Absentee Voting for Iraqi Refugees

   Washington State has switched entirely away from polling sites and to absentee voting, but the rest of the United States is only gradually following suite. I think we can expect to see mostly absentee voting here in the States within a few years. Other countries, however, are doing even better. The UN has sponsored polling sites for Iraqi refugees in countries like Syria and Lebanon, and eight polling sites exist in the United States as well!

   Unfortunately, Spokane's Iraqi refugees did not have a polling site accessible to them. It might be a cool thing, in future days, if we were to try and get ahold of absentee ballots for the refugees of Spokane to vote.

[citing the UN (via the Scoop) and KPBS]

ESL Tutoring

   When the friday afternoon ESL tutoring first began here at Global Neighborhood, I was not precisely sure what to expect. We'd done quite a bit of planning and prep work, and I had done one-on-one ESL tutoring myself, in the past, but I was unsure of how fully our program would be utilized and by how it would work out to have volunteers and refugees just come and be matched without making appointments or firm commitments on availability.

   Hosting a program that asks volunteers and refugees to arrive in uncertain number that they might be paired together and sent off to learn from each other invokes the numinous, and every week is a blessing from God and an active sign of his presence in our lives. It is wondrous to talk to refugees and volunteers afterwards, and to hear them excitedly telling stories of their time tutoring, or remarking that they will tell all of their other friends that they need to come. We pray to God in need and confusion, and our prayers are constantly answered.

   Wow. Praise God!

World Refugee Update

   Working with refugees is an eye-opening experience; while we receive periodic surprises in our dailly and weekly interactions with them, their existence also forces us out of our municipal and national bubble. The world is big, even though Spokane and the United States seem fairly isolated, and things keep on happening "out there." This is an update on the latest refugee crisis in Africa.

   The European Commission Humanitarian Aid department (ECHO) reports that:

An estimated 110,000 refugees have fled from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) following inter-tribal clashes over fishing rights in October and November 2009. The majority of the refugees crossed the Ubangui river into the Republic of Congo and have settled in villages along a 600km stretch of the river

   Which is pretty terrible, but I suspect that we won't hear anything about it in the mainstream media for a few weeks. Or, perhaps, ever. Something else that probably won't show up in the mainstream media, now that the Olympics are over, is this Canadian hubbub: seven people have claimed refugee status after coming to Vancouver, BC, ostensibly to watch the Olympics. From Hungary, Japan, and Russia, Canada's Conservative Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is busy a) calling their claims "ridiculous" and b) preventing declared homosexuals from immigrating to Canada. Which makes me wonder if Kenney is in line with the rest of Stephen Harper's government.

Building Relationships Is Slow Business

   John B. Hayes, in his book Submerge, states an important and relevant point that seems applicable to the work of Global Neighborhood. He writes:

[...]When mission workers start with poor people in empowering relationships, they are likely to get to the problems, together with the poor. The 'work' typically starts slower and looks less impressive when relationship is prioritized before attention to the need, but it is more likely to be owned and reproduced by the poor themselves and, as a result, have a much longer lifespan.

   The work of Global Neighborhood, while not always statistically impressive (although we do have 78 volunteers!), is doing work that is relational and Christ-based. Both of these intentions produce fruit that may take years to recognize. The work is slow-going, but beautiful. We see glimpses of this fruit in the joy that is shared between a refugee and a volunteer when they meet, and we see it also in the interactions between tutors and refugees at our ESL Drop-In Center. From the outside, it may not look like much, but there is something truly remarkable about the work God is doing in all of this. We are privileged to be witnesses of this snail-paced, messy, and beautiful instrument.

A.H.

Refugee Food Blog #4: Kyet thar sipyan

   I've written about a food from Iraq and a drink from Bhutan, and I've made a slightly overwrought point using another "food," this one from Haiti. But I've so far left out the Burmese, the other major origin of refugees currently entering our city. Today I'm going to remedy that by talking about one of my favorite food groups, the curries. This one takes about an hour to prepare, but is pretty darn tasty, and pretty darn straightforward.

