The Changing Face of St. Louis 

Why new immigrants are the city's best hope.
(part 2 of 3)

By Kevin M. Mitchell, St. Louis Magazine

	"Immigrants come as part of a labor certification process," explains Dr. Ann Rynearson, Senior Vice President and Division Director of International Institute St. Louis. "They have a talent we need, hence all the doctors and computer experts. Or they come as a relative to a citizen."	

	The International Institute is responsible for the resettlement of refugees, a highly politicized process determined by the government. Each experience is unique depending on the person and the culture they come from, but while the Institute's efforts go a long way, every new American inevitably has a jarring experience when first making St. Louis his or her home.
	
	Ahmad Barekzai, a young man in his late 20s with piercing eyes, left Afghanistan with what remained of his family in 1993. He spent four years each in Pakistan and India before finally arriving in St. Louis in 2000. 

	"First of all, we hear things from relatives already here," Barekzai says. "Kind of boasting--‘I have a car'--they never say how they got that car. Secondly, it sounds funny, but people get affected by Hollywood. You think America is Disney World and everyone lives like Bruce Willis and Mel Gibson." Additionally, he says U.N. workers often tell refugees to leave all their belongings behind because they will be given everything new when they arrive.

	So when Barekzai arrived here with his 70-year-old mother and two sisters (one schizophrenic, the other widowed with two children), the reality check was overwhelming.

	"I couldn't see anything but what I expected, and I was a person thinking that I deserved to come here and expected many things from the government," he confesses. "The nice house, furnished, somebody to take me out and familiarize myself with the city.... we came here to rest because we had already suffered enough."

	The Institute must indoctrinate people like Barekzai and do it quickly. They find them an apartment, start them on English classes, teach them how to use the bus line and grocery stores, and assess their health--mental and physical. All issues must be dealt with sensitively and with knowledge of cultural taboos. "We explain why we ask all the questions," Vildana Basagic, a caseworker, explains. "You kind of have to be careful about mental health because a lot of cultures don't acknowledge that. You have to curb it in things like, ‘Do you have problems with sleeping?' It's little things like that."

	 "Honestly, the first time I came here I didn't find St. Louis the way that I wanted to see it--it was my fault," Barekzai says. "But the first thing I discovered was the public library, and the people talked to me, liked it, friendly, say ‘hi,' and I was astonished." He was in contact with others from his country who ended up in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C., and at first he was a little envious--until cost-of-living statistics were compared.

	"St. Louis is a good place [for refugees]," says Ariel Burgess, Vice President and Director of Social Services. "You can get a one-bedroom [apartment] for $300. We have entry-level manufacturing jobs. Private/public partnerships provide new Americans opportunities not found elsewhere."

	Barekzai agrees: "It's a valuable lifestyle."

	Everyone starts on the bottom rung. Basagic tells the tale of a newly arrived professor of physics who, because he knows no English, will inevitably start work on an assembly line at a small manufacturing plant in the city. But many employers are willing--even enthusiastic--to hire these new St. Louisans. One is Jim Grant, who is Human Resource Director at the Sheraton Westport.

	"We do have a number in maintenance, and about 20 in housekeeping," Grant says. He says that hiring Institute clients has significantly reduced his turnover rate. "They are easy to train, and we have some that have progressed into leadership positions," making a good, middle-class wage.

	Luckier than many, Barekzai had a working knowledge of English when he arrived here, and eventually became a caseworker at the Institute himself. Now when other Afghanis come speaking Farsi, filled with images of Beverly Hills mansions and free TVs, he is on the front line explaining to them how it really is. 

(to be continued)