​Postulants help refugees learn

What it means to be Americans

BY TONI CASHNELLI

Carlo Shivel is teaching the most attentive students he will ever have. Eager and expectant, they are hanging on his every word.

Their futures – and those of their children – depend upon it. With help from Carlo and fellow postulant Tom Murphy, they are learning to become Americans.

women of the Bhutanese communityOnce a week since October, Tom and Carlo have been leading citizenship classes for natives of Bhutan, an Asian kingdom at the eastern end of the Himalayas. Exiled from their homeland in a wave of ethnic cleansing, the Bhutanese lived in refugee camps in Nepal until the United States agreed to resettle 80,000 of them – the largest such effort since Vietnam. Passing the U.S. citizenship test will give them the rights and opportunities that Americans have always taken for granted.

Building Trust

Today they are reviewing the executive branch of government.

“Who is the President of the United States?” Carlo asks the five people clustered around a table in Hartwell. One of them offers, “George Washington?” Unfazed, Carlo prompts, “Remember when we talked about this last week?” Eventually, the correct answer emerges.

The exchange is an exercise in patience and trust. Many of the 9,000 Bhutanese assigned to Cincinnati – they did not ask to be here – struggle with illiteracy, English, culture shock, joblessness and family conflicts. Some are college graduates, but, “We have a number of people who don’t speak English and cannot read or write in their native language, Nepali,” says Sheryl Rajbhandari, coordinator of Heartfelt Tidbits, a program founded in 2010 to educate and socialize area refugees. “The majority of people above the age of 40 managed orchards or farms in Bhutan” and had only a few years of primary school.

When Carlo volunteered, “This was all new to me,” he says, “even though Cincinnati is one of the largest populations of these people in this country.”

Tom has done tutoring, “but never with people from other countries. PHOTOS BY TONI CASHNELLIBhutan (photo from Heartfelt Tidbits Facebook page)Students are eager to learn.A Bhutanese child. Teachers Carlo Shivel and Tom Murphy.One of my interests is I hope one day to possibly work with refugees or migrants or displaced peoples. I heard recently that Cardinal Turkson [of Ghana] at the General Chapter in Assisi asked us as friars to go work more on the fringes of the world and frankly, working with refugees, they are the fringes of the world. These are people who are stateless: They don’t have homes, they don’t have a country to live in.”

A world of worry

Adding to their anxiety is the lack of information about the recent deadly earthquake and aftershocks in Nepal. “Being separated from family members due to relocation is difficult,” says American-born Sheryl, who is married to a Nepalese native. “They also face some racism and mistreatment because many Americans don’t understand that a refugee is a person who enters the U.S. with proper documentation. Many people assume that if you’re foreign you enter the U.S. illegally.”

 Besides that, “Life in the U.S. is so different than what they’re accustomed to.” Some spent half their lives in bamboo huts before coming to America. “These folks have never had running water or electricity prior to living here, so everything is new for them. Figuring out how to do simple things such as using a stove, shopping at a grocery store and doing laundry is difficult.” Depression is so common among Bhutanese refugees that since 2008, when resettlement began, their rate of suicide has been twice the national average.

It’s a fraction of that in Cincinnati, where Heartfelt Tidbits makes them feel welcome – and helps them succeed.

Tom and Carlo’s citizenship classes are part of a Thursday project that serves between 25 and 45 Bhutanese at the Centennial Barn, a space provided by the Franciscan Sisters of the Poor. The program includes lunch, the study of English, the sharing of good news and communal poetry or meditation.  Former refugee Giri Sapkota, who recently passed his citizenship test, helps Sheryl with translation. Newcomers are welcomed with a slight bow and the palms-pressed-together greeting that is common among yoga teachers: “Namaste”, meaning, “I bow to the God within you.”

As a group, “These are very vulnerable people, trusting and open,” says Sheryl. “They have a tremendous inner strength, a joy for life and a compassion for the human race. When you think of their struggle to get to safety from Bhutan to Nepal, live in a camp for 20-plus years, move to a strange country and continue to smile and think positively, you realize they’re special. I learn from them every day to take life as it comes versus always fretting about the future.”

Little victories

Tom is likewise inspired. “These people really want to make a life for themselves. They really want to learn and understand the country. They want to contribute. They really want to become citizens.”

It has not been easy for them or their teachers. “They [organizers] gave us a binder with nice materials and basically said, ‘Here’s your group; teach them,’” according to Carlo. “I personally was very upset after the first few weeks and told Sheryl, ‘They’re not learning anything. I don’t know what to do.’ She said, ‘You just have to keep going.’ Through trial and error I’ve developed what works for my particular group of people. I told Sheryl yesterday, ‘It’s kind of funny that we’re leaving [for summer studies] and I just started to learn how to do this.’”

In Carlo’s class of three women and two men, “They’re very eager to learn, and they do listen very intently, but they do get very frustrated with the fact that it’s so hard for them. Anytime they grasp or understand anything I’m happy about it. You have to look at it like little victories.”

 Tom had to find his own way using games, puzzles and flash cards. Right, Giri Sapkota and Sheryl Rajbhandari; below, “It’s so hard    for them,” Carlo says.“I had just learned they needed help with writing and was trying to come up with a good way to teach them.” When the breakthrough came, he was rewarded with the compliment, “Asal shicksha” – “Good teacher”.

Contributions

“Every time a new volunteer is brought into the program they bring something new,” says Sheryl. “Carlo and Tom have been able to share so many things about themselves with the refugees, like the story of Christmas, prayer, what’s involved with being a friar, Southern food (cornbread, red beans and rice), and an enthusiasm for learning. They’re constantly providing feedback and were able to give us some insight into how to change the citizenship material to make it easier to teach and easier for the refugees to understand. They will be missed by the refugees and the volunteers.”

The experience has been humbling. “I’ve learned about a group of good people and the hardships they’ve had to go through,” says Carlo, “and how difficult it is to learn English and pass this exam. I’ve learned the value of doing something that is difficult and will stretch you and how rewarding that ultimately is.”

As for Tom, “The biggest thing I’ve learned is that I like to teach.”

 Fortunately, his students like to listen.

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Also, at the end of April a group of frequent Negril visitors, about 50, held their Third Annual Belly Flop Competition at Sea Star.  It was quite a splash as various contestants, in varied costumes, vied for the Belly Flop championship.  At the end of the competition I was given $2,000 for the GKTS program.

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• It’s that time of year, as Fr. Kenan Freson discovered last week at St. Anthony Shrine in Cincinnati. “When I went outside Thursday to do some yard work, a fawn in the brush by the ‘Fatima’ shine came out and followed me to the building.”
• Pope Francis is borrowing a line from Francis’ “Canticle of the Creatures” for his upcoming encyclical on the environment, CNS reported this week. Expected to be released June 16, the encyclical will be titled “Laudato Sii” (Praised Be), named for the introductory phrase to eight verses of the prayer. The Vatican would neither confirm nor deny the report.
• When Jubilarian Fr. Dennis Bosse was asked to reflect on his 25 years in the priesthood for the May 23 Jubilee issue of the (New Orleans) Clarion Herald, he wrote:  “The one thing I can say about being a priest, which I put in the context of being a Franciscan friar first, is going where I am sent and trusting in the Lord that this is where he wants me to be – for the people and not for myself.”

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​The face of the futureIt’s a milestone week for Roger Bacon seniors. This morning, members of the class of 2015 donned caps and gowns for their Baccalaureate Mass at St. Clement Church in St. Bernard. Tomorrow evening, they’ll be RB alumni. Commencement exercises are at 8 p.m. Friday at the Fogarty Center. Congratulations to all!

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