cross-culture visiting 2

On Sunday a student in my beginners class invited me for lunch.  He is in his first year here from Kabul, Afghanistan and his family still lives in the large holding place.  It is cramped, noisy, and they can't wait to get out!  But he will have to pass the integration test, the language test and be given official status to live in LU before he can look for an apartment.  For a long time he has wanted to host us and finally it was possible.  His older son near Heidelberg would host all of us, including Greg's family.

What an honor it was to get to know all these people.  His son has been here three years and has succeeded in passing the very high German tests, in addition to qualifying as an intern physician.  Next year he will take another test in medicine and start his specialization in cardiology.  He works as a doctor and diagnoses illnesses among refugees.  He told us 80 % of his patients have TB and 80 % of them come from Africa and Georgia.  It costs the German gov't €15,000 per T.B. patient, but all can be healed.

In class my student had often talked about his wife's amazing Afgani cooking and he was right.  Every dish was tasty and a treat.  They had worked many hours to put on this spread for us.  We were able to enjoy it in the backyard of their apartment house.

This was almost the last day of April, but it got so hot outside that we retreated indoors for the dessert.

Children are our future.  Trite, but so true.  These two played together without a common language.

He had to leave everything behind, his career, his home, his friends and the life he had built.  It was obviously very important to him to be able to lavish us with hospitality and let us see how well his son is doing.  1.5 hours by train from there is his "temporary" home in LU, squeezed together with many other refugees.  It's very humbling and can be disheartening.  It was our privilege to be invited!