CALGARY—Fatima Alsaleh’s living room holds just two long cushions on the floor, and a TV on a stand in the corner that casts a glow on the washed-out beige walls. The wooden floors are bare but for a tan, brown and white geometric rug. By any Canadian measure, the decor is spare, sparse even.Alsaleh spends most of her time inside the two-bedroom townhouse, cooking meals in the dilapidated kitchen for her two boys and two girls, ages eight to 13. When her phone buzzes, she plugs in her earbuds and wanders into the kitchen, where she is instantly connected to the familiar voices of the family she reluctantly left behind in a refugee camp in Lebanon. At night, Alsaleh sleeps in one bedroom with her daughters; her sons take the other.After waiting 18 months for English lessons while the kids were in school, the single mother now leaves home four times a week to go to a newcomer’s centre for class. But learning the language has not been easy for Alsaleh, who left school in Syria when she was 12. Three years after coming to Canada, her proficiency is still Level 1—the most basic—of four levels.Alsaleh speaks mostly in Arabic: to neighbours in what Calgarians call Little Syria, which is home to around 30 refugee families; on frequent calls through What’sApp to her family in Lebanon; and to her children at home. When her government support ran out in January 2017, she went on welfare and doesn’t see herself ever getting a job.Read more:After initial euphoria fades, the stress of resettlement triggers trauma in Syrian refugees The struggles and successes of five Syrian refugee families “I’ve never worked. Not in Syria, not here. So what would I do?” Alsaleh said in interview in Arabic.This is life in Canada for Alsaleh. She was part the first wave of 25,000 Syrian refugees who arrived in Canada three years ago. As of Sept. 30, 2018, the latest data available, a total of 59,875 refugees call this country home.Lik ...
|
