Just to clarify...

So apparently a few people have been calling my mother very concerned about why I am deferring medical school. So just to clarify: I am NOT pregnant, NOT getting married, I do NOT have cancer, and I am NOT doing a secret government research project (though if I was I wouldn't tell you otherwise). I am planning on deferring medical school because I feel like I need to slow myself down a little bit. I am really passionate about medicine and public health and I know that medical school is right for me but I feel like I have been barreling-along for so long that I don't know what it means to slow down and take care of myself. So I want to spend some time with fewer commitments so that I can figure out what a physical, mental and spiritually sustainable lifestyle would look like for me. I figure that my life isn't going to get any less hectic after I enter medical school so there is no better time to pause than right now--there is nothing at Emory that won't be there in one year. I am sure that within five months I will be cursing the day that I made this decision and will be going insane with wanting to be back in school but that is okay--I'll just take up some bizarre hobbies (I've always wanted to try noodling....).

Manuel está en New Jersey

I owe myself ten bucks--totally was a different state. So we found the Cuban eventually and he will now be forwarded to Portland.

"¿Dónde está Manuel?" And other stories

First, I am going to Emory (Woot!) but I think that I am going to defer medical school for a year (take a moment, pick up your jaw from the floor). There are a lot of reasons for this but in short I feel like God is poking me in the arm about this and, as a friend recently told me, "you should listen to those pokes in your arm, otherwise he'll start shoving and he's a big guy, that'll hurt." I'll keep y'all posted as that decision develops.

"All Hail Panem"
This weekend was really fun! We had the JV Olympics (hosted by the Tacoma house) themed Hunger games! Each house had to dress up to represent our "district" (We wore hair curlers and big fake nails to represent Gresham: the land of a thousand hair salons). We then had a processional parade with a trumpet and a large banner to a nearby park where we competed in a variety of Hunger Games-themed competitions. (part of the theme was that the rules changed frequently and that the "capitol" sabatoged us frequently--aka the Lutheran Volunteers from Tacoma came with tennis rackets to intercept the water balloon toss). The most important part of this story is that Gresham won! It was a close competition with Hillsboro but in the end our knowledge of Hunger Games trivia carried the day (we studied the trilogy in the car ride over--we are that competitive). Our prize was a large glass goblet decorated in gold rhinestones--I will be shocked if it survives the next JV party without it getting stolen.

"Applying Old Skills"
Our office is chronically short of interpreters so we often have to rely on other clients to interpret for newcomers (does this violate privacy?--probably. Do we have any other choice?--no). There is sort of this "sweet spot" around 3-7 months when English-speaking refugees don't have a lot to do (lots of free time) and have been around long enough to help out a newcomer. My coworker Brendon relied on an amenable Iraqi client--who had been a translator for the US military--during an intake for a recent arrival today. He apparently was an excellent interpreter but his set-up was a little quirky. During the intake held at a round table, Brendon sat at 12 o'clock, his client sat at 3 o'clock, and the guy translating stood behind them at 1:30. Brendon kept offering a chair to the guy but he refused saying that he was used to translating this way and that it was more comfortable. I was laughing about this quirk but occured to me shortly after hearing this story that he probably worked in intelligence for the US military and was a translator for interrogations--erm...at least he's applying his skills?

"Speaking of Iraqis" part I
I helped enroll five Iraqi kids in school this week (two older brothers and a set of triplets!) The family seems really sweet. One of the triplets is developmentally disabled and has never gone to school before--I am really excited for him because I think that the United States' school system does a great job helping kids with special needs (especially compared to Jordan and Iraq)--I think he will flourish. The dad is a character--very intense, very Iraqi--who cares a lot about his kids. He doesn't speak English very well so he is very intense and focused when trying to force out sentences. When two of the kids started school yesterday he waited with them at the bus stop. He noticed the other kids at the stop and--thinking they lived in the same complex as his kids (true) and wanting them to be available to help his kids if they ran into trouble (valid)--turned to them and said very loudly and intensely "What is your apartment number?!" The kids kinda panicked (stranger-danger radar going off to the nth degree I am sure) and my coworker had to reassure them that they weren't going to be kidnapped. Later, the Dad wanted to make sure his kids had gotten to school okay so he took a bus and just marched through the hallways of the school, without a visitor's pass, looking for them. Luckily, my coworker again intercepted him and tried to explain the concept of school security so that he won't get arrested some day in a grand cultural misunderstanding.

