IMMIGRATION
At each “social service” table, there was almost always a language barrier and the need for a translator, though some services, like the grocery store, had no translators available. Some participants walked off in frustration, others tried their best to communicate with hand signals, and others just looked on in confusion as the clerk spoke a foreign language.
“People sometimes get the idea that refugees have it easy once they get to the U. S.,” said Tyler Reeve, community outreach coordinator at Community Refugee and Immigration Services. “This is to give people an idea of some of the challenges that arise when a refugee comes.”
Ben Davis and his wife, Tress Reed, of Westerville, got to see a little bit of what it might be like to be a Somali family with three young children who have been in Columbus for only two days.
As they dashed from table to table, they were constantly thwarted: turned away because they didn’t have the information they didn’t know they needed
from another agency, or told they didn’t have enough bus passes to get there, or that they must wait for a translator.
“It can be a little overwhelming and a little confusing when you have to go from one agency to another for your needs,” Davis said. “It would be terrifying and frustrating ( to be a refugee).”
Reed said refugees “must just feel hopeless and want to give up, but can’t.”
Though agencies like Community Refugee help refugees when they arrive, the experience is still difficult. The walk-through was supposed to show people the first four weeks — which can be the toughest for refugees — but doesn’t fully show what it can be like for new Americans, Reeve said.
The event is meant to educate people, “to help people gain some level of awareness of what people are required to do when challenges arise in the resettlement period,” Reeve said.
The resettlement period is usually 90 days, during which the refugees get intensive case-management services from the resettlement agency.
Maeve Richards, of Clintonville, came to the event to learn more about refugees.
“I just really wanted to gain a little more experience,” said Richards, a bartender who was appointed the matriarch of a Nepali family during the activity. “Columbus has a huge refugee population, and it’s important to get a different perspective and see what people go through.”