Columbia Heights resident Degha Shabbeleh still gets emotional when she tells the story of her high school counselor calling her into his office when she first arrived at her new school in Ottawa, Canada, years ago.
Without speaking to her, he worked for several minutes on a schedule, then showed it to her. It was filled with low-level English as a Second Language (ESL) classes.
Had he taken a minute to ask, she could have told him – in English, Somali, or French – that she was daughter of a Somali ambassador, had lived in Belgium and Gabon, and had been educated at international schools.
She did tell him (surprising him with her fluency) that she had the highest of academic aspirations. She asked to be placed in honors classes, as she had been in her previous school.
Shabbeleh recounted this and other stories from her life to about 50 people gathered at First Lutheran Church in Columbia Heights on September 12. She was joined by Columbia Heights Police Officer Mohammed Farah at the first event in the Stories from Our Neighborhood series, sponsored by the church and the group HeightsNEXT.
“I am the top of the top, and this counselor didn’t see it that way, they thought I was the lowest of the low,” Shabbeleh said she thought as a teenager. It was just one of the shocks of what she called a “dark time” for her, when she no longer had many of the abundant privileges she had been used to.
The move to Canada had been very different from previous family moves. “Everything I knew had disappeared,” she said. “I had been the child of an ambassador, now I was an immigrant and refugee.” She was excited to be in a public school for the first time, but found she didn’t feel like she belonged with other Somali refugees. And she wasn’t Western enough to fit in with the Canadians.
Her parents recognized the change in her usually bubbly mood, and told her their own stories. Her father was an Oxford-educated academic who had been discriminated against because of his skin color; and her mother, a college-educated Somali woman – an unusual path for women in those days – talked about professors dismissing her because she was an African woman.
Shabbeleh’s learning about her parents’ struggles gave her strength and an “I belong in this world,” attitude, she said. She graduated high school with high honors and went on to receive a bachelor’s degree from the University of Ottawa in political science and an M.B.A. from the University of Toronto. She also has a teaching license in English literature.
Heights police officer Mohammed Farah told a different story, but rooted in the same country. He grew up in Somalia, and was a young child in the early 1990s as the civil war heightened. He remembers being aware of shootings as well as the peacekeeping forces, but because he was so young his primary memory of those times are of the water and candy the soldiers would give the children.
His family was separated for eight years, with his father and older sister leaving Somalia for Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya in 1993, then going to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, eventually landing in Rochester, Minnesota.
Farah, his mother and other siblings had to stay behind for several years without contact with his father. They moved within Somalia and then to Ethiopia, where they took multiple trips to the U.S. Embassy and incurred significant debt before they were able to join his father and sister in the States.
He, like Shabbeleh, remembers challenging times at his school in Rochester. In his case, he didn’t know English and was enrolled in mainly ESL classes. The first two years, which he spent learning English and trying to fit in, were “very challenging” he said.
There was a lot of bullying, but that didn’t bother him, he said. “My background, where I came from, the kind of lifestyle that I’ve lived, that really prepared me for this. I was pretty much, ‘This is heaven. This is nothing compared to some of the stuff that I’ve seen and where I’ve grown up.’” Sports really helped him adjust, Farah said. He participated in track and field, cross country, and wrestling.
As he approached graduation, one of his math teachers suggested he consider becoming a police officer. At first, Farah dismissed the idea, remembering the reputation of police in Somalia: “They were the lowest that you can get. They’re not worthy; they’re not trustworthy.”
But a ride-along with officers in Olmsted County changed his mind. He received an associate degree from a community college – the first in his family to graduate college – and then earned a bachelor’s degree in law enforcement from Mankato State University.
Both Farah and Shabbeleh talked about how they found their way to Columbia Heights.
When Farah was job hunting, he was attracted by how active the police department was in the community and by the community’s diversity.
He was offered the job two-and-a-half years ago. “I knew I had to hit the ground running hard and try to do everything that I could to help … build a bridge between the police department and communities who face a similar struggle as me.”
Shabbeleh, who had married while in graduate school in Toronto, moved to Minnesota with her husband, living in various places in the metro area. When they were expecting their third child and were ready to buy a house, she said to him, “I don’t care how the house looks, it’s really the community, really who my neighbors are.” She liked what she saw in Columbia Heights.
“I saw different generations in the same town. I saw people walking in the parks and greeting one another. I saw diversity. I said, ‘This is where I want my kids to grow, this is where I want to grow old, and where I want my kids to come back and continue having a family,’” she said. Their family has been in Columbia Heights 10 years and they are expecting their fifth child.
After Farah spoke, there was a get-to-know-your-neighbor break, followed by Q and A, moderated by church member Gummadi Franklin, himself an immigrant. “I hope you have met someone whom you hadn’t known before,” he said, before reading some of the questions, which ranged from what neighbors should know about Somali residents to how neighbors can support Somali youth.
Shabbeleh explained modesty is prescribed by the Muslim religion. It’s the reason women cover themselves, and why they will put their hands over their hearts rather than accepting men’s outstretched hands. “But because women wear a hijab doesn’t block you from communicating,” she said.
She also said that sometimes there’s misconceptions because of the sound of the Somali language. She used mothers reprimanding their children as an example. “They are probably saying ‘Get off the neighbors’ lawn now, you aren’t supposed to be there … you’ll be grounded’ … words you have heard and words you probably have said,” she said. “Because it’s coming from a different language and our tone is very different, it might sound aggressive.”
In terms of supporting Somali youth, Farah said that building relationships is key, and that starts with talking to the kids. “Ask them what they do, what kind of things they’re interested in,” he said. That shows that they are accepted and considered part of the community, he said.
Shabbeleh agreed. “Somali culture is a very narrative culture. We learn from our elders. Every single resident in Columbia Heights is an elder to us, well respected and well loved.”
Talking to the young people is “the only way we can keep the legacy of our city going,” she said. She encouraged people to tell the children their stories of growing up in Heights, of going to the same school the kids do, of playing ball on the same court, stories of mischief and relationships when you were their ages.
The speakers were well received by the audience, with much of the conversation continuing after the formal program. “This has been long in coming. The community is primed for a conversation on race and culture,” said Shirley Franklin, wife of Gummadi Franklin and also a church member.
Dan Fishbeck, the president of First Lutheran’s congregation, said the event was in keeping with the church’s mission to be active in the community. “This church has been here a very long time. The neighborhood has changed and is so wonderfully diverse, but people kind of have their own habits. This is a great opportunity to learn more about others who have come here more recently than maybe those of us who have been here forever.”
The next evening of Stories from Our Neighborhood will be Tuesday, October 10 at 6:30 p.m at First Lutheran Church, 1555 40th Avenue NE, Columbia Heights. Story tellers will be Amada Márquez Simula, who was named Columbia Heights’ 2017 Humanitarian of the Year; Luis Sacta, the owner of El Tequila Latin Kitchen; and Doug Zamora, a glassworker and Spanish interpreter.
Below: Photos from the event. (Photos by Karen Kraco)