Son Samer’s enthusiastic “Thank you” into the microphone caused many people to laugh, including mother Aya, father Mohamad and sister Fatima. (Richard McGuire photo)
When about 150 people from Osoyoos and area gathered Sunday at St. Anne’s Catholic Church for a reception to welcome the Tabanjat Karbouj family, they sang “Happy Birthday.”
This time they were singing it for daughter Fatima, who was celebrating her ninth birthday and her first in Osoyoos and Canada, since the Syrian refugee family’s arrival from the Middle East.
The Happy Birthday song, sung in English and Arabic, has a special significance.
When the family arrived at Penticton Airport on Jan. 15 around midnight, volunteers and well-wishers sang Happy Birthday to Mohamad, the father in the family of four, on the bus ride to Osoyoos.
The mother, Aya, and son, Samer, 6, were also at Sunday’s welcome reception, which was also an occasion to thank the many volunteers and donors who have helped the family settle in Osoyoos.
Each family member in turn spoke at the microphone to say “Thank you” in English to the community, though Mohamad, probably the most outgoing of the four, showed off some of his other newly acquired English to thank individually the volunteer teachers and tutors who have been helping the family learn the language.
Vera Ryan, with her husband Michael, a former town councillor, spearheaded the Osoyoos Refugee Project. She spoke about the cold winter night the family first saw Osoyoos in mid-January.
“It was such an exciting time for us,” said Vera. Addressing the family, she added, “You must have been excited, but also maybe a little scared, a little nervous. You are so brave coming to a new country with a new language and a totally different culture.”
No sooner did the family arrive when there was a whirl of activity to register the children for school, set up accounts for banking and utility bills, arrange medical and dental appointments – all requiring local Arabic speaking volunteers to act as interpreters.
All of this activity followed several months of fundraising and preparing a house.
The idea of sponsoring a family was hatched in September and a steering committee was put together in early October. By December, fundraising had exceeded the target of $30,000 to help the family settle and get through their first year in Osoyoos.
On April 9, all this work was recognized when the Osoyoos Refugee Committee received an award as the “outstanding volunteer project” at the town’s Volunteer Appreciation Awards and Luncheon.
The family has also been hard at work learning to speak English, which they barely spoke at all when they arrived.
Mohamad and Aya take two hours of English as a second language at the Sonora Community Centre each morning, five days a week. In the afternoon they often have volunteer tutors drop by to help them practice what they are learning.
Asked in an interview through an interpreter how their English is progressing, Mohamad tries to answer in English when he can.
“Slowly, slowly, little, little,” he said.
The family has also been learning to adapt to a culture very different from the one they left.
Even little things like shopping for groceries are an adjustment – in Syria and Lebanon, they shopped daily. Here they’ve adapted to shopping weekly.
Some of the foods they’re used to can only be bought in Penticton, though they were happy to learn that Buy-Low Foods in Osoyoos sells some Halal meats.
When spring arrived, Mohamad wasted little time installing a large vegetable garden in the backyard of the house they rent a short distance from downtown Osoyoos.
Here, he plans to grow eggplant, a Middle Eastern staple, along with zucchini, tomatoes, radishes and other vegetables that he names in English.
He also plans to take up fishing and the family will be stocking a freezer in an effort to reduce grocery costs, which they find much higher in Canada than in the Middle East.
At the same time as he works on his English, Mohamad is eager to find paying employment, ideally using his skills as a stone carver.
He shows off pictures on his phone of his exquisite work in marble and other stone with which he’s made fireplaces, chimney decorations, columns and other pieces. It’s a skill that has been passed down from father to son through generations.
Several committee members have put him in touch with people involved in stone and building and MP Richard Cannings introduced him to Pat Field, a stone sculptor from Castlegar.
When committee member Marie Therrien moderated Sunday’s reception, she predicted that the children, Fatima and Samer, would soon surpass their parents in English language skills.
“Before we know it, these kids will be totally fluent in English and they’ll be our new interpreters,” Therrien said.
Both children have been attending Osoyoos Elementary School where they receive language help, but are otherwise integrated with the other students. Fatima is in Grade 3 and Samer is in Kindergarten.
Fatima’s teacher, Julie Dias, says she sometimes uses a smartphone app that translates spoken English to spoken Arabic when they hit a language barrier. And Fatima usually responds in basic English.