"¿Dónde está Manuel?" or "La Jefa"
I have spent the last several days trying to locate an elderly cuban man. Rather, more specifically, I have been trying to figure out where he will be resettled next week. This guy came into our drop-in center last week seeking help for getting his brother's case (Manuel is the brother) transfered to Portland. Apparently Manuel, being 75 and having never left Cuba, forgot the name of the city where his brother lived and so was sent to whatever resettlement city had room. His arrival is imminent so the brother needs to get in touch with his case manager to arrange the switch but no one know which resettlement agency he is coming through. Furthermore, the city to which he says he is being sent does not actually have a resettlement agency. We called the nearby cities but no one had heard of his case. I am convinced he is remembering the state wrong (he's old and there are several cities by this name in other states) but the brother swears it is correct. (I'm not too worried, when he arrives he can call his brother and tell him where he is--ten bucks says it's a different state.) But the whole time I am helping this guy I keep thinking back to a book exercise we did in spanish class where we wrote repeatedly "¿Dónde está Manuel?" and then practiced saying where he could be. ¿Dónde está Manuel? Manuel está en Cuba. Manuel está en el aeroplano. Manuel no está in Portland. ¿Dónde está Manuel? They gave us his refugee case number and I told his friend (the interpreter) that Cecilia would try to find him (side note: this interpreter was resettled by Cecilia 13 yrs. before--he was shocked that she was still around) When he explained this to Manuel's brother he said "La jefa va a buscarlo." I told Cecilia that the Cuban guy referred to her as "La jefa" she said "Oh yeah, they used to call me that." [NBD] I am not calling her anything else from now on.

"Speaking of Iraqis" part 2
This older Iraqi lady was just resettled by us and I went with her case manager (brendon) to visit her at home. We knocked on the door repeatedly and called her name but there was no answer. She spoke no English and had only arrived a few days prior so it was highly unlikely that she had gone out. The door was unlocked (oops--guess that part of "cultural orientation" didn't stick) so we pushed it open and continued to shout her name. There was still no answer so I was sent in (because I was a woman and therefore not as threatening) to see if she was in her room. I saw that she was laying on her bed so I quickly tip-toed out to confer with Brendon. We couldn't just leave--she might be dead for all we know--but I was afraid to go into her bedroom and wake her up--if she wasn't dead, I might kill her from shock. In the end I awkwardly knocked on the frame of her bedroom door and yelled her name really loudly several time. She finally woke up--startled and discomforted that we just walked in--and we spent some time trying to explain to her that she needed to lock her door when she went to sleep because "anybody" could come in (clearly we did).

Well, I have to go speak to a man about a horse (or rather, to a Somali about a job). Until next time! (which hopefully won't be longer than 2 weeks like last time)

The good, the bad, and the baby!

[Side note: thanks for all of the support concerning Emory! The interview weekend was really neat. I didn't get the scholarship but it was great to get another look at the school and I am glad that I went.]

The Good
Remember how I got cursed a few weeks ago? That family managed to make it to Minnesota to see their relatives! The dad's dying wish was fulfilled despite the best efforts and confusion of the medical establishment. Also in the "good" category--last week we took an 11 yr old Afghani boy to outdoors camp. He has only been in the US for a few months but he is super brave and wanted to participate in the outdoors camp (something that every 6th grader gets to do in this district). He didn't have anything on the packing list so we were scrambling to find a sleeping bag, flashlight, etc.. His mom was probably the most nervous--she cried and blessed him with the Koran when we went to pick him up. But he had a fabulous time and even won a "best camper" award!

