(GH: Here’s another excerpt from “Making West Home,” a cookbook on the lives and foodways of refugees in southern Idaho. The book will debut this Saturday at the Idaho State Historical Society. Sarah Barsness wrote the text, I took the photos.)
Photo by Guy Hand
Entering the home of Josephine Nizigiyimana and her family feels like stepping into another part of the world. Their sparkling clean apartment is filled to capacity with family and neighbors; the girls are all wearing brightly colored saris, and in the background a Burundian video of people dancing and singing is playing while everyone sings and claps along with the TV.
Photo by Guy Hand
Upon arriving in Boise in August of 2007, a big part of making Boise home for Josephine and her parents was finding other people from Burundi who had been here longer to help them adapt. Remarkably, they reconnected with Burundian friends in Boise they had met in a camp in the Congo. It is easy to see that being so close to friends has made a difference as the families talk and laugh together. Being with other Burundians helps, but one of the hardest things about moving to the United States was leaving people behind.
“Some of them, they don’t have anywhere to go live . . .”
Photo by Guy Hand
Josephine’s friend Imaculeé Ndaizeye explains, “Yes, like some of that is we miss our families. Our friends, some of our friends—left them, and then some of our family—left them. And then some of them they don’t have anywhere to go live…that’s why we miss. And I’m kind of sad because they’re not going to have a place to live.” Josephine agrees, saying that she misses her teacher and neighbors very much.
Yet there are many things about life in Africa that Imaculeé found difficult: “Someday when I got children, I would say to them that in Africa life was really hard because we used to walk to go to school. We didn’t have school buses. And then we had to walk to collect water far from our home. Not like here where you have water in house. And you have to go in forests to collect—to collect tree because we used tree to cook. And we used to go far. If you want to grow a lot of foods you have to go out of camp. And it was really hard to go out of camp because if police catch you, you have to pay them money or you have to go to jail. Life was really hard. Our parents used to go out of camp to go to work for people that can pay them money. If you don’t go there you can’t have any money to buy if you want bread, if you want sugar. And then that’s the kind of things you need for your life. So life was really hard there.”
Photo by Guy Hand
Here’s more information on the Saturday, May 1st event at the Idaho State Historical Society
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Guy Hand is a writer, public radio producer and photographer specializing in food and agriculture. |