The ingredient list:

—1/2 teaspoon tumeric powder

—1/2 teaspoon salt

—3 tablespoons fish sauce (I love fish sauce, personally)

—1 chicken, dismembered

—2 thin-sliced medium-sized onions

—4 garlic cloves, crushed

—1 teaspoon crushed dried hot hot chilies

—125ml peanut oil

—1/2 teaspoon paprika powder

—2 cups of water

—4 diced tomatoes

   Mix the tumeric, salt, and fish sauce in a bowl, then add the dismembered chicken and let it marinate while you work on the rest of the recipe. Pound the onions, garlic, and chilies to a paste in a mortar and pestle, or in a food processor. The first is better.

   Heat the oil in a wok, and then start cooking the onion paste—it does seem like a lot of oil, but make sure you use all of it! It's important, really. Cook the onion paste until it's reddish brown, then add the paprika and stir for a while. Add the chicken and marinade, water, and tomatoes, then cover and let it simmer for about an hour. When the oil has come back to the surface with that lovely red color, it's done!

   This recipe scales nicely, if you want to make more. Oh, and when you take the chicken apart, try to get about eight pieces. Serve the curry along with white rice and lightly brewed green tea. Eat it with your right hand, and avoid using too much sliverware.

Enjoy!

Refugee Food Blog #3: Gato te

   The last time I ate sand and mud on purpose was… at least 20 years ago. My parents tell me that, when I was a small child, I would shovel sand into my mouth and later get quite irritable as the inevitable end result chafed me from inside my diaper. Sand is much worse for that sort of thing than, say, corn. The point I'm trying to make is that I have been happily sand- and mud-free for the last two decades, but not everyone gets that luxury.

   "Gato te." If we were speaking Spanish, these words would almost mean "Cat Tea," and I would be about to give you directions for a PETA-decried act of housecat reduction. Unfortunately, that's not the case. This phrase is from Haitian Creole, and it means "mud cakes." Frankly, I don't expect you to try this recipe at home, although it might be a good experience that would broaden your perspective on the whole matter. I've never tried it.

   Such is the food situation in Haiti that right now half the population is facing starvation. To a people from a culture that embraces the words "I'm starving" to mean, "I haven't eaten in, oh, seven hours and boy-howdy is my tummy starting to make noises," starvation doesn't make a lot of sense. But this might put it into perspective: How to make Gato te.

—1 handful of mud

—1 teaspoon of margarine

—1/2 teaspoon of sugar

   Mix the sugar into the margarine, and then mix this with the mud as best you can. Flatten the mud and shape it into a circle, then set it outside to dry in the sun. Don't worry if flies or other insects take interest: hopefully they'll get stuck and add to the nutrients available in the dish. When it's hard, enjoy!

   The margarine and sugar don't mask the taste of the mud, and these cakes have a distinct and lingering aftertaste. I should really be plugging Global Neighborhood right now, but the truth is, Haiti needs your support, and will continue to need your support long after the media's fascination with it has died down. That's true of many places in the world: Myanmar is home to a government dedicated to the proliferation of human rights violations and Thailand's borders are filled with refugee camps hosting Myanmar's victims. They don't have enough money, or near enough. There are refugee camps all over the Middle East filled to bursting with Iraqi and Palestinian refugees (even now, 62 years after Israel's independence). Nepal is home to refugees that are ethnically Nepali, but Bhutanese citizens forcibly expelled from Bhutan. They've been there for a generation and have been forgotten by the media. Africa is spotted with refugee camps harboring the victims of its many wars and famines. There are camps and origins that I've never learned of, but that still need your support.

   You live in the United States. If you have enough money to buy an overpriced coffee or chai tea on an impulse, then you have enough money to help somebody that is in dire straits. And, now that you've read this, you can not claim ignorance.

Refugee Food Blog #2: चिया

   I don't know about you, but I didn't start drinking coffee until I was a junior or senior in high school, and my coffee habit didn't really take off until I started taking hard classes in college. Until I learned to like coffee, I would always get one of two things at parentally-sponsored trips to Starbucks: hot chocolate, or chai tea. Chai tea is great—barely any "tea" flavor, mostly milk and spices. Served Starbucks style, it's like drinking a piping-hot pumpkin pie without any of that nasty squash flavor. A perfect and innocuous desert drink.

   So I've known about chai tea for a long time. Only recently did I discover that "chai tea" is an American bastardization of British slang derived from a Chinese loanword in Hindi, and that the spiced milk-brewed tea at Starbucks is the adopted grandchild of a drink brewed in Nepal… and the Nepali version, as introduced to me by some ethnically Nepali refugees from Bhutan who have been resettled here in Spokane, is way better.

