel ban, her visa was deferred, indefinitely.

She waves to us from the phone screen across the room. Azzat’s mother speaks in Kurdish as she sits on the floor, slicing kiwi into a bowl. “She’s blessing you,” Azzat says, turning to Brad and me. “She is saying a prayer, thanking you guys for everything you have done for us.”

I can’t speak. I shake my head no, mumble thank you, wave and smile back at the phone. She’s got it all wrong. We are the ones blessed by her family. We are the ones who should be thanking her for her family. But we can do nothing but wave and smile, wait and hope. We can do nothing but pray she will someday be reunited with those she loves most.

Afia brings out a platter of fruit and pastries. We sit side-by-side on the sofa. I show her photos on my phone from our ski trip to Colorado.

I scroll back through months of images, show her the first photo I took of her family, in the Lincoln airport the afternoon they arrived from Iraq. They look weary, serious, a little bit stunned. Yazin, the boy who hugs me with abandon now, eyes me warily in that first picture.

The kids peer at the photo over my shoulder. They laugh, surprised I was there on that first overwhelming day: “We didn’t know you then! We didn’t even know who was taking our picture!”

They have come so far, across miles, around the globe, over heartbreaking terrain most of us can’t even begin to fathom.

I wish the rest of America could see what my family has had the honor to see. I wish the rest of America could experience what my family has had the privilege to experience. I wish the rest of America could understand that what Trump threatens from the podium about murderers, gang members, rapists, drug dealers and terrorists is not the whole story.

Not even close.

I wish America could see that these hardworking, resilient, joyful, generous immigrant and refugee familes are, in fact, the real story of what makes America great.

What You Might Not Know about Refugees

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I admit, before we sponsored a refugee family from Iraq, I knew nothing about refugees. In fact, let me be as frank as possible: I hardly gave refugees more than a passing thought. Sure, my heart sank when I saw photos of lifeless bodies washed ashore or heard stories of persecution and genocide, but in some ways it didn’t even seem real. I was able to keep myself at a distance. It was terrible, and I felt badly for those who suffered, but it didn’t impact me in any real way.

All that changed the day the Aldake family stepped through the gate at Lincoln Municipal Airport. In the three months since this family arrived from Iraq, the plight of refugees has become very real and very personal to me.

I’ve heard their stories firsthand. I’ve witnessed their struggles and their determination. I’ve seen their joy and relief at having arrived at a safe place, and also their deep heartache and pain over leaving so many loved ones behind in dangerous situations. I’ve laughed with them, shared meals with them, and felt my heart break for what they have suffered and endured. They have taught me so much about perseverance and courage.

I’ve learned a lot about refugees in the past three months, and much of what I’ve learned has surprised me. I want to share some of this information with you, because I suspect, if you’re anything like I was, you are simply overwhelmed by the contradictory information you get from the media. Here is some of what I know to be true:

More than 65 million people worldwide are currently displaced from their homes, and more than half of the world’s refugees — 51% — are children.

Refugees do not choose to leave their country; they are forced to flee.

While Azzat and his family are grateful to be in the United States, they would rather still be safely living in their homeland, a small village in northern Iraq that they were forced to flee when ISIS invaded in August 2014. The Aldake family, along with thousands of other Yazidis, literally ran for their lives with only a few hours notice. Azzat was lucky. He owned a car, and was able to save his family. The 40,000 who fled on foot to Mount Sinjar were not as fortunate. As many as 5,000 Yazidi were massacred by ISIS, and thousands more women and children were sold into sex slavery. Azzat personally knew many people who were murdered or sold as slaves.

Refugees are the most thoroughly vetted individuals entering the United States.

Azzat and his wife completed extensive paperwork, underwent medical testing and exams and were personally interviewed by immigration officials in a process that took nearly two and a half years. Usually the process takes even longer, but Azzat’s work as an interpreter for the U.S. military enabled him to be eligible for special emigration visas and a streamlined vetting process.

Refugees enter the United States legally.  They also pay for their own travel to the United States through a no-interest loan. 

Refugees pay taxes and most are employed within six months of arrival. 

In Iraq, Azzat worked as a supervisor for the medical laboratory of the 17,000-occupant Displaced Persons Camp. He also served as an interpreter for the U.S. military. He wants nothing more than to get a job, now that his family is safe and settled in Lincoln. His resume is complete and up to date, he’s already applied for several jobs, and he is anxious to get to work. As he said to Brad and me this past weekend, “I’m not used to not working. It doesn’t feel right.” Afia, Azzat’s wife, is enrolled in English classes and is excited about the prospect of learning to drive and getting a job, both of which are opportunities she was not afforded as a woman in Iraq. Azzat and Afia very much want to become contributing and productive members of society in the United States; they are not here to take advantage of the system, and being the recipients of public assistance makes them uncomfortable.

Refugees have suffered greatly…and continue to suffer even after they have settled into a safe place.

