Last Tuesday the foreign language students gathered in the auditorium to hear a speech by, Jennifer Zubyk, Danielle Graham, Kaycie Tugman, and Jean-Yves Komayombi, representatives of Catholic Charities Fort Worth. The event was largely about the organization’s Refugee Resettlement program, intended to collect donations for refugees from other countries and help them find jobs in America. The charity is over 103 years old, boasts over 270 staff members and 40 programs, and its mission is to provide service, advocate compassion and justice, and call all people of good will to do the same. In 2013 they assisted in the resettlement of more than 70,000 refugees in the U.S., the greatest number of which reside in Texas than in any other state.
The primary speaker of the event was Jean-Yves Komayombi, who himself was a refugee. Komayombi recounted his story for the audience, detailing first his birth in a small town in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1990. In 1996, inspired in part by the events in nearby Rwanda, a civil war erupted in the Dem. Rep. of the Congo. Komayombi explained that his grandfather lost his job and his dad was pressured to join the rebel government, but refused. Komayombi’s dad began to get threats against his life and family.
One morning, Komayombi remembered, he and his sisters went to school, and his dad went to work, just as usual. But his dad did not return that evening, or thereafter. Eventually Komayombi learned that his dad was a refugee in neighboring Kenya, working to get his family there as well. Komayombi’s youngest siblings, aged 1 and 3, disappeared. Komayombi and his family moved from their home and walked across the Ugandan border, then rode for miles and miles inside and 18-wheeler until they reached the Kenyan border.
Though reunited with his father, Komayombi’s new life in Kenya was very uncomfortable. His family’s new house in Nairobi was much smaller and his dad was furthermore ordered to relocate to a refugee camp, separated from his family. Komayombi’s father therefore tried to stay in Nairobi illegally and was arrested numerous times by corrupt, bullying police officers in the city. Fortunately, a United Nations representative identified the struggle that Komayombi’s family was experiencing and helped arrange their transportation to America through a resettlement program. The settlement process, while Komayombi acknowledges was much shorter than for most refugee families, was still over a year to complete, and the family was not settled until 2004.
Komayombi recalled how overwhelming the settlement was for him and his family, none of whom were able to speak English prior to their resettlement. Even things such as deodorant and AC were foreign, and even of questionable necessity, as Komayombi revealed to the audience that he experienced much, much hotter temperatures in Texas than in his homeland. His mother worked at a Presbyterian hospital in Lake Dallas while Komayombi attended his high school. His sisters went on to get their nursing degrees at Midwestern State University. Komayombi got his degree in social work, and has become an important leader in Catholic Charities Fort Worth, helping to inform more people about the struggles of refugees living in the United States and ways they can help.
When Komayombi was done speaking, the audience gave him a resounding round applause.