“She does everything that the other kids are doing,” said Dias. “I may modify it differently to her needs, but for the most part she is able to do what kids in the class are doing. She is following routines very well and she’s doing really well.”
Unlike her younger brother, Fatima also has the advantage of having had schooling in the Middle East. Nonetheless, Samer engages with his classmates as he shows a booklet of his drawings.
The two children fitted right in when they recently took part in Easter Eggstravanza. There they hunted down Easter eggs, sat on the knees of two Easter bunnies and were lifted up into one of the Osoyoos Fire Department’s shiny red engines.
The family has been introduced to other Osoyoos traditions while they’ve been here, including watching an Osoyoos Coyotes hockey game in the stands with the rest of the community.
Tutors and others have taken them on outings through the area and they’ve also formed friendships with other Arabic-speaking families in Oliver, Summerland and a family of new Syrian arrivals in Cawston.
Asked what the family’s biggest difficulty has been since coming to Canada, Mohamad replies: “Brother, sister not here.”
They were surrounded by family in Syria and Lebanon, where they fled to when the war devastated their northern Syrian city of Aleppo. They’ve had to leave family behind, though they converse with them regularly by phone over the internet.
“We are so delighted with our lovely family,” Vera told those at Sunday’s reception. “They came with their skills, their hopes and dreams and we are just delighted to have them in our community. It’s not easy to come to a new country with a strange culture, and so now we are entering the next phase of our project and again we look to you for help.”
Michael spoke of the three phases of the refugee project: preparation and arrival; settlement, which is still ongoing; and integration, when the family becomes an integral part of their new community.
“I’d like to encourage you to become a friend of Aya, Mohamad, Fatima and Samer,” said Michael. “To meet them and to invite them into your activities and reach out to them. Show them your favourite activities and places here in Osoyoos. Make them feel that this is, in fact, home and they are receiving Canada’s warmest welcome.”
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
Mohamad Rabee Tabanjat is building a vegetable garden in his backyard. He plans to grow egg plants, zucchini, tomatoes, radishes and other vegetables to help feed his family. He’s also interested in taking up fishing and hopes to find employment when he improves his English. (Richard McGuire photo)
Fatima (left) and Samer Tabanjat had a chance to sit in the driver’s seat of one of the Osoyoos Fire Department’s trucks. Waving from outside is their father, Mohamad Tabanjat. (Richard McGuire photo)
Samer (left) and Fatima Tabanjat meet with two Easter bunnies in their first Canadian Easter. The children and their parents came to Osoyoos in January after the family was forced to leave war-torn Syria. (Richard McGuire photo)
The Tabanjat family, who came to Osoyoos in January as refugees to Canada, are settling in and learning English. At back are parents Aya and Mohamad and in front are son Samer and daughter Fatima. (Richard McGuire photo)
Teacher Wendy Neumann (centre) gives Mohamad and Aya a two-hour English lesson at the Sonora Centre. Here they learn the English words for items in illustrations. (Richard McGuire photo)
Fatima’s Grade 3 class did a game where the students form a circle and spin a partner around in the middle. Fatima gives Principal Dave Foster a spin. (Richard McGuire photo)
Despite language challenges, Samer, right, shares a laugh with fellow Kindergarten student Grayson Stevenot as the two draw pictures in their booklets. (Richard McGuire photo)
David Smith (left) shares a laugh with Mohamad and Aya. (Richard McGuire photo)
Michael and Vera Ryan urge members of the community to become friends with the Tabanjat Karbouj family and extend to them Canada’s warmest welcome. (Richard McGuire photo)
Mohamad extends thanks to all those who have helped the family settle in Osoyoos and learn English while his wife Aya looks on. She and the children, Fatima and Samer, each took a turn at the mic to say “Thank you.” (Richard McGuire photo)
Mohamad holds up Samer, who gave an enthusiastic “Thank you” at the microphone. Mother Aya and daughter Fatima look on. (Richard McGuire photo)
Fatima, who turned nine on Sunday, stands behind her elaborately decorated cake while people sing “Happy Birthday” to her in English and Arabic. (Richard McGuire photo)
Committee member Deb Holoboff hands a present to Fatima for her ninth birthday. It’s a handmade “bamboletta” or doll made from natural fibres. (Richard McGuire photo)
Fatima embraces her Grade 3 teacher Julie Dias while Mohamad and son Samer stand behind Fatima’s cake for her ninth birthday. (Richard McGuire photo)
