Posted on 12/07/2002 8:17:56 AM PST by Tancred
WATERVILLE — Imagine there is a civil war in this country, it becomes ravaged, and you are sent off to Somalia as a refugee.
You leave behind everything you know — your language, culture, many of your loved ones — and are immersed in a whole new world.
You have 12 children to support. Try to find a job, when you cannot speak the language. Try to get hired, when you are the only white person in a pool of black candidates for one job.
"You go to find work and you can't even fill out the application because you don't read or write or speak English," says Abdiaziz Hashi Ali. "Who's going to get hired? It's very clear."
Ali, a Somali man living in Lewiston and working with Somali refugees there, presented this scenario Friday to the Mid-Maine Global Forum, to help the audience understand the Somali plight.
Ali, 31, a case worker, and Hussein Ahmed, 30, an employment specialist who both work for the City of Lewiston, spoke to a packed room of people who turned out for the event.
They talked about why the Somalis came to the United States, and why so many who initially lived in Atlanta, Ga. and other U.S. cities ultimately ended up in the Lewiston-Auburn area.
They spoke about the pro-Somali sentiment that pervades the twin cities after Lewiston Mayor Laurier Raymond's issued a letter in October asking Somalis to stop coming to the city because it was "maxed-out financially, physically and emotionally."
"The Lewiston-Auburn community are fully supportive of the Somali population — I cannot say all of them, but the majority," said Ali.
In response to the growing Somali population in Lewiston, the World Church of the Creator, a white supremacist group based in Peoria, Ill., is planning to rally in that city Jan. 11.
Ali and Hussein said they are heartened by the fact that many people will rally in support of the Somalis, and show their solidarity.
"I think it's going to be a counter-type of demonstration," Ahmed said. "We only want to show people how the Somali community and the Lewiston-Auburn are joined together, and show the group we are accepting to live together."
Bright, articulate and engaging, Ali and Ahmed shared lunch with those attending the forum, and chatted about their lives. They ate very little, since recently ending a fast in honor Ramadan, the Muslim holy month. They said that during the past month, they ate only from sundown to sunrise.
Both men were born in Kismanyo, in southern, coastal Somalia. Ali graduated from Gaheyr University with a degree in political science. He moved to Georgia in 1994, settled there and worked with the Christian Council, helping new refugees arriving in that state.
Ahmed graduated from the school of health in Muqdishu with a nursing degree and worked with the United Nations Agency Medicin San Frontieres (Medicine Without Borders), providing health care to refugees in Kenya. He came to the United States two years ago.
Ahmed said Somalis are divided into five clans, or tribes. In 1991, civil war broke out in that African country, and 500,000 people were killed. Refugees went to Kenya and Ethiopia. In Kenya, they experienced killings and looting, and because of the lack of security, the United Nations helped find them homes in other places, such as Europe and the United States.
In Atlanta, Somalis had a very tough time, being faced not only with language and culture barriers and difficulty finding jobs, but with exposure to drug dealers and crime, Ali said. Parents worried for the safety of their children.
Ali said white boys on the school bus would pull the scarves off young Somali girls' heads as a joke, but the action is a very serious offense in the Somali culture, where doing so is equivalent to exposing a very private part of a girl's body. Somali boys would try to defend the girls, and fights would break out, Ali said.
So, Somali adults researched on the Internet safe places to live in the United States. They learned that in Lewiston-Auburn, the last time a police officer was killed in the line of duty was in 1859, Ali said.
They moved to Lewiston-Auburn, which has about 1,200 Somalis —333 of whom are adults, and the rest children, according to Ali.
About 215 Somalis work in a variety of jobs including in a fiber optics plant. One is a nurse, another, a math teacher in a high school, and two are doctors, according to Ali. One of the doctors got a job at a hospital in Boston, he said.
Waterville resident Philip Gonyar, a retired teacher and member of the Waterville Board of Education, asked how Somali students are treated in school in Lewiston and Auburn.
Ahmed said the schools are very good, and teachers are supportive. Class size is more conducive to learning than in larger classes in other cities.
"Security within the school setup is a very good one," he said.
The men, who were introduced by Global Forum Board member William A. Lee, said they enjoyed Friday's event and appreciated the opportunity to speak.
"You've been a wonderful audience," Ali said.
To learn more about the Somali culture, go to
www.hiiraan.com or somalinet.com, according to Ali and Ahmed.
From the sections I put in bold, you can see that only 25% of the Somalis are adults, and of those adults only two-thirds have employment (some are presumably too old or have to look after the kids). Keep this in mind because the local papers here have printed earlier stories trying to debunk the popular conception that they don't work and they don't use up too much public services (but how can they not with all those children?). There are poorer places in Maine than L-A, like Aroostook and Washington counties, but Lewiston also has a reputation for crime and grunginess (relative to Maine, that is).
I look forward to reading them! Unfortunately, I fear you've placed yourself under an obligation that will last a long, long, time.
What did the Somali Tribespesrsons do back in the old country? Well they rustled cattle, goats, camels, and sheep from one another; Conducted the odd raid into Kenya; Kidnapped folks; and generally behaved like a semi-naked version of the Wild Bunch. Their women were known to do a bit of farming and trading and scout out opportunities for the boys to go back to plan "a" above, when they weren't too busy to handle the odd clitorectomy.
So to get our new fellow citizens back to work, we have to recreate in Maine the opportunities they are accustomed to working with in Somalia. I see no reason why the Somalis in LA can't raid Bar Harbor, Boothbay, and Ogunquit from time to time. Many of the summer folk who are the normal habitués of these swank resorts seem to be just the sort of New York and Boston Democrats who are culturally sensitive enough to appreciate a good multicultural kidnapping. Their offspring might also enjoy getting tribal tattoos and geometric scars.
The Dairymen are always complaining about hard it is to make a buck, so the Somalis would actually be doing them a favor by rearranging the Holsteins for them. I also recommend expanding the funky old "Desert of Maine" to 1000 sq. miles., so the Somalis don't get too homesick.
Of course, in order to do their part to make our state more attractive to tourists, I would suggest they where they native garb, summer AND winter. .
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