https://mailchi.mp/266c4e5ad462/getting-ready-for-our-new-family
| Home ShoppingIt has been pretty much a whirlwind! The boys were out house hunting and the market is crazy, but both Isa and Roshan were able to find nice houses for what in today’s market are fairly reasonable prices. Roshan’s house is in the Cementon area of Whitehall, and Isa’s house is just a few blocks from our house! Closings are scheduled for Nov 24 and Oct 24. Thanks to our friend Diane who dropped everything in the middle of her own move to drive all over the Lehigh Valley and find good homes for these boys and their families! |
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| This photo is in front of one of the many houses we saw – not one that the boys purchased though it was a contender for a while. |
| Ghani has not been trucking as long as Isa or Roshan and needs a few more months of trucking income on the books before he will qualify for a mortgage, so he returned to work. Isa also returned to work – his truck needed some repairs and now is the busy season for trucking, so the boys want to work as much as they can while they can. Roshan has been waiting for his driver to get a load to PA so that he can also get back on the road. Once their families are here, they will have to be home regularly and won’t be able to work as much.Ghani’s family is still in New Mexico and Roshan’s and Isa’s families are in Virginia. They have gotten all their vaccines and tests but have no idea when they will be released. We haven’t heard anything from this end about it either. It could be 2 days or 2 weeks or even 2 months, but I am hopeful it won’t be that long! – Addendum – We just heard from Isa that his family should be coming to the Lehigh Valley within the next 2 weeks!We are hoping they will be here for Halloween, though I imagine that will be quite a strange introduction to US culture. :-)I think I may have mentioned that Ghani’s wife, Sadiqa, has her heart set on being a surgeon. I found out that Roshan’s fiancée, Shegufa, went to school for midwifery and is interested in becoming a nurse midwife. Shegufa’s father wants her to be an MD but Shegufa is looking for a faster track to a good profession.Everything may change once they really get here and settle in and life happens – that is the way of things of course. (I am a poster child for that.) And I am looking forward to seeing what unfolds. And so looking forward to having daughters in law!Donations and PayPalThank you so much to everyone who has donated to help! It means so much to know how many people out there care so much and want to help.We have used some of the donated money to help defray the costs of submitting several of the Humanitarian Parole requests. And we purchased some electric kettles we found on sale – there is a lot of tea drinking in the Hazara culture and the kettles will be well used! The rest is waiting until the families arrive and we see what their needs are. |
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| Unfortunately, the PayPal account that we set up to collect money for the boys and their families and other families in need has been frozen. I have heard from some people who donated that the money they donated hasn’t been debited yet from their accounts.Evidently, unscrupulous people were using the account to test fraudulent credit cards. We saw a bunch of $1 donations from people we don’t know and reported the suspicious activity to PayPal who said don’t worry about it. But then PayPal turned around and froze the account. Nolan was livid and did his best to get PayPal to release the funds but they would not budge. They are doing some sort of investigation and after 6 months will release the funds that are in that account.If you donated via PayPal, we are really sorry for this situation. Had we known, we would not have used PayPal. As it is now, if you would like to ask PayPal to refund your money, I believe that you can do that. Or you are welcome to leave it as it is and in 6 months, the money will be released and we will put it to good use then.Again, we apologize for this situation. Please contact us directly if you have any questions.Making the NewsIn case you missed it – we were interviewed by our local news. The reporter and camera guy were super nice and they interviewed us for more than 90 minutes! They used just a few seconds of the interviews – but it is a really nice story.https://www.wfmz.com/news/area/lehighvalley/local-afghans-who-were-in-afghanistan-when-taliban-took-over-share-their-story/article_a9f2648e-17f7-11ec-9827-2315fe0212a1.html |
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| Other UpdatesWe are continuing to work on applications for Humanitarian Parole for the family members of the boys and their friends. It is a continually heartbreaking situation. Unfortunately, even though the Hazara people are one of the most at-risk groups in Afghanistan and they make up 10-20% of the population, from what we can tell, they made up less than 1% of those who made it onto the evacuation flights.So far, we don’t know of anyone who has made it to the US on the basis of an approved Humanitarian Parole petition. It is a terribly tricky situation. Most of these folks don’t have passports, so even if we can somehow get them visas, we aren’t sure how they would be allowed to fly anywhere. We still don’t know if the Taliban will even allow them to go to the airport for a commercial flight. And if they are in Pakistan, even with a Pakistani Visa, they may not be allowed to board a commercial flight with a valid visa, if their Pakistani Visa is not stamped properly – and most don’t have visas for Pakistan.If they have a SIV or P2 or P3 in process, their chances are a lot higher. SIVs are for interpreters and P2 and P3 are for other people who worked for contractors or media companies and such. The system is terribly complicated and difficult to navigate and can seem pretty hopeless, but we can’t and won’t give up.One Happy Ending/BeginningWe ran into this problem of legal, but not-quite-legal-enough in Pakistan with a cousin of Arif’s who had been accepted to a masters program in Austria. She had her visas and tickets booked for the end of August but of course, the Taliban took over. She had a visa to Pakistan and got herself there and tried to fly to Austria multiple times, but was not allowed because she didn’t have the proper stamp on her Pakistani visa.Nolan was able to put her in touch with one of our new contacts somewhere in Europe who was able to find a reasonable travel agent in Pakistan who was able to secure the stamp she needed and she made it out and is now at college in Austria!Personal UpdateNolan and I are really back to work now. Nolan moved his office back into the basement in preparation for whomever needs the bedroom space upstairs. My mom and I managed to pull off a reasonably successful first gig for our new Irish Interchainables jewelry line at Celtic Classic in Bethlehem. We had quite a lot of great help, which is the only reason we could pull it off! |
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| My mother and I have decided to let go of the pottery side of the business for now. We will focus on growing the Irish Interchainables brand and turning that into a profitable business. With the business, my job, and the new family coming, I will still have my hands more than full! Busy or not, we are going start having parties again! Trick or Treat night is on! 🙂 And I am dreaming of happy hours and Christmas parties.Speaking of Christmas and holidays – we have no idea how we are going to manage gatherings with all this new family. We will figure it out as we go. It is a problem I am infinitely grateful to have.Thank you!!!Thank you to all of you who have been praying and sending your love and good vibrations our way. Please keep sending it – especially to Arif and his family and to all the families who are so scared and vulnerable. I can’t tell you how much it means to us and to all of our Afghan friends and family that you care about them and are wishing them well. Sending you big hugs! Thank you. |
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