Cathedral High School students worked together to grow geraniums, which were then donated for neighbourhood beautification projects funded by HCF small grants.

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Planting a new life

Somalis work the earth on John St.

By Barb McKay
The Hamilton Spectator (June 5, 2006)

A dozen Somali women sang in the pouring rain yesterday as they dug their rakes into a plot of earth on John Street.

"Don't get tired, work together," they chanted.

The women fled unspeakable horrors in Somalia, a country plagued by civil war. Now, they are part of a special project, spearheaded by the Hamilton Community Foundation, to bring the impoverished Beasley neighbourhood together.

They're doing it by working the earth in a back-yard vegetable and herb garden beside McLaren Park.

"I lost my father, I lost my mother, I lost everything," said Ikran Muse who fled Somalia to a Kenyan refugee camp in 1991. "As a child, you have never seen a gun before."

Yesterday, there were no guns in sight, just shovels, as the women broke sod in the safety of Hamilton.

Many of the women were farmers in rural Somalia and this was the first time they had worked in a garden after spending as long as 15 years in refugee camps.

The garden was donated by a Toronto minister and philosophy professor, who uses the John Street home to store his book collection.

Matt Thompson, a McMaster University student and community activist is co-ordinating the project. "These women are amazing," Thompson said, "but they want to grow things like pineapple. I said, it's not going to happen."

Instead the group will plant tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, spinach and a variety of herbs. Thompson knows this project means so much more than growing produce. They are building a community.

"We can bring these people together," he said. "They're there, they just don't know each other yet."

As a little girl Muse didn't understand war. Today is no different. The memories still overwhelm her but are locked away. Tears spilled down her unblemished cheeks as she tried to explain. "I can't," was all she could say.

"The country is the same, the religion is the same," she said, "I don't know why they fight."

Then Muse was finally allowed to come to Canada in April 2005. "In this country we are so happy," she said of herself and fellow Somali refugees. "It's a good country."

In the community garden the soil is ready for planting. Every Sunday the women will return to plant vegetables and seedlings and maintain the plot. David Derbyshire, program co-ordinator of the Hamilton Community Foundation, spends every week helping the group. He is in awe of the women who have overcome so much, but maintained strength and enthusiasm to take on this project.

"They are really, really pleased that they have some soil and have something to give back to their community," he said.