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refugees 
Thu Feb 11, 2010 at 09:13:10 PST
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(6 pm. - promoted by ek hornbeck)
now also up at Wild Wild Left
QUICK UPDATE: Friday noonish: Just an alert to let y'all know Tess made it by with a comment, see comments! :-)
Last week, I left you hanging with OTW: Bienvenidos a Miami Part 1. In that Essay, I told you a little bit about my growing up in Miami, Florida, alongside the initial wave of Cuban refugees in the early 1960's. I also promised you I was going somewhere with this. Yes, I do have a Point. :P I will make good on that promise near the end below. And finally, I left you with a cliffhanger with my mention of my Cuban friend, Maria {not her real name}. Well, guess what? I have a surprise for you!
Let's pick up with a little snapshot phone convo between me and Maria, shortly after college.
She picks up on the third ring and I immediately lay into her. "Where the hell are you? It's one o'clock already! Ive been ready for an hour! We're gonna be late!!"
Maria is ever so casual. "Calmate, we have plenty of time. I'll be there to pick you up around 2, like I told you. Man! Calm down."
"But... the invitation says the wedding starts at 2, and it's a 45 minute drive, at least, up to Hollywood. We are sooooo late. This is so bad." I'm whining and pleading now.
Maria assures me and tries to explain. "Bueno, she's Cuban, remember? Are you kidding me? We would look so stupid if we actually had the nerve to arrive at 2PM. They'd lookit us like we're crazy."
"No, no, no, but Maria... he is Jewish! This is just so not done. You don't get it."
"No, you don't get it, the bride's family is Jewban. The groom doesn't count when it comes to a wedding anyway, ferchrissake. Hang up the phone and go fix your lipstick or something. Ill be there in a bit. Jewbans are on Cuban time, reglas cubanas. lolol
Okay, as culture clashes go, this one is certainly tame and a little funny, but it did happen, and yes, we were terribly late by the wall clock, with me fretting all the way of course, but it all turned out just fine. Maria was right. lol We arrived just as the ceremony started, at about 4PM, which was just right by the culture clock.
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Thu Feb 04, 2010 at 11:05:09 PST
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(6 pm. - promoted by ek hornbeck)
now cross posted at Wild Wild Left (warts and all...lol)
OTW = Off the Wall .. my series, the first of which is here, having to do with multi-cultural and diversity topics.
NOTE: I decided to make this Part One because I had entirely too much fun googling related topics & pics, and I got a little lost sidetracked. Lol. I have a certain direction I want to take this, but it may take me another week to actually get there! So there will be a Part Two (at least). Thanks for your patience. Heh.
In 1960, when the first wave of Cuban refugees arrived in droves in Miami Florida, I was about 4 years old. So were a number of Cuban children who would become my classmates, age-mates, rivals and friends. I was just a regular ol', you know, American. My WASP Dad was from Ohio and my Irish Mom, western Massachusetts. Miami was, at the time, a blend of New England transplants, retired New York Jews (Miami Beach), and more. I was considered a bit of a rarity in that I was actually born there, a "native". The huge intake of hundreds of thousands of Cubans in such a short period of time had quite an impact on the city. Since I was only 4 at the time, what do I know? But trust me, it did.
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Thu Jan 14, 2010 at 10:35:09 PST
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(6:00PM EST - promoted by Nightprowlkitty)
Second installment of my new series. My first one last week is here.
PLEASE read & rec this essay here from davidseth with this ACTION item Haiti: Humanitarian Help, Stop Deportations AFSC link. I'm also checking in with the Miami Herald periodically for their local news and updates.
Wow this is boggy stuff. I'm in the weeds here! In light of the current disaster with the earthquake in Haiti, which I wrote about yesterday, I thought I'd try to take a look at the area of Asylum. Others have written essays about the complex political history of Haiti, here, here and here. And here.
I wanted to explore the term Temporary Protected Status, but first I had to see about Asylum. And Refugee.
What Is the Major Difference Between Asylum and Refugee Applicants?
