Immigrants from nations such as Iraq, Nepal and Pakistan are sorting out life in a shelter while wondering what happens after the tornado. Watch video
West Springfield residents Mamoona Iqbal and her husband, Mohammad, along with their 3-year-old son Yahya are staying in a shelter the city has established in the 4-H dormitory at the Eastern States Exposition fairgrounds.WEST SPRINGFIELD –A crying baby, worries about their young daughters living communally, grief over what has happened and fear over what the future holds are just a few of the concerns of the city’s tornado victims being sheltered in the 4-H dormitory on the Eastern States Exposition fairgrounds.
Several of the 91 people now living there spoke about their experiences Tuesday morning as some of them continued to eat their breakfasts in the building’s cafeteria. Tiny, 2-month-old Ahamd Ibrahim, the youngest tornado victim at the shelter, was sleeping quietly in a baby carrier.
However, his mother, 37-year-old Rawaa Khaleel, said the infant cries most of the time since her family was displaced by the June 1 tornado that devastated the city’s Merrick section
She is woken up regularly by her young son, who sleeps at night in her arms.
The Iraqi native said, “I don’t sleep very well because of the baby.”
Nearby, Mamoona Iqbal, 40, was grateful now that the city had consolidated a shelter at West Springfield Middle School and Coburn School into one at the fairgrounds her family has been assigned its own room.
Iqbal had sent her three daughters, ages 20, 17 and 11, to stay with friends out of concern about them living and sleeping among mixed company in a school gymnasium. Since modesty can be restored, Iqbal said she is having the girls stay at the dormitory with the rest of the family.
Twelve-year-old Sajjad Ibrahim poses with his mother, Rawaa Khaleel, 37, and his 2-month-old brother, Ahamd Ibrahim, in the 4-H dormitory of the Eastern States Exposition fairgrounds in West Springfield. West Springfield has has put up people left homeless by the tornado in a shelter it is running there.“In our religion we must be secure in our home. We feel embarrassed to live in groups,” Iqbal said of her Muslim faith.
Iqbal and her family, who are originally from Pakistan, have been sheltered by the city since the tornado destroyed the roof of their home at 17 Sprague St. While in shelters they have braved hot, fanless rooms and have had to give up eating meat as the meals provided by the school system do not use meat that is halal, or slaughtered according to Muslim traditions.
Iqbal described herself as “helpless and homeless.” She is hopeful of applying for a permanent place for her family to live with a local housing authority and is in the midst of learning how to file the necessary paperwork.
“We have no place to go or to put our stuff. I am like blind,” Iqbal said.
She and her 3-year-old son, Yahya Zafar, wake up frequently during the night because they are not used to sleeping in a strange place.
“It is a different place and I don’t know what is going on next,” Iqbal said.
Jinan Alsaffar, 53, a refugee from Bagdad who had been living at 79 George St., voiced similar fears.
“We are nervous. We have lost our homes and our clothes,” Alsaffar said.
In contrast, 19-year-old Damber K. Acharya of 15 East School St. was upbeat. The refugee from Nepal described the shelter as “just like our apartment” and said everyone in her family is sleeping well.
“I like everything except the food. ... We don’t like sugar. In American food they put sugar in everything,” Acharya said.
To deal with that situation, the family has gotten a friend to send them Indian food.
One thing the West Springfield tornado victims should have plenty of is clothes.
So many people have donated garments that the city is no longer accepting them, West Springfield volunteer Carol A. Byrnes said while folding clothes. The clothes were in a storage area to the side of the cafeteria that was filled with other donated items such as diapers and toothbrushes.
Individuals and businesses have been great about donating goods to the victims, Byrnes said.
And one of the biggest local donors to the cause of helping the tornado victims is the Eastern States Exposition itself. The Big E has provided temporary housing for victims in its 4-H dormitory at the request of Mayor Edward J. Gibson.
“We were so fortunate that our facility was not impacted. We wanted to reach out to help people who were a lot less fortunate,” G. Wayne McCary, the exposition’s president, said.
Although the Moses Building in which the dormitory is located has its own kitchen, the city’s public school system prepares and sends meals to the victims.
Jeanne Galloway, the city’s director of public health who is overseeing sheltering tornado victims, said the fairgrounds have barred people who normally use the area for walking and jogging from entering the area out of security concerns.
At the height of the crisis, Galloway said the city was providing overnight accommodations to 170 residents. City officials decided to consolidate the two shelters at the schools into one location after supper Monday because it is easier to staff just one facility. In addition, there were times cots had to be set up in hallways due to overflow from school gymnasiums and cafeterias.
Galloway said keeping people at the two schools was not a good long-term solution to the homelessness problem because students had to take physical education classes outside and eat their lunches in their classrooms.
“The rest of the school year wouldn’t have been a good idea,” Galloway said.
Many of the victims sheltered by the city are immigrants from the Merrick section, the oldest neighborhood in the community. The working class area, which has businesses, industries and many multi-family houses, has long been a home to newcomers.