Killarney home feels like heaven to immigrant family

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 15/12/2016 (3377 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Zoe Dickson and Felicia Joh became sisters when they had no one else.

In the early 1990s, the friends — who once played on opposing kickball teams — fled Liberia separately during a bitter civil war.

Dickson left after witnessing both her parents get killed. She and her siblings split up and became separated from each other.

Joh vanished into the bushes and eventually lost contact with her children.

In 2010, the two school friends, a year apart in age, ran into each other at a refugee camp in Ivory Coast. They didn’t know, initially, who the other woman was.

“From the conversations with each other, we recognized ourselves,” Joh, now 41, said.

Six years later, the bond between them is unbreakable.

Overjoyed to learn Canada accepted their refugee application last year, officials figured the two women would have to live in separate dwellings, with separate sponsors, but in the same city.

“We said we’d just live in the same house,” Dickson, 42, said, laughing.

They were thrilled to find out they’d be sponsored together: Dickson and Joh, as well as Dickson’s young son William Mensah, now eight.

Declaring themselves ‘sisters,’ Joh said they found their saving grace in Killarney, after more than two decades languishing in a derelict refugee camp with little to do.

“Killarney is,” Joh paused, “we compare it to heaven.”

The blended family of three lives in a modest home in town.

A major improvement from their previous shelter, patched together using the stems of palm trees. It was prone to water leakage and they were frequently invaded by driver ants.

The ‘sisters’ now enjoy browsing Facebook and giggling at photos of themselves sprawled in the snow.

“I was sitting on the ground, now I’m sitting on a real chair,” Dickson said.

They keep busy in the mornings volunteering at Bayside Personal Care Home in Killarney and, in the afternoon, honing their English, studying for the driver’s licensing tests and learning math and computer skills.

The two women relied on each other when life was rough, and now when their future is bright as well.

“In hardship, when you have friends that stand by you, they become friends forever,” Joh said.

“By the grace of God, Zoe’s my sister, she’s my mother, she’s my everything for me.”

Joh happily recalls arriving at the airport in Winnipeg on July 25, 2016.

A throng of Killarney sponsors held signs bearing messages that read, ‘Welcome.’

“Really, since we arrived in Killarney to today, it’s very nice people.”

One highlight was a phone call from home. Joh heard from one of her daughters, who she became separated from in 2010.

­Family, friends and the Red Cross have helped Joh in her search.

She dropped her phone when she heard her voice.

“I started to cry. Oh, I cried,” she said.

Laura Rowley, a member of Killarney’s refugee sponsorship group, explained that it’s tough for Canadians to imagine parents becoming separated from their children during civil wars.

In many cases, children could be left with relatives, thinking one of their guardians would return soon. Suddenly, danger arises, someone flees and contact is lost.

While both Joh and Dickson hope to connect with their family, one day bringing them to Canada, they continue to become acquainted with their new surroundings.

Rowley explained the newcomers’ initial months have gone well.

“It’s going better than we imagined. The transition’s been going very smoothly,” she said.

The newcomers agree, thanking God for finding them a welcoming community. They hope to find employment soon.

They giggled when asked what would change their living arrangement. They each envision finding husbands and getting married, but expect the ‘sisters’ to keep spending time together.

“We’d be asking, ‘How you doing? How’s your husband?’” Dickson imagined, laughing while wiping away a tear. “It’d be every weekend.”

Killarney’s refugee sponsorship group is still awaiting a family of eight from Congo to arrive. They also agreed to support that family, even before the blended family arrived this summer.

» ifroese@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @ianfroese