Refugee family moves on to Halifax
Local sponsors say experience was rewarding
A Syrian refugee family that initially settled in Cape Breton has moved to Halifax but those who brought them to the island say the experience was still a positive one.
Stephen Read, who was part of a group of neighbours in Marion Bridge who sponsored Mahmoud and Halima Aabo and their four young children in coming to island, said the family recently decided to move to Halifax to be closer to friends who had also come to Nova Scotia as refugees.
“They wanted to be closer to their friends and felt more comfortable there with people that can speak their own language because there’s many (refugee) families that went to Halifax, mostly because Halifax has a federalprovincial agency that deals with refugees and we don’t have one in Cape Breton,” he said.
The Aabo family arrived in Sydney in January and resided with Read and his wife Irene Grezel for the first few months before they moved into their own place in Sydney. About six weeks ago they made the move to Halifax.
Read said getting to know the Aabo family and helping them settle into life in Canada was rewarding.
“We were happy to be helping them out. It would have been nice if they stayed in Cape Breton but they had their own lives to live and that was fine. We respect that,” he said. “Our main goal was to get a family out of a bad situation and we did that, so we’re pretty happy. It would have been nice if they stayed close but that’s by far secondary.”
Read said the kindness and openness shown by so many Cape Bretoners to the effort to bring a family here, and then to the Aabos once they arrived, was wonderful.
“We’re very, very appreciative and it went a long way and I think it made a very positive experience for our refugee family,” he said, noting, “There were literally well over 100 people and organizations who contributed positively to what we did and helped us out along the way.”
The Aabo family came to Nova Scotia through a program that saw the federal government match the funds raised by the private sponsor families in Marion Bridge. They will continue to support the Aabo family until the end of a full year.