   चिया is the Nepali word for tea, written in Devanagari script and pronounced something like "chiyya." I don't speak Nepali, and I don't read the Devanagari script, but the internet has told me that this is true. And Nepali tea is fantastic—like a version of Starbucks chai tea with a bite, graceful and elegant and deceptively easy to make. Recipes vary slightly from household to household and depend considerably on available spices, but here's how you can make it at home.

—As much milk as you will want to drink, measured in cups

—One teaspoon of loose black tea leaves

—A half teaspoon of ground black pepper

—A half teaspoon of chopped ginger

—One tablespoon of granulated sugar (or less, or more, it's your call)

—Cinnamon

—Cardamom

   Take these ingredients, and stick them in a pot on your stove. Heat the milk on low heat till mildly scalded, but not yet boiling—scalding changes the sugars in the milk to make it sweeter—while stirring to dissolve the sugar and ensure that the milk doesn't burn or stick to the bottom of the pot. Heating it slowly will help with this. Keep it at low heat until it has brewed to the strength you want, then pour into a mug and enjoy!

   If you feel like doing more dishes, you can strain the tea before pouring, but I don't find it necessary.

Refugee Food Blog #1: العدس

   I've pretty much always lived in cold climates, and so I'm perfectly comfortable wandering around in shorts, flip-flops, and a t-shirt, especially in this balmy 40ºF weather. Some people point and laugh, though, but not the refugees from warmer climates. They mostly act worried ("Are you feeling ok?" "Aren't you cold?"), because 40º is no laughing matter for an Iraqi refugee, and they fear I'll get sick. Where Americans might suggest chicken soup as a prophylactic against catching colds, the families of Iraqi refugees that I meet with have their own: lentils.

   العدس, pronounced "al addis," is the Arabic word for lentils, and it makes an absolutely lovely meal. My friend, Haidar, extolled to me over the course of 20 minutes the wide-ranging value of lentils, which I've since forgotten. Ooops. But he also told me how to make this particularly delicious dish:
–2 cups of water for every one cup of lentils

–1 clove of garlic for every one cup of lentils, chopped finely

–1 quarter onion for every one cup of lentils, chopped finely

–1 cup of brown lentils

   Cook until lentils taste "done"—to your preference—and add salt to taste. Transfer to your serving dish, and pour a little olive oil on top. Serve alongside chopped or cherry tomatoes for garnish, and eat with pita bread and your hands. Avoid using silverware if you want it to taste as absolutely wonderful as possible!

Losing some great people

   Do you remember when Pa Ceu, a Chin Burmese refugee, was charged and convicted of child luring? Well, he was absolved in an appeal, and has continued to be an important part of the Chin Burmese community—and the refugee community in general—in Spokane. Unfortunately, work is scarce even for native and white speakers of English, and so it is even scarcer for refugees. With that in mind, Pa Ceu is leaving for Indianapolis—a surprisingly diverse city home to a Chin Burmese population of over 3000. In total, nine families are leaving Spokane for greener pastures and larger cities with larger international populations.

   The exodus of any refugee families from Spokane's community is a loss to us, and especially the exodus of nine families at once. However, as they have told us, "If there were jobs here, people would stay." Refugees are usually extremely dedicated and valuable employees, even though they often lack English skills. Support Spokane's refugee community today, by praying for jobs and by speaking with local business owners about hiring refugees.

Did you know…

   George Washington was born on February 22nd, 1732, and Abraham Lincoln on February 12, 1809, but Washington's Birthday (popularly known as Presidents Day) will never fall on either of their birthdays! In 1968 Congress ratified the Uniform Monday Holiday Act to ensure that Presidents Day, Memorial Day, Columbus Day, and Martin Luther King Jr. Day always fall on Mondays to create three-day weekends for federal employees. So, Presidents Day falls anywhere between February 15 and 21… but never the 22nd.

   So what does Presidents Day have to do with refugees? The United States was predominantly settled by refugees! Plymouth Colony, which became Massachusetts, was settled by refugees fleeing religious persecution—later colonists were refugees escaping from other types of religious persecution and economic hardships. Later, Abraham Lincoln and the Union dedicated their efforts to former slaves seeking asylum in the North, and to ending the situation that made them refugees in the first place. So, Presidents Day can be seen as a tribute to the strength and perseverance of refugees and a celebration of refugees in the United States.