MADISON, Wis. — When Asal Din Gojar arrived in Madison last September, like many others he had to leave friends and family in Afghanistan behind. Now, he is afraid.
“They are still killing people who worked with the U.S. military,” he said. And today, he fears they’ll be left behind.
Formerly employed with the U.S. military and coming to the United States on the Special Immigrant Visa process available to Afghans who assist the U.S. government, he has a plea for government officials now.
“They are still killing people who worked with the US military in Afghanistan, people who worked side by side with the US government.” He fears the worst after a day of chaos and death in Afghanistan: they will be left behind.
Speaking with News 3 Now through an interpreter hotline and with the assistance of his son Shoaid, Asal Din says the transition from Afghanistan to the U.S. has gotten smoother in the past few months after a rough beginning with little interpreting or communication help. COVID-19 complicated an already-convoluted visa process, with him arriving in Madison in September as a pandemic surge was just beginning to get underway.
He was helped by the Jewish Social Services, a Madison-area organization that assists refugees in resettlement by connecting people to services and facilitating things like housing in the community. He’s now taking English classes through the Literacy Network, another organization that collaborates with JSS and has a contract with the state to provide language services to refugees.
He’s struggling with that process, he admitted, thanks to his age–his children are learning it much more quickly, like 19-year-old Shoaid. But he worries about incoming Afghan refugees; communication will be one of their biggest barriers.
“I hope they have interpreters to communicate,” he said through his own translator. Otherwise, he said, it’s difficult to have control over your own plans.
The Literacy Network has served people coming from about 60 different countries, executive director Jeff Burkhart explained. They’re anticipating playing a role in any Afghans choosing to resettle in the Madison area, a likely outcome given the city’s existing Afghan community. (Dane County has settled about a third of the 313 Afghan refugees that Wisconsin has taken in from 2001-2019, according to state data.) Refugees on SIVs have a luxury that other types of refugees don’t always have: they can choose where to live once arriving in the U.S.
Helping them assimilate their language will be a challenge, Burkhart acknowledged.
“There’s so many irregularities about English that don’t exist in other languages,” he explained. “A lot of the refugee population that we have in our programs right now are older students and so it does take more time for them to learn English… We just have to be understanding that it’s not a 3- or 6-month process for people to learn and understand the information that they need.”
Fort McCoy, Wisconsin’s only U.S. Army base, has been authorized along with two other military installations around the country to receive up to 22,000 Afghan refugees. About a 1,000 had arrived by Wednesday morning, according to Sen. Ron Johnson who toured the facility, and he said officials at Fort McCoy said up to 10,000 may ultimately come for temporary housing while their visa situation was sorted out and they were connected to resettlement agencies.
The Department of Defense and Fort McCoy officials didn’t respond to questions from News 3 Now about current capacity at the fort, but said that across all three military installations, capacity had been at 15,000 and officials were working to increase it to 22,000.
Asal Din and his son Shoaid are anxious to communicate a larger, more pointed message. Loved ones are still trapped in Afghanistan, and they’re watching the news closely as the U.S. military prepares to depart and evacuations wind down, after more than 100,000 Americans, permanent residents, SIVs, and other refugees have been airlifted out of Kabul. News of two explosions was breaking as they interviewed Thursday morning; by evening, the death toll of two suicide bombing attacks attributed to terrorist group ISIS-K had risen to more than 90 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members killed, and many more injured.
“I hope they will continue,” Shoaid said. “There are a lot of poor people.”
Asal Din has no trust that the Taliban will follow through on their promises of a less violent regime than the one many remember from 20 years earlier when the U.S. overthrew it, the regime that sheltered Al-Qaeda when it killed 3,000 in the 9/11 attacks.
“They’re here to make a better life for themselves,” Burkhart said. “They deserve our support.”
How to volunteer with the Literacy Network:
Volunteer English language tutors don’t need a certification, Burkhart said, and are asked to commit to at least one semester of teaching one two-hour session a week.
Tutors typically work one-on-one, although the organization also coordinates some group classes, and many of the sessions in the coming semester will be virtual.
The Literacy Network provides the lesson plans and curriculum, and provide tutoring support as well as initial training and orientation. For those who can’t volunteer, donations are also a needed option.
Editor’s note: While some who worked with the U.S. military in the past have requested anonymity for security reasons, Asal Din Gojar assured News 3 Now through an interpreter that he was comfortable with his face and name being shared.
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