Moving to a new country is not easy.

There is a new culture to become accustomed to, new traditions and customs to learn, a language barrier to overcome in some cases and more.

For refugees coming to the United States, all of this is compounded by the fact that they are also starting over and rebuilding their lives from almost nothing — and oftentimes, while separated from some, if not all, of their loved ones.

Liaison between people and services

As manager of the Cultural Navigator Program (CNP) at the Together Center in Redmond, Jennifer O’Neal has seen firsthand some of the things people go through when they arrive in this country.

Through her job, she helps people access the services they need to get back on their feet. She said CNP acts as a bridge between immigrants and the services they need to access, offering free consultation in five foreign languages.

“They can come to us and we will offer them the advice they need and the information they need,” she said.

O’Neal said this includes advice and information on how to navigate the health, education, housing, transportation and legal systems and more. She pointed out that many times, the services in their clients’ home countries do not work the same way as they do here. CNP helps with that.

“We are also a resource for public and private service organizations who need guidance with regard to cultural competency in order to serve their clients who are new to this area,” she added. “Our organization is run by the Chinese Information and Service Center and we work out of locations in Bellevue, Redmond and Kent.”

O’Neal said CNP is always in need of volunteers to help with their services. Some of the roles that need to be filled include bilingual interpreters for languages such as Arabic and Farsi, people to run errands and deliver packets and people to welcome refugees as they arrive.

“We can match them up with opportunities that work for them,” O’Neal said.

A challenging transition

Through CNP, O’Neal has been assisting a number of families from Syria escaping ISIS, who have recently arrived in the area.

With O’Neal acting as an Arabic-English interpreter, one woman shared with the Reporter some of her experiences since she arrived on the Eastside from Syria.

The woman requested to remain anonymous as O’Neal explained that some Syrian refugees have relatives who continue to face political persecution back home, which adds to their stress as they try to get settled in the United States. The woman did not wish to be identified in order to keep relatives overseas safe.

Since she arrived in the area, the woman said some things such as the food stamps program have gone smoothly, while other things have been harder. Through O’Neal she said finding affordable housing has been extremely difficult.

“There is no government assistance for rent and no available low-cost apartments in the Bellevue/Redmond area, where most people in the Syrian or Arab community live,” O’Neal interpreted for her. “That means I have no choice but to relocate to somewhere like Kent or Everett, far from the support and companionship of my community and far from the Arabic-speaking families who might hire me to tutor their children in Arabic.”

Despite these difficulties, she said she has received a lot of help.

“I’d like to mention in particular Meena Menter, who is an immigration lawyer,” O’Neal translated. “She helped me with some very important issues that I was unable to resolve on my own.”

A new home, a new language

The woman said finding employment has also been a challenge. In order to receive cash assistance from the state, she needs to have a job. But she can’t find a job without learning English.

“Needless to say, it takes time to learn a foreign language, but my need for income is immediate,” she said through O’Neal. “It’s an impossible situation.”

In addition, the woman said if you had a vocation back home that required a license — such as a beautician or electrician — it is very difficult to get licensed to practice that vocation here.

“You would need about four years — two to learn English well enough and two to take the classes you need to get licensed here,” O’Neal translated. “That makes it very hard to get a job in your profession here.”

Another challenge this woman — and other refugee parents — must deal with is the public school system. The woman, who came to the states with her daughter, said written materials that are sent home are in English or Spanish, so it is difficult for anyone who doesn’t speak English well. She said she requests translation of materials, but it doesn’t always happen.

“I had some exposure to English before coming here, but it was British English,” the woman said through O’Neal. “American English is very different and I had trouble understanding or speaking it. Many Syrians, especially those from rural areas, may not have studied English at all before coming here. So it is very hard for them.”

The language barrier is not limited to just parents.

Cari Conklin, a Kirkland resident who has been working with another Syrian family and helping them adjust to life in the United States, recently helped the family on their first day of American school in Seattle. She said on that day, one of the daughters was becoming stressed because she needed to use the restroom but didn’t know how to ask. Fortunately, the family met a neighbor at the bus stop earlier — a fifth-grader whose family is Somalian — who also spoke Arabic and could translate. Conklin, whose work with the family has been through World Relief Seattle, said in the future the school may need to ask for the neighbor’s help again until they are able to get someone dedicated to help the new students.

Practical help

In addition to the CNP and the work Conklin and her church have been doing, there are a number of organizations, faith communities and individuals in Redmond and throughout the area who have been doing what they can to help as more Syrian refugees are beginning to arrive in the Pacific Northwest.

The Muslim Community Resource Center (MCRC) initially began its work by organizing clothing drives with donated goods being converted into cash to send to refugee camps in Jordan and Turkey. But as people began arriving stateside, MCRC — which is a community outreach organization out of the Muslim Association of Puget Sound (MAPS) in Redmond but represents mosques throughout the Eastside — shifted its focus to helping refugees locally.

Khizer Sheriff, who co-founded MCRC with his wife, said they have mobilized and coordinated a community response, which includes donating and collecting furniture and other household items so when people arrive and find housing, they will have an inventory to choose from to furnish their new homes. In addition, he said MCRC has been working with Muslim Housing Services in Seattle to raise $250,000 to make 10 housing units available in the area for two years as more people arrive.

