Building Bridges for Refugees from Burma

Mone Aye is being honored as a White House Champion of Change for World Refugees.

I was born in a camp for refugees from Burma, located in Thailand, and lived there until I was 19. In 2007, when finally given the opportunity to, my family applied to come to the United States and was accepted. We moved to Iowa, as do many refugees from Burma, and, finding it to be the perfect place for our family to settle down, we’ve made it our home ever since.  Living in a new country with a new culture and having to start our lives over again has been challenging for us. When we first arrived, we didn’t know much English, so even getting to doctors’ appointments was difficult. There were services available to us, but, with cultural and linguistic barriers, we didn’t know how to access them.

In 2011, I co-founded the Ethnic Minorities of Burma Advocacy and Resource Center (EMBARC) along with 5 other ethnic community members: Mu Law, Ree Reh, Ro Sang, Thway Kaw Paw, and Henny Ohr, our Executive Director. We wanted to combine the efforts of the ethnic minority members living in Des Moines to achieve a better quality of life. Although EMBARC has dedicated staff, volunteerism is essential to the sustainability of the organization.  Members of the Board, primarily refugees from Burma, volunteer their time to assist newcomers and provide direction to the EMBARC administration. They are inspired by their common goal of helping refugees succeed. Other refugees provide critical support to newcomers through activities coordinated by EMBARC, such as its Refugee Navigator and AmeriCorps Refugee RISE programs. These programs are designed to empower those they seek to help by providing them with resources to create self-sustaining, community-based support systems.

I have served as the board president for the ethnic community-based organization (ECBO), EMBARC, since its formation. From the initial community meeting in 2011, EMBARC has obtained 501(c)3 status, and received a significant federal grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Administration for Children and Families. EMBARC continues the practice of supporting the oppressed and helping refugees from Burma succeed. It has programs to address current needs and to determine any new initiatives that may be needed. EMBARC understands the needs of the refugee community; we understand their resources—both tangible and intangible—and encourage and model success and independence, while showing compassion in leading folks to resources.

In 2014, I became a United States citizen. As an individual that was born displaced, I personally consider my citizenship to be one of my greatest accomplishments. In 2015, I passed the last of my HiSET (GED) exams and am looking forward to earning a college degree. I have a family, a job that serves my community (Bilingual Outreach Worker for Des Moines Public Schools), I teach English classes on Saturdays, and do whatever it takes to ensure the safety and comfort of my community members as a board member of EMBARC.  

Mone Aye was instrumental in establishing the Ethnic Minorities of Burma Advocacy and Resource Center (EMBARC), a non-profit created by and for refugees from Burma in Iowa. 

A Life and Death Decision

Sasha Chanoff is being honored as a White House Champion of Change for World Refugees.

In the past two decades of work with the U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program, there is one situation that stands out, a life and death decision point in my work that changed me and opened the doors to starting RefugePoint.

In February of 2000, I was part of a small U.S.-funded rescue team that went into the Congo to evacuate people who were being massacred there. Our mission was to get out 112 survivors who were stuck in a safe haven outside Congo’s capital, Kinshasa. My boss David at the International Organization for Migration, where I worked at the time, had overseen six months of evacuations that had flown out nearly 2,000 people who would all eventually come to the U.S. For this final evacuation flight, David told me that under no circumstances could we include anyone else beyond the 112 – doing so would jeopardize the mission due to the complexities of operating in a country at war.

When my colleague Sheikha, my operations partner on the mission, and I arrived in the safe haven, we took photographs and biographical data details for the 112 people to create our flight manifest. Then, a man working in the safe haven pointed to a large, 20 x 20 tent in the compound and told us we needed to take a look at the new arrivals in there. They were not on our list, but Sheikha and I went in anyway.

As we stepped through the tent door, it was as if time stood still for moment. There were 32 widows and orphans huddled together. They all looked emaciated and traumatized. The man who brought us in told us that these people had been in a prison camp where many of their family members had been executed. Sheikha leaned over to a little girl holding a doll and asked, what’s your doll’s name? Suddenly the doll’s eyes popped open and we realized it was a tiny baby who looked more dead than alive.

That night Sheikha told me we had to try and take them. I argued that we couldn’t, that we needed to stick with the program and not put the others at greater risk. I wondered, could I live with myself if we left the widows and orphans there and they were killed? I didn’t think so. But could I live with myself if we tried to take them and failed to get everyone out, as David had warned? It was an impossible situation. Sheikha finally convinced me to try, and David agreed as long as the U.S. Embassy was on board. They were.

We managed to get everyone to the airport on the final evacuation day, but on the tarmac the Congolese government officials began scrutinizing our list and the photographs and stopped us from boarding the widows and orphans. For a few tense minutes it looked like we wouldn’t get anyone out. They finally let us board everyone and fly out.

Later all those evacuees resettled to the United States. I’ve watched over the past fifteen years as they’ve rebuilt their lives, joined the work force, married and had children, gone to college, and become U.S. citizens.

That experience in the Congo opened my eyes to refugees who were off the radar and yet needed resettlement as a life-saving solution, people like the Sudanese Lost Girls in Kakuma camp who were overlooked during the Lost Boys resettlement, or refugees who had fled to urban slum areas after attacks in refugee camps. This is what inspired me to start RefugePoint, so we could reach other refugees in life-threatening situations who have slipped through the safety nets and disappeared into the cracks in the system.  For me it all goes back to that seminal decision point, which changed how I think and act.

Sasha Chanoff is the founder and executive director of RefugePoint, an organization that finds lasting solutions for the world’s most vulnerable refugees. 

Finding Home Turf

Ben Gucciardi is being honored as a White House Champion of Change for World Refugees.

As youth face the difficult realities of building a new life in the United States, the Soccer Without Borders (SWB) program I founded is a space they feel safe and respected.  For many, the concept of classroom learning is foreign. But the sport of soccer, and the basic concept of play, provides a familiar platform for healthy learning and growth.  Youth from different backgrounds find common ground on the soccer field and build cross-cultural relationships. The development of this social support system simultaneously empowers individuals and strengthens the community.

In my work with SWB, I have the opportunity to work with refugees like Take Hel Say, who arrived in Oakland, California at the age of fifteen speaking no English, having grown up in a refugee camp in Thailand. Originally from Burma, her family had fled civil war and persecution of her Karen ethnic group. When she stepped on to the field, something sparked in her: though she lacked soccer skills, she felt immediately comfortable, engaged and grateful for an opportunity to simply play. She invited friends to come along, and became a leader within her Karen and school communities. Now, five years later, Hel Say has graduated high school, is attending community college, and has joined Soccer Without Borders as a part-time coach for younger girls.

We are proud of the work we have done at Soccer Without Borders, but perhaps most proud that we have reached a point in the organization that young people like Hel Say are assuming formal leadership roles, and teaching us how to best serve newcomer communities. 

Ben Gucciardi is the founder of Soccer Without Borders. He has a Master’s degree in Global Educational Leadership from Lehigh University.