Dalib Bulle leads an uncommon life for a 21-year-old.

Unlike many men his age who attend college, have a girlfriend and enjoy economic support from parents, Bulle is married, lives with his parents, and works full time to help with the family's expenses. He also takes credits to have his high school diploma from Kenya recognized in the United States.

"Before coming here I thought living in the U.S.A. would be very easy. I thought there would be no difficulty in buying whatever I wanted. But I soon realized that this was not true," Bulle said. "I know I have to work hard to be successful in America. I never imagined what work it would take."

Bulle, a Somali Bantu refugee living in Burlington, wrote these words in a December 2005 journal entry, a year and a half after resettling in Vermont from Kenya. And despite his many grown-up responsibilities and busy schedule, he finds time to serve as secretary of the recently established Somali Bantu Community Association of Vermont.

Bulle, the board of directors and other Bantus who form the funding core of the organization, meet every Saturday in a small South Burlington office the group rents to conduct its business.

With the mission of facilitating the assimilation of the Somali Bantu people to the local culture, the association was officially recognized by the state in January. It seeks to provide educational, cultural and life skills training programs for its members.

"It's very difficult to all of us to adjust to this culture," said Mohamed Shabaan Abdi, the association's treasurer and one of its founders, at the April 14 meeting. About 20 Somali Bantus -- mostly men and a few women -- gathered that Saturday morning to discuss the latest news from their community.

Language and cultural barriers keep many Somali Bantus from getting better-paying jobs and make it difficult to improve the quality of their lives, Abdi explained.
Furthermore, they face challenges in maintaining their cultural and religious heritage while adjusting to life in Vermont.

Unique culture, unique challenges

According to the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program, 386 refugees from Somalia arrived in Vermont between 2003 and 2006. That number does not necessarily include the refugees from Somalia who might have moved to Vermont from other states. Most of these refugees are Somali Bantus.

"The term Bantu is a linguistic term, a complex family of languages," Abdi said. There are more than 1,500 Bantu languages and they are spoken across the African continent south of the Sahara, he said. People who speak a Bantu language are simply known as Bantus. Bantus in Vermont speak Maay-Maay, which is an oral language.

Bantus are not natives of Somalia. They were taken there from their native lands as slaves during the 18th and 19th century, Abdi said. After they were freed, they were marginalized and discriminated against by being denied education and government jobs, he said. Finally, the civil war in Somalia in the 1990s forced the already impoverished, mostly illiterate Bantus to flee to refugee camps in Kenya.

Bulle, who fled to a refugee camp in Kenya's Dadaab region when he was 7 years old, wrote: "The camp was overcrowded and it was easy for children to die from diarrhea. It was also hard to get something to survive, like water or food. We had to stand in line to get everything -- food, water, firewood. I was very disappointed when I came to this camp, although it was better than Somalia at that time."

That was the camp to which Abdi, 33, said he fled when the war began; he had just graduated from high school in Somalia. Abdi spent 12 years in Kenyan refugee camps, where he worked as a case manager for CARE International, got married and had the first of his two children. He resettled in Vermont in February 2004.

For those who had learned English at the refugee camps, adjusting to life in the United States and finding better-paying jobs was not that hard, Abdi and Bulle explained. Abdi works as the Somali Bantu liaison for the Burlington School District and Bulle holds a similar job in Winooski. Both were hired within a month of their arrivals in Vermont.

However, for those who do not speak English -- most of whom had previously been denied education in Somalia and are illiterate -- getting jobs in areas outside of manufacturing, the food industry and housecleaning is quite a challenge, they explained.

Economic improvement is only one of the challenges they face here.

Bantus are family- and group-oriented, Abdi and Bulle explained. Couples marry very young; women as early as 15 years old. They live with the husband's parents and tend to have many children. That is a consequence of their religious practices, Abdi said, as Muslims are forbidden to interfere with natural reproduction.

Dating is not allowed among Muslims, Abdi said. When a man meets a woman he likes and wants to marry her, he talks to his parents who in turn go and talk to the woman's parents. The bride-to-be is asked if she likes the man who is requesting her for marriage and if she accepts, the wedding takes place.

None of these practices is common in America, and the Bantus struggle to keep them alive and teach them to the youngest generations. The children see boys and girls kissing in the schools and they do not understand, Bulle said.

One of the first projects of the Somali Bantu Community Association was to visit each Bantu home in Burlington, Colchester, Williston and Winooski to go over the education system and review some of laws with which Bantus are not familiar. For instance, if children miss class for several days, parents have to notify the school, Bulle explained. That was not the case in the schools at the refugee camps or in Somalia.

An organization is born

The idea to form an organization to serve the community was born last year when members of what would become the organization's core group began to realize the Somali Bantus' unique challenges, Abdi said. Similar organizations had been formed in other states around the country. "It was time," he said.

In September, Abdi called fellow Bantus to a meeting at his house to discuss the idea after he had resigned from his seat with the board of directors of the Association of African Living in Vermont, he said.

Abdi was the only Bantu representative on the African association's board even though Bantus are one of the biggest African groups in the area. There are more than 70 Bantus families in and around Burlington, all of them related to each other as members of three big families. Abdi said he felt Bantus' interests were not well represented by the Association of African Living in Vermont so they decided to organize their own group.

At the beginning they would meet in members' homes and in January, the group rented the South Burlington office on White Street where they meet every Saturday. The group is self-funded and everyone serves voluntarily. For members who want to actively participate and have a voice, there is a one-time registration fee of $50. The core group -- about 24 people -- make frequent donations to support the expenses of the organization, but no special fund-raising events have been conducted. The group recently applied for non-profit status with the Internal Revenue Service and plans to apply for grants.

Saturday morning, the organization's board of directors and three officers left for Manchester, N.H, to meet with a sister organization that is forming there. There are plans to join forces and create a Somali Bantu Community Association of New England, Abdi said, as there are many Bantus in cities all over the region.