After years of fearing for their very lives, refugees are not simply “all better” once they arrive at a safe place. Azzat told Brad and me that though he tries to forget, he can’t escape the memories of being persecuted by ISIS. Even when he can keep the terrifying memories at bay during the day, they return at night to torment him in his dreams. Azzat and Afia also worry daily about Azzat’s mother and his two brothers, who are still in Iraq awaiting approval of their visa applications, which have been deferred indefinitely.

Refugees are ordinary people, just trying to make a better life for themselves.

They have hopes, ambitions, and dreams. They aspire to make a better life for themselves and their families. They are grateful for ordinary gifts you and I typically take for granted, like a safe environment for their families, an education for their children, and to make a meaningful contribution to society. They are gracious and warm, excited to learn, generous and hospitable, and quick to share what little they have.

I am so grateful Azzat, Afia, and their four children made it to Nebraska safely. I’m so grateful they’ll get to see their children and someday perhaps their grandchildren grow up in a safe place where they will not just survive, but thrive. I’m so grateful they have this chance to dream, create, and live a new life for themselves, but my heart breaks for the thousands like them who won’t.

[Facts from Greateras1.org and the UN Refugee Agency]

When You Forget You’re Not the Author of the Story

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“Well that went one hundred percent NOT like I thought it would.”

These are the words I said to Brad as we pulled out of the airport parking lot last Thursday. We had just met the Yazidi family whose arrival we’d been preparing for and anticipating over the last six weeks. During that time we’d acquired hundreds of donated items; filled our garage, basement, and living room with pots and pans, bedding, kitchen utensils, furniture, clothes, and food; shopped for them with the monetary donations we’d received; and thought about and prayed for this family of six daily.

Brad had even researched Yazidi recipes so we would know the culturally appropriate foods to purchase. I had exchanged dozens of emails and texts with the friends and strangers who were helping to furnish the apartment. We’d checked and rechecked our Google doc, worried we’d forgotten something important, fretted over whether the kids needed another set of pajamas.

The night before our family’s arrival I tossed and turned in bed, trying to imagine what it would be like to finally meet them. The day of their arrival, I was so nervous/excited, I couldn’t work. I paced around the house and checked Facebook 4,900 times instead.

Turns out, the much-anticipated meeting was, in a word, anti-climatic. [And let me stop right here and stay this had nothing to do with the family or the organization responsible for their arrival; it was all me and my own baggage. Read on.]

Lincoln is home to a close-knit and vibrant Yazidi community – the largest in the nation, in fact. This is good. It means our family has a ready-made support network – people who have been in America for a while now and will help our family make the transition. In fact, about 20 Yazidis were at the airport to welcome our family and another who arrived on the same plane. It was clear, when they walked into the terminal, that our family knew a lot of the people who had shown up at the airport to welcome them.

At the United gate, Brad and I were briefly introduced to Azzat, the dad, and I quickly snapped a photo of the family. Then, in a matter of minutes and in a jumble of confusion and chaos, both refugee families and all the Yazidi people who had arrived to welcome them disappeared, presumably to have a warm meal together and connect after such a long and painful separation.

I was quiet for a few minutes as Brad and I drove from the airport to our house, where we would meet up with the rest of our sponsorship team and begin the process of moving and setting up our family’s apartment. During the short drive I wrestled with feelings of disappointment and disillusionment.

“This is a surprise to me,” I said to Brad, laughing sheepishly. “I never knew I had a hero complex.”

The truth is, I had written the whole story before our family had even stepped foot in America. I had it all worked out in my own mind: the poignant meeting at the airport; the excitement of the kids when they saw their bedrooms, their new backpacks, the cute stuffed animals propped just so on brand-new sheets; the friendship we would forge…dinners together, laughter, conversation, pass the lamb stew!

I had written a beautiful story in my head, a perfect story, really – a fairy tale, complete with a knight(ess) in shining armor and the quintessential happy ending.

The problem was, I had forgotten one critical detail:

I’m not the author of this story. In fact, I’m not even a main character.

God is the author of this story, and long before I even knew a single detail about the Yazidi people, long before “sponsorship” and “refugee” and “resettlement” were part of my daily vocabulary, long before I was even born, in fact, he had already begun to write it.

He knew how this family of six would flee persecution in Iraq; he knew that they would land in Lincoln, Nebraska; he knew what my role would be in their lives. He had plans for each one of us in this story, plans for hope and a future. 

The problem was, my plans didn’t match his. The truth is, they rarely do.

I had forgotten, again, that God is the Planner and the Author of all good stories. I had forgotten that he had already written this story and had already written a storyline for me – a storyline that was much different, and honestly, a lot less limelighty, from the one I’d written for myself.

An hour after Brad and I left the airport, our friend Nathan backed a moving truck into our driveway. Our friends showed up, and together we all emptied the garage, basement and living room. Then we all drove to Kristen’s house to pack more into the truck, and then to Deidra’s house to carry her sofa down her front steps, up the ramp, and into the back of the truck. Then Nathan drove the truck across town to the apartment, where we all unloaded it box by box by box.