The Bad
Not all refugees make it in the United States. One of our guys who struggles with mental illness just lost his housing when his benefits ended. I'm really struggling with this one--this guy was the very first refugee who I worked with by myself (remember that frantic post during my first week about the Iranian father and daughter?). I feel like once we decide to resettle a refugee in the United States then we have a certain responsibility towards them. There is something fundamentally wrong about bringing an unwell man to the United States to be homeless. It is hard to feel good about your work when the system completely fails.

The Baby!!!
On the other side of the emotional spectrum, I visited a new baby the other day--the first american citizen in this family! Even more precious than the newborn were the new parents. They were so nervous and careful with this little guy, and every time the baby yawned the Dad would exclaim with delight. It was even more special because these parents were from two different cultures--one was a somali muslim and one was an ethiopian christian (the wife told me that if she wants to tease her husband she brings up Israel). They should be the poster family for world peace.

The good, the bad, and the supernatural

The good: I got a call from Emory School of Medicine's dean of admissions who told me that I am a finalist for a full-tuition scholarship to the school! The school is flying me out to Atlanta next week for another round of interviews. (for perspective: 12 finalists, 4 scholarships) WOOOOOT!!!!!!

The bad: I nicknamed an iraqi family "sketchy mcsketchers" last week when i found out that they are in the process of arranging for a russian bride for their son over the internet. Sketchy....

The supernatural: I was officially cursed by a Somali elder on Friday-or rather, I and the medical establishment were cursed. This was during a palliative care team meeting which I was invited to sit in on while we talked with one of our Somali family's about Dad's end-stage cancer (Dad is 80+). They had only arrived a week earlier and I started out very upset that we brought a man to the US just to die in a foreign land. It turns out that it is not quite a foreign land--he has friends in Minnesota and he wants to see them before he dies so that they can bury his body correctly. When the doctor tried to explain that he wouldn't survive a trip to Minnesota, the wife got very agitated and the translator had to awkwardly explain that we were being cursed for not following the wishes of an elder. I have discovered that I really am a romantic--I am totally on the family's side and believe that there is something sacred about a man's dying wish. I am also pretty sure that they will get him there--it might involve kidnapping him out of hospice and pulling a 'little miss sunshine' in the back of a VW van. But seriously, they will get him there--if an 80 yr old guy could survive a two day trip from the other side of the world with metastatic tumors, they will find a way to get him to Minnesota. (I might slip them a train schedule on the sly to help).

Different Perspectives

Funny story--I got really sick. Like really sick, and I had to miss nearly two weeks of work in favor of lying in bed and resenting the outside world that I could not join. Since I am a part of a Luddite-loving organization, I do not have internet access at home so I was unable to complain about feeling sick in blog form. After some intense western medicine, however, I am significantly improved and have (thank God) returned to work. And thus resume my de-contextualized stories of the refugee-in-Portland world. I have two stories today that I can sort of label "different perspectives"

1) There is this Burmese family that was being cheated in a major way by their ex-landlord who wanted close to $2,000 for "extreme damages" to their old apartment (minus the security deposit that still meant the family owed about $900). This family has 7 kids and only government assistance for an income so when they came to us I was ready to "go to bat" for them in a major way. I researched tenant/landlord laws, spoke to renters rights hotlines, contacted friends in law offices, etc.--I didn't want the family paying anything extra. After we had drafted one letter, the landlord and the case manager spoke and the landlord agreed to knock off $200 in charges. Legal action really wasn't an option for the family so the case manger just sent them the revised bill. I was not thrilled. But the family came in to see us later that day and they were ecstatic. They were so excited, mom kept shaking our hands saying "thank you" and the teenage boy (the only english speaker) asked us to look over the check he wrote to make sure it was correct. They even brought an envelope and a stamp and asked us to write out the landlord's address. They didn't even know what they were paying for--in their eyes they were just asked for a large sum of money, they came to us for help and they saw a concrete result from our advocacy. They were so happy that someone cared enough to help them. Despite my frustrations I decided it was a success story--even though I still think the land lord is a crook--because in the end what matters is that we made someone feel like they mattered enough to be helped.

