Once among their nation's elite, some Iraqi refugees find economic hardship and loneliness in Md.

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/world/iraq/bal-te.refugee30dec30,0,7540287.story?track=rss

By Matthew Hay Brown | [e-mail]
December 30, 2008

It's not that Muhammad Shumri imagined building a new life in Baltimore would be easy. But he didn't expect it to be so hard.

The 48-year-old physician was a high-ranking official in the Iraqi Ministry of Health when a photograph that placed him at a meeting with U.S. officials was stolen from his computer. Soon he was receiving anonymous threats warning him to stop working with the Americans.

He moved his wife and five children out of Iraq, traveled alone to the United States and requested asylum. He planned to get a job, find a place to live and send for his family.

"I thought, 'I am a doctor, they know me, I worked with them, I can get a job, they will help me,'" Shumri says in the Reservoir Hill house where he rents a room. "I didn't think I would have the same job. But maybe I would take a job as a physician or teach at a university.

"I was shocked when I got here."

That reaction is common among the 202 Iraqis who have settled in Maryland since the 2003 invasion. Professionals who made up their country's elite - doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers - are struggling with an unfamiliar culture, an expensive economy and a bureaucracy that doesn't recognize their credentials.

[LiberalEsto]

1. It happens to all kinds of people

There are plenty of other immigrants who sacrificed high profile careers to come to America. Just because someone arrives here does not mean that they automatically get to resume their careers.

My Estonian parents were both law students, but their educations ended with WW2. They considered themselves fortunate to come to the U.S. There was no money for additional education, so my father ended up working as a bookkeeper at a soap factory until he retired. My mom stayed home and raised us, then worked as a nurses aide until her back gave out.

They used to watch Perry Mason, an old tv show about a lawyer, with tears in their eyes.