Eden Prairie is home to approximately 500 Somali families, based on estimates from the school district. Since first settling in Eden Prairie in the late 1990s, a substantial portion of the Twin Cities suburban Somali population have come to make a home in the bustling suburb. In this ongoing series, Eden Prairie News will share stories from that community that offer insight into how the Somali people came to Eden Prairie and what their future may hold.
For Khadra Hirsi and her husband, Mohamed Arab, life has been a series of transitions. Then came a move to Eden Prairie and with it, something they had never had – a long-term home.
“We didn’t have, in our life, a place that we’ve been 10 years,” said Hirsi, who works in immigrant services for the city of Eden Prairie’s Housing and Community Services department.
“It’s only Eden Prairie,” she added.
Hirsi and Arab originally met as classmates in a refugee camp near the border of Somalia and Ethiopia. They and their families eventually moved to the Somali capital of Mogadishu, then from country to country after civil war broke out in Somalia.
Hirsi and Arab were one of the early groups of Somalis to settle in Eden Prairie in the late 1990s, and among the first Somali home-owners in the city. Information spreads through the Somali community through word of mouth and for many Somalis in Eden Prairie, Hirsi offers the first resource on how to navigate life in a new culture and country. Arab also worked as a resource for Somali Family Services four years ago, before devoting himself full-time to his business, International Wholesale Foods.
For their children, Eden Prairie is the only home they’ve known.
Hirsi’s journey to a life in Eden Prairie has been circuitous and not without its challenges. She was 5 years old when she first heard the Somali word for “refugee.”
She heard, “Hey refugee, go back to where you’re from.”
“That word, I always remember. It’s in my heart,” Hirsi said.
Hirsi was from a region known as Ogaden, west of Somalia, which includes a large number of Somali people but was under the control of Ethiopia. Fighting broke out between Somalia and Ethiopia in the late 1970s and Hirsi’s family members were among the refugees who fled across the border.
Hirsi stayed at the refugee camp from first grade to eighth grade, then moved to Mogadishu, where she finished her high school years. From Mogadishu, she traveled to Libya, where she stayed for three months; from Libya to Italy, where she stayed two and half years; then from Italy to Jacksonville, Fla., for another two and a half years; then from Florida to San Diego, for another two and half years; and from San Diego to Minnesota. By then, it was the late 1990s and the first wave of Somali immigrants was coming to Minnesota.
“Then Minnesota’s my home, finally,” said Hirsi.
When she was still very young, Hirsi was wounded. Debris sliced through a section of her lower arm, leaving a scar that can still be seen. She became ill from an infection that stemmed from a piece of metal still lodged in her hand. At the time, Hirsi’s father was busy taking care of her mother, who was deathly ill. Hirsi’s uncle helped her, eventually working the piece of metal out of her hand, but there was no medicine to help blunt the pain.
It was in the refugee camps that she met her future husband, Mohamed Arab. They were classmates in elementary school and middle school, then moved to Mogadishu. Hirsi’s school years were during a period of relative stability for Somalia when Mohamed Siad Barre was in power.
Hirsi finished high school when she was 17, and her uncle helped her move to Italy.
The idea was Hirsi could get a nursing or medical degree in Italy and return to work in Somalia and support her family.
“He trusted me that I could be the future for the family,” said Hirsi.
She moved to Italy.
“Then everything changed,” she said.
Civil war broke out in Somalia in 1991: Barre’s regime crumbled and the country became mired in internal rebellion – fighting that has continued with various players to this day.
Back in Italy, school took a back seat to finding work to send funds to her family.
Hirsi initially found work as a nanny. She was 18 years old, a time when most people are thinking about their future, but for Hirsi, the pressure to support her family and even keep them alive was on her head.
She heard about opportunities in the United States, to go to school and get a job. So, Hirsi made the decision to move to Jacksonville, Fla., a time she describes as her “worst years.”
In Jacksonville, she was alone, without access to the easy public transportation that had been so prevalent in Italy. She thought she would be able to get a job right away, while also going to school.
That did not turn out to be the case. Her job counselor found her an opportunity to go to nursing school – a nine month program that would have been really a “very good opportunity,” noted Hirsi.
But, she had a family to feed, back in Somalia. The program would not leave her time for a job.
“Nine months, how can I not feed them?” she asked.
At the time, she thought, “I need this school, I need my future, I need to be a nurse,” but was torn by the fact that her family was counting on her to send support.
“Who’s going to feed them?”
Ultimately, Hirsi turned down the program and sought work. She ended up with two part-time jobs housekeeping, but the wages yielded very little to spare.
Hirsi ended up sleeping maybe four hours a day and having no other Somalis to communicate with. Nowadays, Hirsi works with a group helping new refugees handle mental illness and posttraumatic stress. Looking back Hirsi can see her own depression she felt while living in Florida. She was alone and felt unsafe, lost her appetite, couldn’t sleep, would often cry. She tried to go back to Italy, but such a move would take months and months of processing.
Over and over in her head she wondered why she did not realize she would be gone for good, when she left Somalia.
“I was not ready to leave for good,” she said.
Looking back, she realizes, “I really was so strong.”
“It’s not something that you can make, it’s something that God [gives] you, that’s what I believe.”
She got through it and moved to a place where she could find a home. Now, through her position working with immigrants in the community, she is able to help others face a smoother transition than she had.
Hirsi wants to reach out to help the people of Eden Prairie understand what the Somali people are like.
Life is fast-paced for Hirsi and Arab, who must juggle the demands of their professional lives, their ties to the community and navigating both cultures. When learning about the Somali people of Eden Prairie, key themes emerge: The main issue is that their culture is very focused on doing what’s best for their children.
They “depend on their children,” noted Hirsi.
This ties back to why Somali families started moving to Eden Prairie – and it’s the same reason most people choose Eden Prairie, good schools, safety.
Hirsi said some families including her own, found out Eden Prairie “is a beautiful city,” a “safe city, it has really nice schools.”
Both Hirsi and Arab want people to feel free to get to know their Somali neighbors. If you are invited in for a meal or tea, take them up on the offer.
Keep in mind, they are new to a foreign culture and region.
“It will take time to know a place,” noted Hirsi.
Hirsi said, that, if someone has a neighbor who is an immigrant, know that it’s a family that “feels what you feel.”
They need a safe environment. “Their kids are [the] same as your kids,” she said.
“I feel the same way you feel,” said Hirsi.
She noted the strangeness of moving to a culture where neighbors don’t know each other’s names.
“In our culture the neighbors become family members. That’s where we grow up, that’s where we come from,” she said.
Hirsi said she would like her neighbors to feel comfortable knocking on her door to ask for something.
“It would make me happy,” she said.
edited by
http://www.edenprairienews.com/news/announcements/finding-home-eden-prairie-110
Reviewed by
Ogaden People Solidarity Forum(OPSF)
http://www.ogadenforum.blogspot.com/
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