2) I have made friends with this really sweet Ethiopian lady who is about to have her first baby (thousands of miles away from any relatives--and she is only a year older than me). She has been translating for us (for free) and I stopped by her apartment the other day to say thank you and to give her a baby blanket I made. She and her neighbor were sharing coffee and invited me to join them. It turns out that the two of them watch Jerry Springer together every afternoon (they asked me if the people were real.....I wasn't sure how to answer). This episode had this crazy lady (as per usual) who was in a fight with her boss--both of them happened to be African American. We were chatting about the show and I discovered that the two women thought that all black people in the US must be like this and consequently they were afraid of Portland's African American community. I spent some time trying to explain "stereotypes," "non-representative samples" and the general problems with reality TV but I don't know if I made any difference. So thank you Jerry Springer--you have successfully made Africans afraid of African Americans.    

As promised, a few stories

Again, I apologize for the delay in story updates--we had to go do JVC which means no access to technology for the better part of a week. So allow me to catch you up on a few gems:

The suspicious Nepali family:  I got to do my first airport pickup on my own. I was sent to meet three Nepali siblings and deliver them to their sponsor family (cousins) in the states. The sponsor had my cell number and we agreed to meet outside of security [side note: we don't normally have to go to the airport to meet someone if they have family willing to go for us. The sponsor family was settled by another volunteer agency, however, and my supervisor's competitive streak kicked in--she wanted us "to look good in comparison" so I was sent] I got to security and was looking around for a nepali family but couldn't find anyone who fit the part. I called the cell number and realized I was standing next to the sponsor--he was a punk-looking twenty-something yr. old with a smart phone (someone has been doing some acculturating). The three siblings arrived without incidence and we managed to get them back to the sponsor's apartment--where there was an AK-47 made out of cardboard and tape hanging on the wall above the couch with a pair of handcuffs (no accounting for decorating taste). It only got weirder when the family started hinting they wanted me to leave--before we ate anything! I usually have to beg a Nepali family to stop feeding me and these guys wanted me to go without even a cup of tea....weird. It got even weirder when I picked them up for an appointment two days later and they were eating lunch with spoons and forks (not their hands). This family perplexes me.

The missing I-94: [background info necessary to appreciate this story--the I-94 is a 4"x6" piece of cardstock that serves as a temporary passport that every refugee is given that says "Refugee" and gives them permission to be in the United States. It is their ticket to social services and is what allows them to cross borders] So I picked up the three Nepali siblings to go get social security cards (this is the same day I saw them eating with silverware and was really thrown off). It seemed to be our lucky day because we got a great parking space (right by the door), the office was completely empty when we got there (we still had to wait fifteen minutes, because, you know, it was the social security office) and we had all the correct paperwork so it was no problem to get the cards. We got back in the car and started driving home when one of the brothers said "I lost the little paper." I swerved to the side of the road and we started checking pockets, folders, seats, etc. After a thorough check we didn't find it so I returned to the social security office. There I searched the entire waiting room, combed the parking lot, watched the security guard search behind the counter through all of the papers, and finally dug through the trashcans just in case someone threw it away. The siblings walked 2-3 blocks up and down the street in case the wind blew it away. It was NOWHERE to be found. The Nepali guy was (understandably) freaking out--his sister kept repeating "very bad, very bad." I finally put a stop to the search when they started stripping his clothes off (it was unlikely to be in his pants--and he couldn't afford to get arrested for public indecency since he now did not have ID). I reassured the guy that he was not going to be sent back to Nepal and I finally called the case manager to break the bad news (she then asked me "well did you look in the car or in the waiting room?"). Crazy thing is, it turns out that the only thing he absolutely needed the original I-94 for was applying for a social security card--everything else can be done with copies (which we have). As long as he stays in the state of Oregon for the next year (till he can get a green card) it's okay he literally lost it 2 seconds after it didn't completely matter. We never did find that I-94--it was literally 40 feet from the counter to the car and it completely vanished .

