In the daily life of an organization that helps immigrants
This article is part of the Local Journalism Initiative (IJL)
After numerous stops, the elevator doors of this tower on Côte-des-Neiges Road open. While those of the Interpreter, Assistance and Reference Service for Immigrants (SIARI) will open in a few minutes, dozens and dozens of people, mostly asylum seekers, are already forming a long queue to come and seek help.
The day will therefore be similar to yesterday, and to all those that have preceded it since the start of the pandemic. For over 40 years, SIARI has supported and accompanied new immigrants, refugees and their families. Whether through its interpreting services in daily activities, francization, or computer support in immigration procedures, SIARI helps newcomers who often do not speak French or English, to overcome these barriers.
In a room located on the other side of the elevator shaft, a dozen SIARI employees dine together in the middle of the cubicles before going back to work. The scene is in itself quite ordinary, and yet it is the first time in a long time that almost all of them have managed to get together to share a break.
This rare moment infused with lightness, they owe it to the fact that a representative of the board of directors came by earlier in the morning to discuss their working conditions that had become unsustainable.
It is in an ironic tone, while anticipating their response, that the director general of SIARI, Fatma Djebbar, addresses her employees to measure the weight of the overwork they are enduring.
“Who goes to the bathroom twice in a day? ” she asks her employees at the end of the table.
The no less meaningless yellow laughter from the whole room indirectly answers the question. Unsurprisingly, the reaction is the same when Fatma asks who are taking their one-hour unpaid lunch break.
“We have appointments scheduled and it's already full, but there are more people without appointments”, explains Sharmila, one of the employees.
In the meantime, leaving to look for her agenda, Yolanda shows what the week ahead looks like for her. Each day is full of appointments that take place hour after hour, from morning to night, and even on the weekend.
“It's my agenda without appointments; I don't add people without appointments, otherwise it's a lot,” she explains, looking at her agenda which, for many, would be a source of anxiety.
“A few years ago, you could still go out, take a walk, go to someone's house after work, but now it's over,” says another employee. You go home at night to eat, and then you stay on your couch until the morning itself. At the weekend, it takes you all Saturday to get over the week.”
Sitting at the end of the table, Fatma Djebbar says in a serious tone that, proof of the discomfort of her employees, their contributions for group insurance doubled this year.
Among the solutions discussed earlier with the board of directors was the hiring of a social worker, not for the beneficiaries, but for the employees of SIARI.
As soon as the break is over, everyone goes back to the front. The hustle and bustle quickly resumed in the maze of corridors where the languages of the world intertwined.
An employee calls up his colleague at the end of a corridor near the printer to ask for a service.
“Have you seen everyone in my office? It's going to be a very long time,” his colleague replies.
Changing lives with the means at hand
All members of the team have an immigration background and have thus personally experienced the ups and downs of the immigration process in Canada.
For Fatma, there is no doubt that their life stories make them even more sensitive to the reality of the people they serve.
“They don't even realize that they are changing lives every day,” explains the director in front of her employees.
“One detail changes lives,” adds Fatma. When you lose your keys, you go see a locksmith, but there are people who can't talk to the locksmith to come and change the lock because they don't speak English or French.”
This empathy and this deep desire to help people who do not speak either of the two official languages make it even more difficult for employees to refuse certain applications that are vital in the eyes of asylum seekers.
“They are mostly integration counsellors, but they become social workers, translators, coaches, nurses, doctors, teachers,” Fatma explains with dismay. To which all employees agree without hesitation.
Just yesterday, a person speaking only Ukrainian and not knowing who to contact called SIARI to find a gynecologist.
“We are not funded for the things they do on a daily basis, even for registering asylum seekers on the Ministry of Immigration portal, we are not subsidized for that,” explains the director of SIARI. However, hundreds of people turn to the organization to fill out the famous platform.
MMe Djebbar says that only funding to the mission would allow them to adequately meet the demand, which has long exceeded their capacity threshold.
Out of its annual budget of approximately $1.4 million, only $119,000 is granted each year to the SIARI mission, or 8.5% of its total budget.
“Governments, both provincial and federal, are washing their hands of it. They subsidize us with crumbs and they wash their hands of their responsibilities, says Fatma Djebbar. It is the community right now that supports the communities, it is no longer normal.”
She deplores the total lack of communication between her organization and the federal government.
Bridging the absurd
The members of the team thus take the opportunity to list various measures imposed by governments that, in their opinion, only add to their work.
Among the recent measures is the requirement for asylum seekers to register on the Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) portal using a computer.
This requirement fills the computer room every day, which was urgently improvised by SIARI to deal with the massive arrival of asylum seekers who do not have computer equipment. “We feel that decisions are taken in offices, whether at the federal or provincial level,” says Fatma. They don't see the impact [of their decisions] on people.”
