Mariella grew up in Butare, Rwanda as the youngest of 9 children in a loving and supportive family.  25 years ago her world turned upside down because of the genocide.  She speaks here about how she coped with her losses as a young woman. Mariella has lived, worked, and studied in Rwanda, Uganda, Belgium, Denmark, and England prior to arriving in Maine last August 2018.  She is uniquely qualified to be an advisor to those undergoing transformations, having re-invented her life multiple times.  Currently,  Mariella is the Program Coordinator of  Immigrant Business Hub program at the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center.  They offer new entrepreneurs access to support through mentorship, networking, advice, and finding capital. 
She is also a new member of the Greater Portland Health board of directors and the mother of three sons.

Music: Aline Gahongayire sings "Ndanyuzwe" (I am grateful).

This was a special one-hour round table discussion on Workforce Development in Maine. Guests highlighted a program they all experienced together at Southern Maine Community College called ESOL-to-IT as director, instructor, student, and tutor. 
Maine has a real need to develop a workforce because of an aging population with upcoming retirements as well as new business growth.  Immigrants offer a skilled and hard working labor force.  If Maine strategically plans for it we can match meaningful work with just the right workers. 
Dieudonne summarized it well, New Mainers are grateful for the help/training/support they receive here and want to remain loyal to Maine.  If Maine had more infrastructure to connect jobs and workers, immigrants and native Mainers both would be able to stay here, work, pay taxes, and contribute to building a healthier state for tomorrow, all of us together.

Guests:
David Zahn, Chair of ESOL and Global Languages Department at Southern Maine Community College. For more information on the ESOL to EMT click here
and more on SMCC's workforce training click here.

Stela Markova-Kanin, International Project Coordinator from Bulgaria who was a volunteer and tutor in the ESOL to IT and ESOL EMT programs offered at Southern Maine Community College. She spoke of free Conversational English support at YMCA where she works in accounting.

Dieudonne Nzeyimana is a pioneer in the development of IT in the Rwanda Public Administration, was COO of Population Services International and recently participated in the ESOL-to-IT workforce development program. 

Stefanie Trice Gill is the founder of IntWork, a diversity recruitment firm that specializes in matching Maine employers with engineers, IT, and other STEM professionals, mostly immigrants. She helped in a similar way with the ESOL to IT program at SMCC. MANA also offers info on workforce gap and solutions.

Music:
Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares sing "Ergen Deda" early in the program and to close
Kizito Mihigo sings "Ijoro Ribara Uwariraye"

Salma Al Adhami (Iraq) and Tracy Moore were paired through the Senior Companion Program which is a subset of Catholic Charities of Maine's American Friends Program.  The two women have worked together for four years and have come to think of the other as family. 
Salma retired from teaching first grade after thirty years.  It was a job she loved.  She lived in Basra, Hilah, and Baghdad, Iraq before moving to Westbrook, ME in 2014 to be with her surviving son.
Tracy is a social worker who volunteered through Catholic Charities of Maine and feels lucky to have meet Salma.  Tracy has helped Salma find her way to a fiber arts center and the two women love to exchange recipes and so much more. As you can hear, they care very much for one another.
Salma is also involved in the New England Arab American Organization (NEAAO) where she spends time with peers and receives instruction in swimming, Zumba, and computer literacy.
Though she brought a translator to this interview, Salma has studied English for years and wants to become independent now that she has applied for US Citizenship. 

This interview was translated by Nagham Al Ani.

Music: Samer Didi sings Hymn of Basra.

Martin's parents were farmers from South Sudan who taught their sixteen children to be "givers" by donating ten percent of their yields to people who needed food.  Martin has been working to support others since. 
He was interviewed in April of 2015 about his work at the Director of New England Interpreter Services.  Click here to listen to that archived show.
Martin has now started his second business, using his communication skills in the human services.  USA Family Well Being Services provides in home social work support (HCT or Home Community Treatment) for families, in their native languages.  He and his team help vulnerable families to support children with special needs while introducing them to resources and offerings in their local communities.

Music: Bob Marley "Everything's Going to be Alright."

This is the fourth time Georges has been on New Mainers Speak.  During this interview he speaks about the on-going responsibilities of citizenship.  He has been working with Results, a global organization focused on ending poverty through political and policy actions focused on global health, education, and economic opportunity.