Afghani family-- This one was a tougher story. An Afghani family was just referred to us for school registration and since there were five kids, I got to help. These kids are so stinkin' cute! And they are really polite and have just enough english to completely charm you. I was so happy to get them into school but there were a few heart-breaking moments. First, when we remarked how responsible and self-confident the 11yr old boy was we were told that it was because when they lived in Iran he was the "man of the household" (Dad was killed in the war) and so he was the one who had to earn a living for the family--so he worked in a store for several years (which would make him 7 at the time). I made paper airplanes with him while his mom was filling out paperwork and I decided that I wanted to make a special effort of helping him to remember how to be a kid again. The second sad moment was when the 18 yr. old tried to register for highschool. Amazingly, the local school agreed to take her and she was thrilled to continue her studies. But then the case manager had to break it too her that if she enrolled in school she would automatically drop out of the job-placement program and her family would lose $300/mo in cash assistance. Since they could not afford their bills without that she had to make the really tough decision to not enroll in school and instead pursue a job. Another tale of kids having to grow up too fast....

The really lucky Iranian man: We just resettled an Iranian man who used to be a woman before surgery in Thailand (primary reason he is now a refugee). He is joining his partner in portland--a woman who used to be a man. He is really sweet and polite and every time I see him I think "man, is he LUCKY he got settled in Portland and not Utah or the midwest." That feeling was underscored when one of the case managers reported that she is pretty sure she smelled weed at their apartment (we aren't doing anything about it--we are case managers, not baby sitters). Again, it is hard to think of a better place for this couple to have landed than in Portlandia--they will fit right in.

BONUS STORY: I did my second airport pickup today--a somali mom and son. Time was tight so I had to pick up groceries and a few appliances for their apartment on the way to the airport. I figured that we could squeeze  in their two or three IOM duffel bags into the backseat with the kid. Turns out they had SEVEN bags, six of which were large roller-bags that were 40lb+. I did not see that one coming (and I had to bust out my amazing tetris skills in the honda once again).

An up-beat preview

That last post was kind of heavy.... I have some great stories to balance it but I have to leave for our JVC social justice retreat in ten minutes (because we don't spend enough time focusing on social justice). So I will give you a taste of what is to come:

--The suspicious Nepali family.......
--The case of the missing I-94 and the stripping Nepali man......(might be same family)
--School registration with the Afghanis
--The Iranian man who is REALLY lucky that he was resettled in Portland

Sorry that there is no time for the full tales now--but stay-tuned!!

Hoping for Results....

I often try to just focus on the funny, the positive, or the real learning-moments of my work for this blog. But to be honest, sometimes it is really overwhelming and tough. I will pour my heart and soul into trying to help a family and will get nowhere, things will fall through and forces beyond my control will foil plans. This week has been particularly tough. In the interest of honesty about my experience I would like to share these things with you. I also want to share a quote I have taped to my desk.
--I have spent dozens of hours trying to get this kid into basketball with the hope that participating in sports will help boost his performance in school (which has been dismal due to attitude problems). I got him in, convinced someone to pay for it, and gave him instructions to take the bus to practice. Then, inexplicably, his brothers and mother all signed up for an English class exactly when his practice would be so there is no available bus pass for him to use to get to practice. That same day I also got and email from a teacher saying that he is not paying attention in class and has been repeatedly late.
--I am having a serious disagreement with one of my coworkers about how to best approach a case. My coworker thinks one member of the family is being selfish and should be pressured to translate for/help the other; I think that this is not our place and that we need to back off. Meanwhile this family member burst into tears in front of me in our office, no one in the family is moving even close to self-sufficiency and their benefits end in two months.
--We just got informed that the state of Oregon is experiencing a budget shortfall and so is looking to cut DHS spending by 3.5%. To accomplish that, they want to cut the state refugee budget by 10%. But they counted all of the state refugee budget in that math (including, I think, federal money) even though the cuts would only come from the monthly benefits (TANF) pot. Much complicated math later (courtesy of yours truly) that means that refugee benefits could be cut by 48% (giving families only 4 months instead of 8 months to learn english and get a job--when only 17% of families are managing to do that on the current schedule). The alternative proposal is to cut overall DHS spending by 10% which, as proposed would equal a  97% cut in monthly benefits (i.e., 1 week of support to learn english and get a job). If this happened we would pretty much just have to end the current resettlement program.....