Sheriff said some community members have also donated cars, while others are volunteering their time to drive people around when needed as the newly arrived likely won’t have access to a vehicle or have a driver’s license. He added that they have also reached out to Uber, the ride-sharing app, to see if they can work out an arrangement. This is still in the works, Sheriff said.

MCRC is also working to connect people to education, ESL classes and vocational training so people can take required licensing exams to be able to work and get back on their feet.

“Many of these people have good skills,” Sheriff said.

Conklin added that the refugees arriving are highly educated professionals and now they are starting over with minimum-wage jobs. In addition, she said upon arriving refugees must pay back the U.S. government for their plane tickets — so they immediately have debt they have incurred.

O’Neal said contrary to what has been shown in the media, Syrian refugees are generally well-educated, cultured, middle-class people who happen to have been caught in an extremely unfortunate political situation not of their making.

“Syrians are also known for their entrepreneurship, trade and business acumen,” O’Neal said. “They have a wealth of skills and know-how to contribute to the economy here if ways can be found to help them with practical matters, such as obtaining licenses, completing paperwork to start businesses and building their clienteles.”

She said personally, she is looking forward to having some Syrian restaurants open in the area, calling Syrian cuisine “among the best in the world.”

Legal help

Another organization that is helping refugees is Americans for Refugees & Immigrants (ARI), which is focused on working with state and national lawmakers to enable refugees to come to the United States. ARI was started in September 2015 by Anny Khan of Renton and Isra Ayesh of Shoreline.

Khan, who is the organization’s executive director, said one of their goals is to make sure people know what their rights are and receive the help they need. And like CNP and MCRC, ARI can connect people to resources.

ARI has recently been working with lawmakers such as Reps. Suzan DelBene and Dave Reichert of the first and eighth congressional districts. Khan said they want to make sure legislators hear the refugees’ and immigrants’ side of things before making decisions based on immature reactions to recent attacks such as the one in Paris in November 2015. She referenced H.R.4038, a piece of legislation that would require the FBI to conduct a screening of individuals seeking refugee status in the United States.

Already, Khan said refugees are screened by four different agencies before they can enter the country. And the process can take anywhere from 2-4 years.

The Syrian family Conklin has been working with is evidence of this timeline.

“It took them over two years to go through the process,” she said, adding that the family had been living at a Jordanian refugee camp for some time prior to their arrival in Washington.

Conklin said the family’s only thoughts were on fleeing Syria, not taking over the United States.

The woman O’Neal has been working with said she has seen the process take more than a year, as well.

Khan noted that it would be very ineffective for a terrorist to sit in a refugee camp for years before they are able to come to the country they are targeting. She added that the way to fight fear is with knowledge and “people need to educate themselves more” on the issues.

Bringing people together

While the Syrian refugee crisis has many in the country divided, Conklin said she has seen it bring people of all backgrounds together.

The refugee family she has been helping is Muslim and a lot of the work she and her church have been doing has been in partnership with MAPS.

Since she has gotten involved in the efforts, Conklin — a Christian who attends the Eastlake Community Church in Kirkland — said she has become friends with people of different faiths who she would not have otherwise simply because she rarely came across them in her day-to-day life. Conklin said this has been a learning experience for everyone in a number of ways.

For her personally, she has learned how important others’ faith in God is to them and that they pray and seek God the same way she does.

“Yes, there are differences, but your heart is the same,” she said. “It’s been pretty amazing.”

Conklin added that she and the Syrian family have even prayed together, despite their differing faiths. And on the Monday before Christmas, they held a peace vigil in Kirkland that had all faiths represented, from Christians and Muslims to Hindus and Jews.

“We had all the bases covered there,” Conklin said. “It was a wonderful experience.”

For Sheriff, seeing other faith-based groups reaching out to help and partnering with them to synchronize and collaborate their efforts to help the mainly Muslim families arriving here has been great.

“It was really touching and amazing to see,” he said.

A history of helping

This coming together to help refugees new to the country is not new to Redmond.

In 1975, Minh-Duc Nguyen and her family arrived in Redmond as refugees from Vietnam following the Vietnam War. Her family — which was made up of her, both her parents and her four siblings — was sponsored by Redmond United Methodist Church (RUMC).

“We were the first Vietnamese family to arrive in Redmond,” Nguyen said.

Nguyen, a teenager entering Redmond Junior High School at the time, said church members and other members of the Redmond community were supportive and nurturing. She described instances in which her peers would take the time to play with them and teach them English and other instances in which teachers would escort them from class to class to make sure they knew where to go.

“Our family is forever in gratitude to the people of Redmond,” Nguyen said, “especially to the members of the Redmond United Methodist Church for their incredible support.”

And now Nguyen is taking the help she received from the Redmond community 40 years ago and is paying it forward.

Following a trip back to Vietnam in 1993, she founded Helping Link, a Seattle-based organization focused on helping Vietnamese immigrants new to the country. Nguyen said they offer ESL classes, tutoring for students and computer classes.

Nguyen said Helping Link is her way of helping people new to this country, providing them some comfort so they don’t feel so lost — just as those in the RUMC and greater Redmond community did for her family in 1975.