- [Terry] You know, there comes a time when there's a call to action that speaks to your heart.

- [Linh] I remember that feeling of having to leave your country, and your family, and your people.

And going to a place and just like have no idea what you're going to walk into.

When I was reading about the crisis in Afghanistan, I just wanted to be able to help.

- (speaking foreign language) - In the fall of 2021, private citizens all over the country stepped up to help pilot a federal program called Sponsor Circles, which allowed communities to resettle Afghans by personally committing to support them in their first 90 days in the country.

Linh Peters and Terry Tran are two Vietnamese refugees who fled by boat when they were toddlers.

They met and teamed up in early 2022 to sponsor Mohammad's family.

After nearly a year of getting to know each other, we asked them to sit down and reflect on the power and the pitfalls they've witnessed firsthand when it comes to resettling in Washington State after a chaotic exit from Afghanistan.

Ghulam, a friend of Mohammad's, interpreted for us.

He, too, was at the airport when Mohammad arrived.

- Let's see, I'm a Vietnamese refugee myself, but I've been here for, oh gosh, many years, since the '80s.

- So my story is very similar to Terry's.

I'm Chinese but we left Vietnam in 1980 and ended up in Minnesota.

Everything that I have in my life today is because of the people that helped us.

I just remember you show up at the airport and you see a bunch of people and you have no idea who they are.

You don't speak the language, they don't look like you, and you're just kind of like, you just kind of follow them and you trust them.

I had that image in my head.

And when they came out, it was very similar.

- When he exit and he saw us, I think that was a time that he noticed that, "No, I'm not alone."

Because he was not expecting people to welcome him.

Because he was just a refugee.

For the eyes of others, he might be like nobody.

And I remember his words that day that, "Our country is gone.

And I thought we have nothing left, but seeing you guys here gives me the courage that, no, I'm still alive, we still have life."

- (speaking foreign language) - [Thanh Tan] Linh and Terry were some of the first in the country to sponsor Afghans in the midst of an emergency humanitarian crisis.

But the resettlement system, originally built to respond to Vietnam war refugees, has been decimated over time.

There was no official playbook for them to follow.

- Hi.

- Hi.

- Hello.

- Hello.

- Of course, we're going to help them settle and begin life here in the Seattle area.

We'll help them with finding jobs.

And of course, most importantly, housing, stay warm and dry.

You see here, for the address?

In the US we put capitals for the names of streets.

I'm like, "Oh, okay, we can do that."

We have five of us in this circle.

We all have our own networks of friends and families who might be able to help and support.

So I'm like, "Okay, I think we can do this."

But little did we know it was a little bit tougher than we thought because we are not professionals.

We are not professional resettlement agency case workers or managers so we didn't quite know the exact resources to tap into.

- You know, I have two college degrees.

I have worked in companies for 25 years, but it was really challenging to feel like I was doing a good job helping the family.

I felt a very strong personal responsibility to the family.

I didn't want to let them down.

- [Thanh Tan] Mohammad is just one of approximately 70,000 Afghan refugees trying to start over in the United States.

The language barrier alone is a big enough hurdle to overcome but on top of that there are myriad other challenges stacked against them, from finding affordable housing and work, to navigating bureaucracy and the legal system, to trying to overcome the trauma of fleeing their homes on a moment's notice.

The resettlement system is rebuilding, but not fast enough.

- Every caseworker that I knew and I was in contact with was dealing with hundred cases.

The amount of people that were coming, and the resources that they were asking from us, and the things we needed to deliver, we were not capable.

- [Thanh Tan] Navid Hamidi is a former interpreter for the US military.

He immigrated eight years ago from Afghanistan and is now executive director of the Afghan Health Initiative, a coalition that cares for the health and wellbeing of Afghans in King County.

- The biggest problem within our community is that now people are settling down with that chaos.

We're seeing the mental health effects and the trauma that was caused.

And now they're seeing the impact of that in terms of emotions, like stress, and also the expectation of family that happening in Afghanistan.

Everybody left like hundreds of people, close family members.

You don't speak English.

You cannot communicate with anybody.

You're making minimum wage, you're sending that money to Afghanistan, you're paying your bill.

You don't have anything to show for it.

Those are all like pressures and the stressors that will impact their physical health.

We need to bring them a lot of resources, a lot of support.

They need different support now.

They don't need food and clothes.

We got them that.

We need to make sure that as a healthy member of our community, these people are built and fixed mentally to make sure that they are ready to take next challenge of life and trying to build that life that they deserve.

We brought them here, and some of them, we forced them to come.

And it's our responsibility as a community to make sure that we take care of them.

- [Thanh Tan] Though only obligated to help Mohammad's family for three months, Terry, Linh, and their circle remain engaged nearly a year after that first airport meeting.

They all know the road ahead remains uncertain, but together, they are determined to rebuild, restore, and bring Mohammad's family back to whole once again.

- [Terry] Having their family become part of our family has been very rewarding.

In the US we're so individual, that this aspect of family and a village, I really have appreciated learning that aspect of Mohammad's family and culture.

- (speaking in foreign language) - [Thanh Tan] Coming up in episode 4 of this series, we shine a light on Afghan women adjusting to their new lives in America.

"Refuge After War" is the first season of Crosscut Origins.

Submissions are open for Season 2.

Learn more and apply at Crosscut.com/Origins "Refuge After War" is made possible by the generous support of Cairwa.