So, yeah, it has been rough. As promised, here is the quote:
(courtesy of Thomas Merton's "Letter to a young activist")
"Do not depend on the hope of results.  When you are doing the sort of work you have taken on, essentially an apostolic work, you may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect.  As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results but on the value, the truth of the work itself.  And there, too, a great deal has to be gone through, as gradually as you struggle less and less for an idea, and more and more for specific people.  The range tends to narrow down, but it gets much more real.  In the end, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves everything. "

The good, the bad, and the ugly in the last 7 days

The good: I met two Iranian brothers today who had to get an ID from the DMV. It took a while and there were all sorts of classic paperwork snafus-- "you need to fill out the yellow form, not the grey one," "The department of homeland security doesn't have his birthday in the system," "why does his last name have two parts to it?" etc.--but while we were waiting one of the brothers, through much miming, was able to tell me about how he was a photo-journalist and a political cartoonist in Iran (which is why he is now a refugee--not a safe or prosperous profession in those parts). He even showed me some of his political artwork including a pencil drawing of a Persian woman with haunting eyes mutely pleading for help from behind an Iran-shaped crack in a wall. I never thought I would say this about a trip to the DMV, but I had a really great time.

The bad: Speaking of Iranians, this one Iranian girl keeps calling me with these really surreal questions. She called me once last week because she missed a meeting with her job coach and was worried that he would be mad at her and wanted to know if everything would be okay (if only she knew how much of our lives was filled with missed meetings). She then called me last week and said "my job coach found a position for me at 7-eleven but I heard that if I work there I will get shot because people rob 7-eleven stores." I like to think of it as a spiritual exercise when I have to exert every iota of my will to keep a straight face and consider her question seriously. I think it will be excellent practice for being a primary care doc in the future ("yes, it is possible that you have a flesh-eating bacteria but statistically-speaking I am going to guess that it is just a splinter"). The bad part is that she has gotten my cell phone number and has started texting me these ridiculous questions on the weekend--I am going to have a serious talk with her about boundaries.

The ugly: I was chatting with a friend-of a friend-of a friend over the weekend about his new job as a corporate "summit" consultant. He plans conferences for CFOs of fortune-1000 companies. The people with whom he communicates are such big-whigs that he is not allowed to send an email to anyone yet without running it by two coworkers for content and grammar first. I was struck by this and suddenly remembered a form I recently filled out--the end of which consisted of a single question "Do you recomend that this child is safe in his or her home?" and I had to circle "yes" or "no." No one checked over my work on that form. The priorities in this world terrify me--I have not yet gotten over that deeply disturbing comparison.

The ending-on-a-happy-note part: The sudanese mom I have been working with has made it into income-based housing! She now pays $14/mo in rent and will be able to afford toilet paper for her kids again! She ahd to move with very little notice, however, so there was no time to contact the schools in advance. Instead, her kids just walked up to each of their teachers and said "I won't be here tomorrow" and then left. (I had to field a lot of confused phone calls after that)