The major difference between asylum and refugee applicants is that those seeking refugee status apply from outside the United States. Asylum-seekers must be in the United States or applying for admission at a port of entry. DoJ Fact Sheet
Credible Fear: An asylum seeker who has a credible fear of persecution or torture is referred to an Immigration Judge to hear and then judge their asylum claims.
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Mon Aug 31, 2009 at 10:08:03 PDT
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( - promoted by buhdydharma )
According to an article and accompanying photo essay, "The Lost Boys of Afghanistan", in The New York Times, thousands of Afghan minors have come to European Union countries seeking asylum.
"The boys pose a challenge for European countries many of which have sent troops to fight in Afghanistan but whose publics question the rationale for the war."
Thousands of lone Afghan boys are making their way across Europe, a trend that has accelerated in the past two years as conditions for Afghan refugees become more difficult in countries like Iran and Pakistan. Although some are as young as 12, most are teenagers seeking an education and a future that is not possible in their own country, which is still struggling with poverty and violence eight years after the end of Taliban rule.
Estimates by the Separated Children in Europe Program have about 100,000 unaccompanied children from non-EU countries living in the EU. Many of the minors are not asking for "protection in any form."
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Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 07:21:58 PDT
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Yesterday I asked for your help. I was concerned because many poor people from Honduras have been fleeing the country, passing through Guatemala, and landing in shelters in Oaxaca and Chiapas, Mexico. These shelters are ill equipped to deal with a large influx of refugees. I wanted to help those who will help the refugees. I have now found two reliable organizations in Mexico that do just that.
Please join me below to help these refugees.
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Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 15:34:34 PDT
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( - promoted by buhdydharma )
Today I read that many poor people from Honduras have been fleeing the country, passing through Guatemala, and are landing in shelters in Oaxaca, Mexico:
The military coup in Honduras is providing an unexpected test of Mexico's immigration and refugee policies. On Friday, July 3, dozens of Honduran nationals arrived at a church-run migrant shelter in the southern state of Oaxaca seeking refugee status because of the political situation in their country.
Alejandro Solaline Guerra, spokesman for the Mexican Episcopal Conference, said a group of Hondurans sought assistance at the House of Mercy in Ciudad Ixtepec on the Tehuantepec Peninsula. The migrant advocate said the bishops' organization will contact the National Migration Institute to request refugee status for the Hondurans under international law.
"Migrants from a country in a state of war should not be denied refugee status," Solaline declared.
The Honduran political crisis could aggravate an already conflictive situation in Mexico's southern border region. Despite the international economic crisis, thousands of Central Americans and other Latin migrants continue to cross the country's southern border en route to the United States. Along the way, migrants remain a favorite target of corrupt Mexican officials and bands of organized criminals. source.
I think that as the golpe de estado continues in Honduras and as the instability and repression grow, and the economy continues to be disrupted, more and more poor Hondurans will have to pick up and leave, fleeing across Guatemala and into Mexico.
I suspect that those who are running shelters all along the well traveled route from Honduras and across southern Mexico could help these refugees if they had money to do so.
That's where I need help. El Hogar de Misericordia en Ixtapa does not have a web site. La Conferencia del Episcopado Mexicano has a site, but no way to donate. I don't find on line anywhere to donate to support these refugees on their journey away from Honduras and into Mexico, though I am well aware that there are shelters along the route.
Long story short: I need your help to find a way to get funds to those who are helping the refugees from Honduras who arrive in Mexico.
This seems particularly important to me. Those fleeing Honduras are preyed on by gangs like the Mara Salvatrucha and their rivals, by coyotes, by the police. Their journey is precarious even when it is motivated purely by economics. And now, I fear the golpe de estado and the lockdown in Honduras and Honduras's economic isolation will drive even more poor people from their homes into the snares set by waiting gangs and police. The shelters are essential to protect these refugees, to feed them, to give them an opportunity to stop in a safe place.
