Several of the refugee women that we work with are learning very basic English and Handwriting Skills. So many refugee women have never been educated. Often, the women in our basic English conversation classes have never even held a pencil. Stop a minute and think about that. Do you remember your teacher in preschool or Kindergarten or your mom helping you to hold one of those big fat pencils and teaching you how to form the letters of the English alphabet on paper? I actually remember my teacher teaching me to hold the pencil properly as I would grasp it with my whole fist. I remember those cap erasers on the end of my pencil would make my pencil feel top-heavy and awkward. I remember writing the letters in my name backwards. Learning to write is a challenge and it takes several years to actually master it well. And then there is phonics and grammar. So many of our refugee students have no basic English vocabulary, no handwriting skills and no former education at all. Teaching uneducated adults how to write and read is a real challenge.

Some volunteers (even teachers trained in ESL) have had to realize that their ESL and a lot of their teacher training doesn’t help as much as they thought it would as they work with our refugee women. Teaching our ladies the English skills they need to be successful in America is a lot more difficult than one might imagine. There seems to be little written material that teaches uneducated adults English. If an adult has an education in their own country and needs to learn English in America there are tools and resources to help make that happen. Asha’s Refuge and other organizations like us have had to pull together resources and write our own along the way. We must help build the vocabulary of our students as they are already adults and have to know how to do things like write their name, sign their name, write the date (understand what they are writing), say and write their address, etc.

Our basic English Conversation Class teachers, Sara, Rebecca and Chris have found a few helpful resources that they feel will help our ladies. (By the way, we sincerely thank Sara, Rebecca and Chris for their hearts commitment to leading and teaching this group of women.) We are asking for donations to purchase the needed resources for our basic English class. You may contribute online here via PayPal or feel free to purchase the items and bring or mail them to us. I have listed items we need below. Thanks in advance for your help!

Alphabet CD; One Little Sound-Fun with Phonics and Numbers by Hap Palmer
Amazon for $14.99
Currently we have seven (7) ladies that would like one. We’d like to have more on hand for new refugee students.

Oxford Picture Dictionary, second edition, monolingual
Amazon for about $11.00
Currently we need (12) Twelve but would like to have more for future new refugees

(Update: May 3, 2012, I visited my friend Ada today. She is feeling better today. We think she had the flu. She’s been pushing herself to eat things that would settle her tummy. She was weak but feels a lot better today. She has a doctors appointment Friday. Thanks for your prayers for her!)

Yesterday I had a phone call from Ada (Not her real name). She’s the older refugee lady that I mentioned in a previous post that has been helping a lot of the younger refugee girls. She’s sick. Ada called me and begged of me to come to her immediately. She mentioned that she was afraid and worried about her health because she couldn’t keep food down. Ada seemed anxious about how she was going to be able to help the girls when she wasn’t well enough to help herself.

I couldn’t go to Ada yesterday. And, I couldn’t go to her today. I have spoken to her and she is still eager for me to visit her. I will go to her tomorrow. I hope it isn’t too late.

I often wish I lived among the refugee community so that I could have quicker access to them when they are in great need. If I did live near them I might try to “fix” all their problems the way I think is best though. I would probably run to them and exhaust myself trying to make life easier for them. In some ways, I have done that from afar at times. But, God reminded me of something. It’s the caterpillar in a cocoon picture. A caterpillar struggles in a cocoon once it becomes a butterfly. It fights itself out of the cocoon in order to gain the strength it needs to fly. If someone reaches in to pull the butterfly out of its cocoon before it’s time then the butterfly may never fly and will live a shorter and more difficult life.

I hate to see my friends struggling. While I will certainly go to the sick, poor and hurting, I must also realize there is a time when I just cannot run to help. I can stand in the mud with my friends but I cannot carry the weight upon myself to always “fix” things. For one, who is to say I know best for them?

In saying this, I think some think too strongly on this idea and altogether stop helping people. That’s not good either. I pray that I can hear God’s
whisper to me to tell me when to run and when to hold back. I never want to hold back God’s love but I must grab hold of the fact that sometimes saying no or not today or not right now is still showing love. It’s okay to meet my friends half way too!

