What Houston’s refugees can teach Harvey survivors
The city’s internationally displaced people are uniquely qualified to support those who lost everything
“D o you think we can get pho?” my daughter asked.
Lucky to escape Harvey unscathed, we were venturing out for the first time since the deluge hit Texas. There in our favorite noodle shop, it was possible to imagine a Houston untouched by disaster.
But even before Hurricane Harvey, that would have been an illusion. Disaster is what brought thousands of Houstonians here in the first place. This is a city of survivors.
Houston is by now well-known as the country’s most diverse city. But it is more than an immigrant hub; it’s America’s No. 1 magnet for refugees.
And for anyone rocked by Harvey’s life-upending losses, those refugees and their experiences can be a monumental resource. Many are facing the flood’s ravages alongside their neighbors, but they are distinct because every refugee lost everything once before. And then they rebuilt. After 20 years reporting and living in my adopted city, I’ve come to feel awe at its once-displaced population. Since the 1970s, more than 70,000 refugees from 78 countries have settled in Houston, all fleeing versions of the chaos unleashed by Harvey. Most lost status, work and community, along with the possessions, snapshots and love letters that tell our life stories.
They might not fit the
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profile you expect. In recent years, they’ve been arriving from Bhutan, Burma, Iraq, Afghanistan and Cuba.
During the 1980s, they poured into the city to escape death squads and guerrilla war in El Salvador and Guatemala. And in the 1970s, Houston became home to tens of thousands of Vietnamese.
What, I wondered over my Vietnamese coffee, might they tell their fellow Houstonians right now? Mechelle Tran, the pho restaurant’s 37-year-old owner, had an answer. “I came here when I was 5. I have trauma amnesia, but I grew up hearing the stories,” she said.
After weeks at sea, the family landed in refugee camps in Malaysia and the Philippines.
“There were a lot of parallels to Houston right now,” Tran said. “A bottle of fish sauce was like liquid gold, because all you had were processed packaged foods. Nothing real.”
Living in chronic uncertainty, her parents had zero control of their future for years until a church linked them to a host family in Houston.
Damaging as it was,
the displacement changed her for the better, Tran believes. For one thing, because Houston’s community helped them start over, she and her peers are almost fanatical about community service. When her restaurant had no more food to give, Tran orchestrated a T-shirt drive for drenched Houston Police Department officers.
Seeing her parents’ struggle to protect her also forged an iron resolve to honor their efforts.
“You had no choice, no options, no falling back,” Tran said. “It’s grit. The kids whose parents have lost everything in the flood will see their parents rebuilding. They will have that little bit in them that says, ‘I saw Mom and Dad do this.’”
Flood survivors might also find surprising strength in seeing themselves as one striving community. Benito Juarez, who oversees immigrant affairs for the city, told me that the Latino, South Asian, African and other refugees who settled here make it a point to band together.
“A sense of solidarity is built into their situation,” Juarez said.
For Harvey’s survivors, that could translate to those recovering fastest sharing services and emotional help with the hardest hit.
Taking action, especially on behalf of someone else, is a lifeline, Yani Keo, a Cambodian refugee leader, believes. Keo lost more than 60 family members to the genocidal rule of Pol Pot.
Pitching in for others, Keo said, gives an uprooted life meaning again. Research backs this up. Post-traumatic growth suggests trauma builds strength. It’s not always the case, but taking action, and seeing a model of someone else’s resilience, make positive change more likely.
As I sipped the last of my Vietnamese coffee, Tran added one more thing. No one chooses to be wrenched from home, she said. But flood survivors overwhelmed by their future might have more power than they realize.
“The minute your foot touched that boat or canoe, you made a decision,” Tran said. “You made the decision to fight.”