It would be a service to provide financial help to the shelters. The question, dear Dharmanics, is how we can do that. I ask your assistance in finding a way.
h/t to Mariachi Mama for the Mexidata article
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Sat Jul 04, 2009 at 14:53:55 PDT
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( - promoted by buhdydharma )
I've been thinking about climate refugees for awhile, partly inspired by all those pictures of Dust Bowl refugees from the 1930s. Floods and famines have forced people to leave their homes for greener pastures throughout recorded history, and presumably before that.
But nowadays we've got a new kind of climate refugee: Rising sea levels are driving people from their homes in many corners of the planet. A case in point is the Carteret Islands of Papua New Guinea, a low lying coral atoll, home to 2500 people.
Cross-posted from DK GreenRoots/Eco-Week at Daily Kos.
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Thu May 14, 2009 at 15:10:01 PDT
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( - promoted by buhdydharma )
By Abdul Malik Mujahid
During the last thirty years of wars in Afghanistan, Afghan civilians have had one safe place to escape to: Pakistan.
They fled the Soviet invasion. They fled civil wars. They fled US bombing. Pakistan took care of millions of these Afghan refugees.
Now that safe haven with its lush green valleys is burning with bombs.
And the hosts, the people who themselves welcomed Afghan refugees, at times literally into their homes or into campsites on their farms, are on the run. They are streaming out of Swat, Dir, and Buner, and registering as refugees in Mardan and the fertile valleys of Pakistan. The UN says about two million Pakistanis have been displaced during the last year of drone attacks, bombing and fighting.
Pakistan is bombing its own land and its own people who are caught between the Taliban and the Americans.
Whomever I talk to among Pakistanis, it seems, there is an emerging consensus. They hate both the Taliban who blast schools and the Americans who bomb Madrasahs. Both kill civilians.
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Thu Apr 16, 2009 at 12:58:37 PDT
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(11 am. - promoted by ek hornbeck)
The US media may not be reporting it and the politicians may not want to talk about it, but the situation in Iraq is deteriorating. On Friday, 5 US soldiers were killed in a truck bomb attack near Mosul, and another died Saturday when an IED hit his convoy north of Baghdad.
Nor can we forget that life for ordinary Iraqis is still full of danger--last week six simultaneous car bombs across Baghdad killed 32 and wounded 120--and full of misery--on a good day Iraqis are lucky to get four hours of electricity. No wonder tens of thousands filled the rain-drenched streets of Baghdad a week ago, chanting "No, No To America! No, No To Occupation!"
That war in Afghanistan, where 21,000 additional troops are being shipped into harm's way? It's actually a war in Afghanistan AND Pakistan. Two articles that you did not see in your local newspaper last week provide a much clearer picture. It is not a pretty one.
The News, an Pakistani paper published in English, laid out what those miraculous pilotless drones used by the US military actually do:
Of the 60 cross-border predator strikes carried out by the Afghanistan-based American drones in Pakistan between January 14, 2006 and April 8, 2009, only 10 were able to hit their actual targets, killing 14 wanted al-Qa'eda leaders, besides perishing 687 innocent Pakistani civilians.
One result of American death raining out of a clear sky is a massive refugee crisis. A new UN report says that 600,000 Pakistanis have from fled their homes in border areas rendered deadly by the drones and US-backed Pakistan Army operations. These internal refugees join 1.7 million homeless Afghan men, women and children who have fled into Pakistan!
How much more misery will the expansion of this war cause? How many more mujahidin fighters will it produce? It's got to stop! We've got to stop it!
This Friday and this weekend mark the 20th observance of the Iraq Moratorium. Please take some action by yourself or with others to stop this war!
Crossposted at DailyKos.
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Thu May 01, 2008 at 07:45:48 PDT
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May 1, 2003, is another day of infamy for the Bush administration and America. In the kind of staged bravado dictators relish, George W. Bush donned a flight suit, pretended to fly, and then used an aircraft carrier as the backdrop for a speech to declare the mission in Iraq accomplished. Every cable news channel carried the event live as if history were somehow being made. It is time to look back at five years of accomplishments in Iraq.