Please pray for my friend Ada. I do still wish we had an Asha’s Refuge building in Binghampton so that refugees could come to us and we to them a lot easier. We could have so many resources available in this space to help them
help themselves. Most of all, we love our friends and want to be a light in a often dark and difficult place. Please, please pray for the space to open up for us there. Whatever He wants for us, that’s what I want. And, of course whenever He says it’s time.

There are many refugee young women who have made it to Memphis safely but have had to leave their families behind. These women are between the ages of 18 and 27. Most of them are not educated and do not speak English. They are vulnerable and could be at risk to being victims of sex crime, depression and suicide. Asha’s Refuge wants to help.

About 4-5 weeks ago a group of new young refugee women arrived to Memphis. When Deborah and I met them, they were very shy and afraid. They miss their parents, siblings, friends. They understand that there is a chance that it could take a long time for the rest of their family to be approved to come to the US if they ever come. There is an older new refugee lady who has taken a motherly liking to these girls. Her name, we will say is Ada. Ada allows the girls to all pile up in her home and sleep on her bed, floors and couch together so they are not so afraid. Some of the girls are having trouble sleeping at night and cry most of the night. Ada prepares each meal for the girls and divides up all their donations equally among them all. Even though Ada is also a newcomer and a little anxious, she fortunately speaks English very well and helps everyone to understand what is going on around them. She has a caring heart and she loves deeply. Ada has a displaced or broken hip that causes her to walk with a limp. She also has some other health problems she is struggling with. Asha’s Refuge wants to help Ada help her new young friends.

Most of the young women are doing okay emotionally, but there is one that is truly struggling. We will name her Kacy. Kacy cries all the time. She burst out into tears at any given moment. She ran out of one of our Friday English conversation classes to the bathroom to cry. Last week, Kacy expressed wanting to die and told some of the other refugee ladies how she planned to kill herself. This breaks my heart! This breaks Ada’a heart and it causes a lot of additional anxiety and fear for the other young refugee women. Kacy is being closely watched by her Case Manager, new friends and has been seen by a doctor. She is okay, but still struggling.

I’d like to ask for a prayer of hope for Kacy. I also have some specific requests for the young refugee group of women, Kacy and Ada. I’d also love to know if any of my readers or supporters has any day of the week that they could make them self available to help mentor and show care to any of these women. I’d like to collect encouraging cards and hand drawn pictures from children to encourage Kacy. Are there any college students that want to make a new friend?

Ada has requested laundry detergent (I already bought her some, but she will soon need more. I’d like to collect about 5-10 more bottles of liquid detergent. They often wash clothes by hand so the liquid is best for doing that). These women would probably love to have more flip flops/sandals sizes 7-9. There are about 8 women all together. They also could use long skirts, sizes small and medium mostly and one large. The skirts must be long enough to reach their ankle. Here’s a list:

-Liquid Detergent (ten)
-Flip flops/sandals (size 7-9; very lightly used or new only please)
-Tylenol/Motrin
-long skirts (size small to medium, one large, petite medium is good too)
-shirts, solid colors please to go with skirts…size small and medium
-feminine products
-Kroger/Aldi Gift Cards
-towels (bath towels, kitchen towels…new)
-bug spray (roach) (Ada wants the glue stuff…not sure what she’s talking about)
-welcome and encouragement cards (have your children draw Kacy and the other women an encouraging picture).

Please note that we have already had toiletries donated and we feel like the women are okay on those. Please also understand we are only collecting the specific items listed. You can also make cash/check donations to Asha’s Refuge to help these women and other disadvantaged refugees like them. Your financial support greatly helps us to continue to meet the needs of our refugee friends. Your donations can be dropped off at my house and put on my front porch for those of you that know my address. Financial contributions are tax deductible and can be mailed to our office at 1035 Winchester, Ste. A216, Collierville, TN. 38017. Contact us at jamie@ashasrefuge.org or deborah@ashasrefuge.org if you can help. Thank you in advance for your help.

Our website has received a few updates. We have added an event calendar that can be viewed by clicking on the tab that says “calendar” on our menu bar. We hope this helps everyone to keep up to date with the ongoings at Asha’s Refuge.

For now, the calendar lists our Friday English Conversation and Preschool Classes at New Bethel and our quarterly orientations. In the future, we hope it will list things like fundraising activities and additional classes such as computer, citizenship and art classes.
If you ever see anything that interests you and you want to know more, please contact us through the “contact” tab or just send us an email. We are always looking for committed volunteers.