Jim Lommasson

Diaspora, Baghdad, Iraq

Dr. Baher Butti: Brother in law: Seattle Washington USA. Sister: Budapest Hungary. Brother: In Jordan….no maybe Dubai/UAE. Brother: Brighten England. G.B. 

Jim Lommasson

Domino Set, Baghdad, Iraq

Othman Al Ani: I brought this domino set with me from Baghdad because it reminds me of the great times I spent with my friends. I chose this from all […]

Paul Fardig

Escaping Through the Back Door

When Eva Simons Rickles arrived home from school one day in November 1937, she was greeted by an unfamiliar nurse and was told her mother was sick in bed.

Kim Oanh Nguyen

When A Dream is Born

Walking down the halls of his middle school, Wilson Nitunga was eating an apple. The bell rang, and students around him rushed to class. A teacher approached

Sankar Raman

Counting on Math and Soccer

Mussa doesn’t remember much from the night his father was killed. From where he stood in his crib he could hear men’s voices in the room next door,

Sankar Raman

Reprogrammed Like a Cell Phone

Amidst the thick darkness of a city just before sunrise on the day he arrived in Portland, Abdulelah Aldabea imagined his brain was an iPhone restoring to

Sankar Raman

Determination Born in a Refugee Camp

After generations of peaceful living in the mountainous country of Bhutan, the family of Nabin Dhimal was abruptly forced to flee in 1989, when the Bhutan government

Sankar Raman

Fighting for a Better Life

Life in calm Clackamas, Oregon, where Hamada Haaji Chamada lives with his family is very different from the war-torn city of Mogadishu, Somalia,

A Resilient Daughter of the Arab Spring

When Rama Yousef was born in the Syrian capital of Damascus in 1999, her father cursed and cried tears of frustration. She was his fourth child and not the son […]

Sankar Raman

Come Up and Speak Up

When Hameda Dil Mohamed, 21, spoke in Pioneer Square last September at a rally in support of Rohingya refugees she hoped  

Kim Oanh Nguyen

Building a Home and a New Life

Neither Govinda nor Januka ever expected to own a house. Govinda Dhimal and his wife Januka Bokhrel both grew up in refugee camps in Nepal.

Sankar Raman

Desert to Oregon, a Paintbrush in Hand

Hussein Al-Baiaty was about as far away as anyone could be when terrorists crashed two airplanes into New York’s World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

Sankar Raman

Broken Glass to Breakout Senior

In 2013, when a bomb exploded and shattered all the windows of 15-year-old Sara Mohamed’s classroom in Damascus, Syria, she better understood  

Sankar Raman

Woman Without a Country

By the time Eman Abbas and her two sons made it to the United States in 2015, her Iraqi heritage had cost her admission to her dream school, a fair-paying […]

Katy Weaver

Rebuilding Her Life to Reconcile

One of Dijana’s earliest memories is of sleeping in the woods with her family. They weren’t camping for fun though — they were hiding. “We were attacked in Bosnia