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Thu Mar 06, 2008 at 03:01:09 PST
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(a different kind of math lesson... - promoted by pfiore8)
Another surreal day in America. Everyone is talking about the "math" in the race for the Democratic nomination for president. Our war criminal in chief endorsed McCain to carry on his proud tradition of violence for profit. The corporate media laps up the most expensive presidential campaign in history. Meanwhile, halfway across the world, the Iraqi people continue to suffer because of our actions and inactions.
Here is a story that every news outlet in America managed to ignore. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) just published a study of the mental health problems of Iraqi refugees living in Jordan and Lebanon. More than half of the refugees interviewed reported high levels of clinically significant emotional distress. What's a few million traumatized people forced to flee their homes, jobs, schools, extended families, and country? Their suffering does not fit our narrative about the war.
Our presidential candidates have already spent more money on this election than our country has spent over the past five years to help the victims of our foreign policy in Iraq. That's right. Our presidential candidates have spent more than 300 million dollars, more than four times what has been spent to help refugees in a country we destroyed. Even with the proposed 125 million dollars for FY08/09, it will still be a drop in the bucket compared to the money spent on the presidential race.
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Tue Feb 26, 2008 at 16:27:25 PST
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Remember this:
President Bush laid down the standard of success when he announced the surge more than a year ago: "If we increase our support at this crucial moment, and help the Iraqis break the current cycle of violence, we can hasten the day our troops begin coming home."
Than yesterday we get this:
The Pentagon is projecting that when the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq ends in July there will be about 8,000 more troops on the ground than when it began in January 2007, a senior general said Monday.
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Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 14:13:39 PST
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In Baghdad, this troupe of five clowns called themselves the "Happy Family Group." Their purpose was to bring some entertainment and relief to children whose lives had been scarred by violence and fear. They called their show, "A Child Is Just As Sacred As A Country." By every account, the show was popular among children, an oasis of laughter in the desert of violence. Their story over the past six months is tragic and inspiring. It also highlights the plight of Iraqi refugees.
Picture source
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Wed Feb 13, 2008 at 16:09:18 PST
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According to a new article by Steve Bloomfield in the UK Independent, the U.S. policy of advising Ethiopia in its war with neighboring Somalia has failed. Not surprisingly for the Bush team, it has achieved results entirely the opposite of what it intended. The outcome? UN officials describe it as the "the largest concentration of displaced people anywhere in the world.... the worst humanitarian catastrophe in Africa, eclipsing even Darfur in its sheer horror."
According to Bloomfield, the U.S. believed that Al Qaida had established a presence in the "failed state" that was Somalia at the beginning of this century. The U.S. wanted to strike at the Union of Islamic Courts, a fundamentalist coalition that was ruling over much of central and southern Somalia.
On Christmas Day 2006, Ethiopia invaded its neighbour, Somalia. The aim: to drive out a coalition of Islamists ruling the capital, Mogadishu, and install a fragile interim government that had been confined to a small town in the west. But Ethiopia was not acting alone. The US had given its approval for the operation and provided key intelligence and technical support. CIA agents travelled with the Ethiopian troops, helping to direct operations.
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Sun Dec 16, 2007 at 08:51:00 PST
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(this is what "consequence" looks like... - promoted by pfiore8)
Thanks to us Responsible Adults!
An Iraqi boy reacts after seeing his sister and both of his parents killed in the car, in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2005
As we bring Freedom and Democray at the point of a gun!
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Sun Oct 21, 2007 at 22:02:33 PDT
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(The other collateral damage ....11:15 - promoted by buhdydharma )
Today brought the news that Syria Shuts Main Exit From War for Iraqis:
DAMASCUS, Syria, Oct. 20 - Long the only welcoming country in the region for Iraqi refugees, Syria has closed its borders to all but a small group of Iraqis and imposed new visa rules that will legally require the 1.5 million Iraqis currently in Syria to return to Iraq.
1.5 million refugees are going to have to go back. Go back to what exactly?
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Reform Immigration -
March for America
Sunday, March 21
March on Washington
Saturday, March 20
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