Fall 2021 22 A Tale of Two Refugees Finding New Life in America By Esther Fultz American economist, Thomas Sowell, once said that the freedom of America is the freedom to live your own life and take your own chances. Historically, America has been a place people from all across the world look to as a bastion of freedom. Immigrants and refugees from all across the world still seek the freedom and security that a life in America can provide. Fifi Gaju is a junior studying at Mt. Vernon Nazarene University. She was born in Congo but spent most of her childhood in Rwanda due to tribal conflicts in Congo. “In Congo, there are different tribes and we’re not allowed to marry into a different tribe,” Gaju explained. “We believe that if you marry someone from your tribe you’re going to have a good understanding of that person and be able to communicate better with them. [Other tribes] hated [my tribe] because of that, and they started to kill us.” As the conflict escalated, certain tribes began to drive others out of the country. “They wanted us to move out of the country, and we wanted to stay in our country,” Gaju recalled. “This is still happening in the Congo now.” While moving to Rwanda allowed Gaju and her family to escape the conflict, conditions in the Rwandan refugee camps were hardly better. “We would eat the same thing all year, from January to December,” Gaju remembered. “For us to have something to wear – clothes or a pair of shoes – my parents had to go and sell the food that the government would give us… It was a choice between eating that month and buying clothes that month. We would go three or four days without eating... Nobody would wish to live their life like that.” Anne Sada, an 18-year-old refugee who was born in Rwanda and raised in Congo until coming to America at the age of 12, also spoke of the meager living conditions in her former country. “It was totally different [than America],” Sada remembers. “My grandmother used to sell food so we didn’t go hungry… We used to have a farm, and my family would have to look after the animals and make sure nothing happened to them. It was just a lot.” The actual process of coming to America was long and grueling as well. Gaju said she and her family spent 13 years in the camps before actually being able to come to America. Gaju explained how refugees are repeatedly interrogated to ensure they are telling the truth about who they are and why they decided to leave their home country. A single mistake in an interview can have devastating effects. “If you mess up, if you say something different from what you said yesterday, that means you aren’t going anymore,” Gaju said. “There’s people that are still in the camps because of that.” Gaju said many times that being in America is not something she takes for granted. She is especially grateful for the opportunity she has to go to school and eventually work in America. Education in Rwanda and other African countries is very limited. Where Gaju grew up, school only goes from primary school to a student’s freshman year of high school. If one has enough money, there are limited options for secondary and post secondary education, but Gaju explained that finding this money is impossible due to levels of depen-
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