AUSTIN (KXAN) – Refugees from several countries sold handcrafted goods Saturday at the TownLake YMCA.
The refugee holiday art bazaar was hosted by the Global Impact Initiative, a nonprofit created to help disadvantaged communities through education and job skills training.
Anjum Malik, the nonprofit’s CEO, said the Global Impact Initiative currently helps around 400 refugee families in Central Texas. On Saturday, the majority of those selling artisanal goods were from Afghanistan and Ukraine.
“We hope that events like this will have ripple effects and change people’s perception about refugees,” Malik said. “I attest how humbling, how sober, how inspiring it is to work with them.”
Elizabeth Arhunova said she was visiting Austin when the war started. She was supposed to return on Feb. 24, 2022, but the war began the following day on Feb. 25.
“I didn’t have [a] place to go back, so I started to re-build my life,” she said.
Arhunova said it has not been easy assimilating into her life in the States. She’s had to learn the culture and the language and says consistently seeing stories about the state of the war makes it even more challenging.
“Sometimes I cry just because I read something bad about Ukraine,” Arhunova said.
But she says the difficulty of the last nearly two years has been made better by the other Ukrainians she has met through organizations like the Global Impact Initiative and the American Ukrainian Relief Association (AURA).
“[I’m here with] a circle of Ukrainian creators who recently came, and they all made hand-made things,” she said. “It’s a big help for Ukrainians. Some of them have a job, some have a part-time job, some don’t have any job. It’s an opportunity to have money and communication…we’re like a big family here.”
