Refugee children grow up fast

Daunting responsibilities often weigh down young refugees in their new country.

Take a peek into the life of Ayub Hassan.

He has not seen his mother since civil war in Somalia separated them in 1992. He was 7.

His father suffered a gunshot wound in the fighting. He contracted malaria a short time later and died.

Hassan and his three younger siblings ran away with a grandmother. They traveled to Kenya where they lived in the capital city of Nairobi and in a refugee camp for nine years. The five of them arrived in Phoenix as refugees in March 2001 and later moved to Salt Lake City.

At 16 years old, Hassan assumed the role of caretaker, breadwinner and father figure in his strange new land.

While his peers at Highland High School were going to proms and football games, he worked a full-time and a part-time job. He also attended Horizonte Instruction and Training Center.

Until a few weeks ago, Ayub, his brother and sister lived in a dingy Avenues neighborhood apartment. They subsisted on little food, slept on sheetless mattresses and had no coats.

If it wasn't for a Utah woman who met the young family by happenstance and befriended them, they would still be living in a rat hole. Luckily for Ayub, the woman helped them a get into new apartment, which took some wrangling with the housing authority. She found an understanding Salt Lake Community College administrator who got Hassan into school.

Hassan awakes each day at 6 a.m., drops his sister off at school, attends classes in the morning and parks cars at the airport in the evening. He gets home about 11:30 p.m.

"I don't really like it actually, but I have to. I don't want to miss school and I don't want to lose my job," the young man said.

"Actually, sometimes it's kind of a crazy life, full-time work and full-time school. But I have to do it because I have to support the family."

Meantime, his friends hit the clubs and party.

"I would like to do that, but I cannot. I have (to) take care of my future because I don't want to be loser." He is working toward a degree in carpentry and would like to open his own shop.

"That's my idea," he said. "I don't know if I can do that or not. It's hard to do in this country."

He shrugs off having to grow up so fast.

"I have to do that because there's no one else we can ask help," said Hassan, now 20. "I have to earn my own."