'These are my people': Seven years after fleeing war, refugee family reflects on life in Nova Scotia

As Ikhlass Hassan Haggar flips through photos of her family's first few days in Canada, she smiles, and points out a picture of a grey house with a red door. 

"It was [such a] nice house," she says. "It was so pretty." 

It's a picture of her family's first home in Nova Scotia, in the small town of Annapolis Royal, where they had settled seven years ago this summer.

In 2016, Ikhlass, her five siblings and her mother were in a refugee camp in Chad, where they had fled after escaping war in Darfur, Sudan. Ikhlass, who was just 15 at the time, recalls having limited access to basic needs, such as running water and medical care.

"It [was] not even safe. We don't have enough food … not enough education. It's not safe enough to live there," she says.

The Hassan Haggar family came to Annapolis Royal through the Blended Visa Office-Referred program, which allows a community group to share half the cost of supporting a refugee family while the federal government covers the other half. 

The Annapolis Royal Community Assisting Relocation group, an organization created specifically to sponsor a family through the program, raised more than $30,000 to help settle the Hassan Haggars. One couple even bought and renovated a home for the family.

After several months of organizing, the Hassan Haggars arrived in June 2016.

"It was just different, I'd never lived in [that kind] of town before. It was so different than where I was living," Ikhlass says. "And now, I can see running water, like power, like everything."

Ikhlass says it was difficult at first to adjust to her new home because she and her family didn't know how to speak English and had left everything they had known behind. But what made it easier, she says, was the community's support. 

The town of just 500 people donated more than money — they also donated their time: driving the family to appointments, teaching them English, taking them shopping, and helping the older children learn how to drive. 

"Everybody in that community, they help us a lot, a lot, a lot. Even the words 'a lot' for them is not enough," Ikhlass says.

Ikhlass says the opportunities she and her family have received in Nova Scotia would never have been possible in Sudan. All of the Hassan Haggar children, who are expecting to become official Canadian citizens in the coming months, have now received an education and are following dreams of their own. 

Moustapha, the youngest of the six children, is starting Grade 7 this fall and says he wants to become a pilot. Saffa, the youngest daughter, is a star athlete with plans to become a doctor. Heading into Grade 9, she was recently awarded a scholarship to a private school, with hopes of attending next year. 

"It's going really well," she says. "I care a lot about my academics, so I study a lot and try to get good grades.

"I'm just excited to see where that takes me later in life." 

Ikhlass, now 21, is going to nursing school in the fall. She says she was inspired to become a nurse to help people, because she remembers how inaccessible health care was in Sudan. 

In 2019, the family moved to Halifax to be closer to education and work opportunities, but Ikhlass says the decision to leave Annapolis Royal wasn't an easy one.

"We really, really don't want to move from Annapolis because Annapolis people are great, great people," she says. 

Ikhlass says her family keeps in close contact with the Annapolis Royal community, and plans to visit before the summer ends. Home, she says, is the small town that welcomed her and her family seven years ago. 

"These are my people," she says. "These are my family. Even before I go to Sudan, I will go to them. These are my family. Now they come first."

For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.