For newly-arrived migrants who fled their countries with nothing in hand, a little bit of help and support from the community goes a long way.
“It's honestly very important to me,” said Hayam Mohamed.
Mohamed knows it better than anyone. Her family fled Sudan in 2012.
“It was honestly a very hard struggle,” said Mohamed. “It was not easy.”
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But with the support of her community, her family was able to create a life for themselves in the U.S., and today she’s paying it forward.
Mohamed joined dozens of community members as the city of San Diego launched welcome week, an initiative meant to help newcomers feel at home in the region.
“San Diego is a welcoming city and we embrace the diverse backgrounds of the people from all over the world who come here and make our community their home,” said San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria.
Butterfly templates are available at all San Diego public libraries throughout the week for the community to color and write welcome notes in.
“I want to have a lot of different colors because there's gonna be a lot of different families who are coming from different countries and I want to make the notes colorful so that it can represent them,” said Kaelyn Bethel, as she was coloring in the template.
The notes will then be distributed through community organizations and refugee resettlement agencies.
“They may not know the individual or the family that colored the page but they know when they see the colors there that they are loved, that they are welcomed,” said Appaswamy Vino Pajnor, Catholic Charities of San Diego CEO.
Welcome stations have also been set up at each library with information on its community and how to access resources.
“This whole event just makes me feel really connected to my family because like I wish they had this so they would feel welcomed and would have felt like they belong here and they wouldn’t have to struggle as much as they had to,” said Diana Estrada, a high school student at the event.
This is San Diego’s 10th annual Welcome Week. This year’s theme is: “Where We Belong”
“Our hope is that the families that receive these notes will see it as a gesture of gratitude from their San Diego neighbors that they now have to remind them that they are in fact welcome here,” said Mayor Gloria.
