Special appeal for the Zamani family

A letter from Dave and Wilna Parry...

Dear friends,

St Clement’s and REST recently sponsored Nasrullah Zamani to join his sister Fatemeh here in Vancouver. You may remember the background to his story that involved the tragic events leading to the death of their father in Afghanistan and the subsequent deaths of their mother, two brothers and a sister near the Iran Turkey border in March 2018.

Nasrullah’s move to Canada came about very quickly following submission of his sponsorship application at the end of 2018. He and Fatemeh visited St Clement’s in November 2019 to say thank you for all our community had done to help them. He has been attending Vancouver Community College to study English and is now living in Surrey with a family friend. He has also been playing soccer in Coquitlam over the weekends – something he has not done for a long time.

The Zamani family had six children and there remains one sister still in their native area. She is married and she and her husband have 4 children. After the tragedy of March 2018 their house was deliberately burnt to the ground by the Taliban and they were forced to go into hiding. They were unsafe in Afghanistan; the children could not go to school and none of them could go out on the streets for fear of being recognized and targeted.

In desperation, they fled to a neighbouring country where they have applied for refugee status. We are helping Fatemeh prepare a refugee sponsorship application for the family. She has advocates in the United Church and at the Britannia School where she is a student. The United Church will submit the sponsorship application and Britannia is facilitating the collection funds for the settlement of the family when they reach Canada. We understand that sponsorship can take one to two years.

Having lost their main asset, their home, the family have very little and friends at Britannia have agreed to donate clothing. Of course, this will take a while to get to them but it will be welcome. Britannia have also paid three months rent and contributed towards immediate food needs. It is our hope that some parishioners at St Clement’s would be able to offer either monthly or a one-time donation that would sustain the family in their temporary foreign home. Even a small number of regular donations will make a tremendous difference to this family.

Their rent is currently $250/month, but this may increase if they can find somewhere with hot water, some heat and perhaps a shower. Their food bill is about the same amount per month. St Clement's Parish Council gave its support to the launch of this appeal in November. We plan to forward funds on a monthly basis to the family. In the event that funds collected exceed anticipated needs, we will advise you that further donations will not be required and apply any balance to the settlement fund.

Donations can be made through the offering plate on Sundays using an envelope marked: “Zamani family support fund” or by dropping a similarly marked envelope into Yvonne at the office.

With thanks,

Dave and Wilna