'There's no limit for your dreams:' Syrian family finds home in P.E.I.

Starting over is never easy, especially when you have to do it twice.

That's something 23-year-old Sandra Antoun has already accomplished in her life.

In 2012, Sandra and her family were forced to flee their home in Syria for safety in Lebanon.

After four years there, in February 2016, the Antoun Family came to Canada, sponsored by The First Baptist Church in Charlottetown.

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The first move to Lebanon helped prepare them for the second, said Sandra Antoun.

"It was really hard to find a place and rent a house, and find a job and start," she told CBC's Sarah Keaveny Vos. "But we never give up, that's the main point, and the main idea in our family. And the same thing happened when we moved to Canada. To find a job was hard, but we tried a lot and we applied to a lot of places, and here we are today."

Antoun is now working at Scotiabank, while others in the family are at the Superstore. "That was unbelievable to us how that happened, all these changes happened in one year."

'Totally destroyed'

Antoun was 19, ready to start her second year in university, when the family had to leave Syria.

Just two weeks ago, people were allowed back into the war-ravaged area to see what was left.

"It's totally destroyed, all the houses there. We received a picture of our house, what it looks like now, you can't live there, everything is damaged," she said.

When they moved to Lebanon, they weren't able to take anything but the clothes on their back.

Antoun found some work as a cashier and an accountant, and also volunteered with a humanitarian group, trying to bring some relief to the other refugees.

"We do a lot of activities for the kids in the camps," she said. "So we were drawing on the face, do some stuff, play with them, and make them forget about the horrible days they were, and the situation they were in in Syria."

Helping low-income refugees

Then Antoun got a job working with the International Organization for Migration's Livelihood Program, helping low-income refugees start working again and re-build their lives.

"I was very happy with that kind of job because I feel like the same way I started my life again from the bottom, from the zero, and move up step-by-step, and now I'm helping them do the same thing."

When the family came to Canada, she became the person now receiving that kind of help.

She says the Canadian experience has been better than when they moved to Lebanon.

'Much better for my parents'

"Now everything is easy, like to go to the walk-in clinic, or to go to the doctor, or to make anything, it wasn't really easy in Lebanon," she said. "Here it's much better for my parents, especially my father's health situation."

In addition to the bank job, Antoun also has a scholarship to study at UPEI.

"They give a lot of opportunity here. There's no limit for your dreams," she said. "First of all, to maybe buy a house, and my family are working hard to reach this dream. And the second one, we found another church to sponsor my uncle, so we submit an application last June, and we are looking forward to see him here."

After two drastic moves, she sees herself staying.

"Whenever I go any place, I feel like, yeah, I'm like a Canadian citizen. I can do whatever I want, and that's really very good."

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