Losing home, losing everything

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What happens when the world goes haywire?

Last week I heard from a young man in Gaza who’d just been bombed out of his home.  Fadi collects money on Facebook and distributes food and clothing to his neighbors. He also runs a campaign to put solar panels on the roofs of nearby houses. Since the power plant was nearly destroyed, his community has three hours’ worth of electricity a day—not enough to wash and cook and read by.  Fadi has lost three friends in the last few months; he is trying to finish high school so he can apply to college and hopes to study medicine.  But right now he doesn’t have a place to read or do his homework.  From the videos he posts it looks like he is living on a vacant lot, no roof over his head, his only resting place, an old deck chair.

As I corresponded with Fadi (and tried to find a refugee organization that might be of help), I realized how much we take for granted here in the US.  The running water for washing up and brushing teeth, for cleaning up after every meal. The electricity for doing laundry, running the vacuum.  The high speed internet connections, access to healthy, organic food.  Each day I worry that my country is losing its heart, forgetting that it has so many “home” advantages. 

Most of my life I’ve been drawn to expats---my best friends are transplants from Chile , Guatemala, Iraq, Lebanon, Scotland, Germany and New Zealand.  I’ve got a soft spot for people who have packed up and moved to another country, who have had to carry their sense of home on their backs and learn how to put down roots again.   This is probably because I moved so much as a kid (13 times by the time I graduated high school).  I know what it’s like to be the outsider, the stranger, to be so grateful when someone reaches out and says hello or opens the door and invites me in.

One of the most traumatic things in life is the loss of home, and with violence erupting in so many areas around the globe, we are living in a new Era of Displacement.  Today there are more exiles than ever before—a record 65.3 million people at the end of 2015, compared to 59.5 million the previous year, most of them fleeing war and persecution, leaving their heirlooms behind and taking only what they can carry on their backs.  

Immigrants usually bring with them one or two small objects that remind them of home.  On her mantle a Guatemalan friend keeps a hand-carved figurine (dancing skeletons of a bride and groom) commemorating the Day of the Dead and promising a happy afterlife.  On the walls of his study, my Iraqi friend displays an illustrated page from the Koran, a souvenir from his grandfather’s library in Baghdad.  If you aren’t one of these people, you very likely know someone who is.

When is the last time you reached out to a stranger? Asked a newcomer to share their memories of home over dinner? In the comfort of your living room?