A new life
Syrian family thanks community, sponsors for all they’ve done
Tears threaten to fall when Ahmad Alhsso starts to talk about how thankful he is to Canada and Cape Breton for saving his family’s life.
Alhsso, from Syria, is thankful for Munro Academy Response Syria (MARS), which sponsored his family and spent 20 months trying to get them to Canada. He’s also thankful for the help from Cape Breton Island Centre for Immigration and Lifeline Syria Cape Breton. Finally, he’s thankful for the island’s welcoming strangers.
“I thank everyone who has gotten involved in helping us get here, even people who just smile at us,” he said, through a translator. “I am now starting my new life and I am focusing on the future.”
Alhsso was one of the speakers at an event put on by Lifeline Syria Cape Breton. About 150 volunteers, sponsors and family members got together to share a meal and to give thanks.
For the eight Syrian families who attended, people like Alhsso, his wife, Jenan Alahmad, and three of his four children, they were giving thanks for the help they were given to get to Canada.
“I moved out from Syria because I wanted security for my children. I wanted them to be safe and continue their education,” he said.
“When we moved here, I thought there would be challenges. But the sponsor provided everything for us from A to Z.”
The family is from Aleppo. In 2013, shortly after the war broke out, they fled to Turkey where Alhsso worked in construction. Three years ago, they started their application to come to Canada under refugee status.
“I found there was nothing worth staying for in Syria. There was no jobs, no education, no security for my children,” Alhsso said.
They moved to Canada in August and the transition to life here has been easier than he thought it would be. That’s thanks to their sponsor group, which is often checking up on the family.
“I have been with Ahmad since day one and he is always telling me he didn’t think or didn’t expect the group or the sponsor to manage everything for him,” said Moataz Alzowri, Alhsso’s volunteer translator from Saudi Arabia.
“Because what we went through in Syria, compared to what we have now, our family has been saved. We’ve beaten that,” Alhsso said, stressing how happy he feels watching his children play and live a “normal life.”
“We feel welcomed. We feel very safe.”
Anne McDermid, a volunteer with MARS through the Westmount United Church, thinks the community should feel very lucky to have Alhsso and his family living here.
“When you have a family who wants to become part of community, that’s a big step. That’s what they are for us. They want to live here and be a part of this community,” she said.
“They have shown us how to live, with their giving and their hospitality. We are very lucky to have them here.”
Alhsso plans to stay in Cape Breton and start a business, so he can give back to the community and country that saved his family’s life.
“I thank, especially Anne because she is always with us. I thank the sponsor and everyone else who is always here with us. I thank the people here in Canada,” he said.
Anne laughed, “I said to Ahmad when I was driving him around the other day, ‘when I get old, you’ll be driving me.’”
Everyone laughed. It was a room full of good friends, blind to differences of language, skin tone or religion.
“I thank everyone who has gotten involved in helping us get here, even people who just smile at us.
I am now starting my new life and I am focusing on the future.”
Ahmad Alhsso