Another measure that forces many people to go see the organization is registering for francization courses offered by the Quebec Ministry of Immigration. Although these courses are intended for people who do not speak Molière's language, registration is done... in French. SIARI therefore accompanies them so that they can register for francization courses, which are necessary to settle in Quebec.
To respond to the massive flow of people seeking help, SIARI employees were also forced to improvise as interior designers.
Since the start of the pandemic, a dozen offices have had to be added to meet demand. Rooms that used to house a single office and a single employee now accommodate three. The meeting room and even the kitchen both had to be converted to accommodate cubicles and offices.
For Fatma, funding for the mission would also allow them to find larger premises and hire more staff.
“The duty to help them”
Sergine L. is a project manager for asylum seekers. Like all of her colleagues, she works from the heart, even if it means leaving feathers. However, it is with a smile that she confides that she does not have “enough hours in a day” to meet the workload.
“From 2 p.m. I have to stop taking asylum seekers to register on the IRCC portal, because the last time it was almost 6 p.m. and I was still there, when it's supposed to close at 4 p.m., it's supposed to close at 4 p.m.,” she said. I had to start doing that, because I don't want to exhaust my colleagues either.”
Since the start of the day, Sergine has seen no less than sixty asylum seekers who have come to seek help from SIARI for various reasons. “They come every day, but not necessarily for the IRCC portal. They also come for other things, like housing benefits and the baby registry,” she explains.
“This morning, we had a family of asylum seekers whose mother had given birth two months ago, but did not know how to register her child,” she adds.
She says that the pace of work was “pretty calm” when she was hired in 2021. Subsequently, the reopening of the borders imposed a new rhythm by filling the SIARI corridors with hundreds of asylum seekers.
“I felt like I was going to lose my mind,” explains Sergine. I even came secretly on Saturday to help fill out forms because I have a lot of empathy for these people.”
Just as she recalls the exhaustion she is feeling, Sergine stops smiling, and her eyes fog up. She admits that even talking about this subject can make her shed tears. “I am overwhelmed, I don't have enough time and I am unable to say 'no',” she confides. At the end of the day, it doesn't go very well, because I'm like a vegetable on my couch.”
Faced with the distress of asylum seekers caught up in the complexity of their new host society, Sergine blames herself for not finding the strength to refuse their requests. “Even inside me, when I want to say 'no', I can't, I can't,” she says. They are still vulnerable people, but they don't understand that we at SIARI need to rest in order to function.”
In addition to the fatigue caused by the amount of work, SIARI employees also have to deal with the life stories of asylum seekers. These stories are often scarred by the horror and persecution they experienced, which forced them to seek asylum in Canada.
“There are no great stories”
In their asylum application, people must show that they have been persecuted in their country of origin. For integration counsellors, there is no choice but to listen to these horror stories all day long and then tell applicants about IRCC. But for some employees, these stories take them back to their own past.
This is the case of Raquel*, an asylum seeker from Colombia who works at SIARI. Each week, she helps no less than thirty Spanish-speaking asylum seekers to fill out the forms of the Ministry of Immigration.
“They have to tell us everything that happened in their country,” she says. There are people who have been raped because they are part of the LGBTQ+ community, women who have been victims of domestic violence or families who have been persecuted because they were in contact with drug traffickers.”
Some applicants are hesitant to give him details, but for others, Raquel is the first person they can confide in in a long time. The young woman assures that “there are no good stories” in everything she hears.
“It's hard for me because there are a lot of cases where I see my own story,” she adds. You put yourself in the shoes of people and it's tiring, but you try to do the best you can.” She herself had to leave her native Colombia with her family because her sister was persecuted because of her gender identity and sexual orientation. Faced with the horror stories she hears all day long, she admits that she sometimes feels like she is “sacrificing her mental health.”
“It's as if you were experiencing the same thing again, but in people's shoes,” says Raquel. This week I arrived home and cried in my sister's arms because it's a burden, all these emotions.”
No sooner had she recovered from her emotions than a colleague passed by in a hurry in the hallway to call out Raquel and two other colleagues. “In five minutes, we're celebrating Yolanda's birthday! ” he announced to bring in as many people as possible.
Back in the room where the team had dinner earlier, twenty employees rushed in accompanied by their director Fatma. Everyone seems to have put the burden of work aside for a few moments to celebrate the birthday of Yolanda, one of the oldest employees of SIARI.
“A tradition at SIARI is that we celebrate every birthday! ” says Fatma after Yolanda, or Yollie as her colleagues like to call her, blew out the candles on the cake purchased for the occasion. “Thank you friends! ” Yolanda answers them, very happy with the surprise they have prepared for her.
As soon as the pieces of cake were finished, director Fatma reminded her troops to the reality of work: “Friends, there are a lot of people waiting in the hall.”
Again, the respite was short lived.