We spread sheets and comforters over mattresses; assembled bunk beds and end tables; screwed lightbulbs into lamps; stocked the fridge, pantry, cabinets and drawers; arranged fruit in a bowl; set placemats on the kitchen table; stacked extra blankets in the linen closet; laid toothbrushes on the bathroom counter, propped stuffed animals just so on freshly made beds.

When we shut off the lights and closed the door behind us four hours later that night, the apartment was a home.

This was the role God had for me in his story – to welcome this refugee family to America not by being their hero or savior or even their friend (God himself has all that covered), but to slip in like an elf behind the scenes on a cold winter night and make them a home — a home that would say, “Welcome.” A home that would say, “We’re glad you’re here.”

God writes the most beautiful stories. Our job is to help bring those stories to fruition – to be his hands and feet and heart on the ground. He is the Author, we are the “characters,” and sometimes, our role, our storyline, is small, hardly noticeable, a bit part. But that doesn’t make the story less perfect or less beautiful.

I’m over my initial disappointment, have my head back on straight, and have handed the pen back to its rightful Owner. No one but God himself knows the rest of this story. Perhaps this is merely the first chapter. Or maybe, when Brad and I left the keys on the kitchen table and closed the door behind us last Friday morning after putting the last touches on the apartment, we turned the final page.

Regardless of whether it’s the beginning or the end of our role in this particular story, I’m really grateful God wrote a part in it for me. Helping to create a home for a family I might not ever even know is one of the best experiences I’ve ever had.

The Blessing is Outside Your Comfort Zone

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This is my living room right now:

#WeWelcomeRefugees

This is my basement:

#WeWelcomeRefugees

It’s not pretty. In fact, it’s messy, cluttered and driving me a little bit crazy. And I haven’t even shown you the garage, which is full from front to back with used furniture.

For the past few weeks my family and a small group of our friends have been collecting furniture and household items in order to set up an apartment for a Yazidi family of six who will be arriving as refugees from Iraq on December 14.

The parents and their four young children will likely land in America with nothing more than a couple of backpacks, and although Lincoln has a large Yazidi community, this family knows only one person here, a former co-worker. We know virtually nothing about this mom and dad and their four kids, except their names, their ages, and the fact that the husband speaks a little English.

Our case coordinator Vanja told Brad and me a little bit about the Yazidi people — how warm they are, how they never shake hands but always embrace instead (which made me laugh, as Brad, the stoic Minnesotan Nord, and me, the reserved New Englander, are perhaps two of the least huggy people in the universe).

“You will be their window, their doorway into this new life,” Vanja told us, “but your lives are about to be forever changed too.”

Vanya’s statement reminded me of something I read by Henri Nouwen recently:

“The discipline of community makes us persons; that is, people who are sounding through to each other (the Latin word personare means ‘sounding through’) a truth, a beauty, and a love which is greater, fuller, and richer than we ourselves can grasp. In true community we are windows constantly offering each other new views on the mystery of God’s presence in our lives.”

I like that. It’s beautiful and lovely. On the other hand, let me be straight-up honest with you: Vanja’s statement made me a little nervous.

Being someone’s “window and doorway into this new life” sounds like a lot of responsiblity. Honestly, I don’t know if I’m up for it. I don’t know what this relationship might look like. I don’t know how to navigate it. In the same way clutter and untidiness breathe unrest into my heart and soul, scenarios like these, in which I can’t predict or control the outcome, make me uneasy too. I don’t particularly enjoy walking into new and unfamiliar situations. I don’t like social awkwardness (who does, right?). I don’t like not knowing what to say, or wondering if I’ve said the wrong thing.

This is all pretty far beyond the tidy boundaries of my nice, neat, ordinary life.

A couple of months ago I was listening to On Being during my morning run, and the woman being interviewed said something that stuck with me. She was talking about running – specifically about how sometimes, when you push yourself past your comfort zone, past the point you think you are physically able to go, you reap unexpected rewards.

“The blessing,” she said, “is outside of your comfort zone.” 

I’ve been thinking about that phrase a lot lately as we prepare for the arrival of our Yazidi family a week from today. I’ve already experienced myriad blessings – in the strangers who, seeing my request for donations on Facebook, have mailed checks to pay for groceries; in the friends and acquaintances who have texted, messaged, and called to say they have linens, a blender, a television, a dresser, snow boots, backpacks, pots and pans, beds; in the generosity of strangers and neighbors alike. It’s been beautiful, really, to see our community rally in support of people they don’t know, people who are “different,” people they will likely never meet.

I don’t know how this will all turn out. There are a lot of unknowns here, and the unknowns — that which is outside my comfort zone – are intimidating. But in the midst of all I don’t know, I am also confident that there will be blessings on the other side.

Want to do something to help the refugee crisis, but don’t know where to start? If you are in Lincoln, contact Lutheran Family Services of Nebraska – they help refugees resettle, and you can get involved in lots of different ways. Or, consider learning more about the crisis and ways you can help here at the We Welcome Refugees website.