The Refugee Who Planted a Garden

When Hawa Abdi arrived in Clarkston, Georgia, in 2016, she wanted to go home. The Somali Bantu refugee missed the red soil of her village, the familiar call to prayer echoing across rooftops, the neighbors who spoke her language. Clarkston felt foreign in every way — the strip malls, the humid summers, the bewildering grocery stores stocked with food she didn't recognize.

But Hawa couldn't go back. So she did something remarkable. She started gardening.

First, a small patch behind her apartment complex. Then, with help from a local nonprofit, she joined a community garden plot where refugees from a dozen nations grew side by side. Hawa planted okra, collard greens, and hot peppers. She shared her harvest with elderly neighbors. She learned enough English to swap recipes with a Burmese grandmother two plots over. Within three years, she was leading gardening classes for newly arrived families and volunteering at her children's school.

"This is not my country," Hawa once told a reporter from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "But these are my people now."