He cares about an informed citizenry and encourages people to be aware of what is going on and taking action to support good policies.  Georges encourages people to insure the veracity of the content they read about in the news, checking the source, using multiple sources and checking with trusted contacts. 

Georges continues to work in his professional job as a property manager for Avesta, serves as President of Ladder to the Moon Network and helps to produce Amjambo Africa, a newspaper for Africans in Maine written in several languages and circulated through the Bangor Daily News monthly.

Music: George's nephew Israel Mbonyi sings "Ibihe" 

El-Fadel came to Maine in 2004 after being forced from his home in Darfur, Sudan.  El-Fadel was previously on New Mainers Speak in August (NMS 188) and September (NMS 191) of 2018.  He continues to share his stories and his insights regarding all he has learned throughout his epic journey, to date. This interview was timed well to coincide with Thanksgiving.  There are few people more grateful for what they have than he.
In this segment El-Fadel focuses on the way people from his village show respect to elders.  He also helps listeners to understand the powerful respect Sudanese people feel for the earth and the very dirt from which all life flows.  He discusses the way they grow their foods, find their well water, make their homes of mud bricks and grasses (also born of the earth) and even make their toys from the hard baked clay earth.  Their gratitude and thanksgiving always starts with a respect for the earth and soil that make life possible and holds us at the end of our lives.

For regularly updated news about Sudan, El-Fadel suggests Darfur Women Action Group. 
If you wish to book El-Fadel to speak at a school event he can be reached at Elfadelfcr@gmail.com.

Music: An Ethiopian song for joy and peace.

Mambo left Luanda, Angola  alone and arrived in the US in 2015.  It was difficult, but he quickly found his way once he was enrolled in classes at Portland High School.  He had help from his principal, mentor, teachers, and friends who became his new family here in Maine. 
Presently, Mambo works third shift packing lobster for trade and then goes to college full time, studying business management at Southern Maine Community College. He hopes to one day have his own business so he can work for himself and employ others. 

Music: Mambo pays tribute to his recently deceased 19 year old friend/brother Mardo with the song "See You Again" by Wiz Khalifa.

Tae Chong (NMS 097) is the director of TEEM (The Emerging Entrepreneurs of Maine) which is a new program offered through Catholic Charities.  This project has a market called Fikiria (Swahili for "Imagine") which is a store-within-a-store at 244 St. John St, Portland, inside the Threads of Hope store.  Amanda Fisher is the manager of the mission driven resale shop that helps to fund other Catholic Charities programs in the area.  She brings with her years of high end retail experience and shares information about display, marketing, advertising and sales to the entrepreneurs, among many other responsibilities. 
Presently, Nana Batumike and Zahra Abukar (NMS 160) are creating fashion designs, selling jewelry and make up for Africans at the St. John St location.  If you want to learn more about "Glamming" and "Queening" swing by and and check out their designs.
 
Music: Selected by Nana Batumike, "Dream Big" by Ryan Schupe.

Earlier this year (2018) Anselmo and Henrique arrived in Portland, Maine.  They come from Cabinda, Angola which is an area about the size of New Jersey (7,000 sq. miles) located between Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo on the Atlantic Ocean, and is not contiguous with the rest of Angola. 
In Cabinda there are many natural resources (oil, diamonds, gold, uranium, phosphates, and rare tropical hardwoods) and a temperature that ranges between 65-87F all year long. 
Some people in Cabinda would like to seek independence from Angola and sovereignty for their people, as their culture is quite different from Angola's and their work to unite the disparate groups has not been successful. 
Anselmo and Henrique are a part of a group called ADCDH (translated from Portuguese that stands for the Association for the Development of a Culture of Human Rights) which works peacefully toward raising global awareness about their region's issues.  

Music: "Filho DeCabinda" by Filipe Mukenga

Music + Words
Kifah Abdulla (NMS 141 and 173) and Devon Colella co-create an emotional healing art form between poet and cellist. Devon describes a landscape and Kifah lets his "ears taste the cello" and responds with a reading of his poetry.  Together they explore silence and sound while awakening a different kind of consciousness that invites healing from diverse experiences, such as life as a prisoner of war.

If you are interested in inviting them to your future event they can be reached through these outlets:
www.kifahabdulla.com 
abdulla.kifah@gmail.com
DevonColella@comcast.net
https://www.quadtheduo.com/
also through facebook and instagram.