Picking Up at the Airport
Day 1
We showed up at the airport about 10 minutes prior to the arrival of our refugee families. It didn’t take long before we spotted several people carrying IOM bags proceding down the concourse.
IOM – check. Ethnicity – check. Number of family members – ???. Yikes!? There are too many people! We agreed to take two families at once, since they are closely related. But we were told there would be eight people total, two families of four. It looked like at least 12 people were headed our way.
OK, one woman was an escort. She accompanied the families half way around the world to make sure they would arrive in the right place at the right time. Now she turns around and goes back.
An LSS case worker arrived and explained that, indeed, there were three families arriving, our two families and another that LSS was taking care of. Phew!
We sorted out the families. LSS had also brought an interpreter to help explain some of the details surrounding the next few days. With the interpreter present we also took time to get Social Security paperwork filled out. Asking for mother’s maiden name and place of birth is always a challenge, made slightly easier with someone who speaks their language.
Once the paperwork was completed we loaded up their luggage in a couple vans and drove them to temporary housing. They have other relatives that arrived a few months ago living in Milwaukee. They will share their apartment, and the apartment of a neighbor, for a couple weeks until we have space available for them.
The risk is that they decide they want to continue living with their relatives. The certainly seemed happy to be reunited. Our hope is that they realize that cramming 8 people into a single apartment is just too much. But coming from a refugee camp where they lived for years, it might be all the space they need.
It’s after 10 pm. The families started their journey more than 27 hours before. They are with relatives now. They are tired, but happy. We leave them alone for the night as the rush begins tomorrow. Our journey of creating productive, contributing members of our society has just begun.
