"Refugees should get a red badge of courage," said Chris Webb, a nurse with Valley Mental Health's multicultural treatment team. "They relocate with very little hope of ever going back. That's got to be a terrible feeling."

Refugee Vy Nguyen. Homeland: Vietnam. Seven months in Utah. Today the 13-year-old is attending Northwest Middle School and working hard to learn English.

Refugee Muridi Elmi. Homeland: Somalia, Bantu clan. Two years in Utah. Called Kenya's Kakuma refugee camp home for a quarter of his life. Today he is the 47-year-old chief of the growing Somali Bantu population in Utah. He wants to open a community center.

Refugee Lydia Sequeira. Homeland: Iraq. Nine years in Utah. Persecuted because of her religious beliefs. She is a Christian. Today Sequeira works for Catholic Community Services, helping refugees find jobs.

Refugee Joseph Pako. Homeland: Sudan, Uduk tribe. Nine months in Utah. Today the 25-year-old hangs clothes at Deseret Industries for minimum wage but attends Horizonte Instruction and Training Center. He wants to be a nurse.

Refugee Miro Marinovich. Homeland: Bugojno, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Eleven years in the United States. Came with one small bag. Today, Marinovich is the director of refugee resettlement in Utah for the International Rescue Committee (IRC).

It is a normal day at Salt Lake City IRC office. The cramped lobby is full of Cubans; about 10 Liberians are gathered in the kitchen, and a group of resettled Somalians from the Bantu clan are in the conference room.

The IRC is one of three organizations that bring refugees to Utah. Together, IRC, Catholic Community Services and Jewish Family Services brought 772 refugees to the state in 2004.

"I never know when I go to my office who will be waiting," said Marinovich, Utah IRC resettlement director.

"Is it going to be a group of (Somali) Bantus? Is it going to be a group of Cuban refugees? Is it going to be Burmese refugees sitting there?"

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees refers only about 1 percent of all refugees for resettlement. It is considered the option of last resort.

Most arrive with next to nothing. They step off the plane tired and bewildered. They might or might not have someone from their homeland waiting to meet them. Most often there is only a resettlement agency worker who will be their lifeline in the United States. The case manager might not even speak their language.

They are whisked through a strange city to a small apartment furnished with second-hand furniture. There is food for a day in the refrigerator.

But in recent cases, these first few hours and days illustrate a huge divide in the living skills with which some refugees come.