STRASBURG, Pa. — The only Amish man in the room stood by a window and stroked his long beard, listening to a Somalian refugee talk about his new life in America. Ivan Beiler’s family ate chicken pot pie and stuffed grape leaves at a nearby table with a family that had fled Syria. His wife, Martha, wore a simple white bonnet; the woman across from her, a hijab.
Beiler’s family has lived in the U.S. for centuries, but with every refugee story he heard on this foggy Saturday afternoon, the vast differences between them and their guests faded.
“I can actually relate to their stories of moving here and trying to fit in, because we’re so different, too, and that’s the way it is,” Beiler, 54, told the crowd. “We are different, and you can feel that.”
About 75 people paid $45 apiece to eat lunch and listen to each other’s life stories recently at Beiler’s farm, a cross-cultural exchange for the Amish, refugees, and the surrounding community. The event was collaboration between LoKal Experiences, a tourism company that aims to open up the Amish world to outsiders, and Bridge, a Lancaster-based venture that offers experiences with Lancaster County’s large refugee community.
Many Bridge experiences are dinners in refugee homes. Founder Mustafa Nuur, a Somalian refugee, said his favorite is the “Bring your uncle to refugee dinner,” which requires a guest to bring someone who has never before met a refugee.
Nuur has organized over 2,300 events since 2017.
“When I came to America, I realized this is a very big and diverse country, but nobody knows each other, nobody talks to each other. You don’t know your neighbor or anybody that doesn’t look like you,” Nuur said before the meal. “I realized that to love your neighbor, you need to get to know them first.”
Nuur fled Somalia after his father was killed in front of the family for refusing to contribute to a terrorist organization. He escaped with his mother and seven siblings to a refugee camp in Kenya, where he lived for eight years. The family came to Lancaster County in 2014.
In September, Lancaster became the first city in Pennsylvania to be deemed a “certified welcoming city” by Welcoming America, a nonprofit that encourages communities to open their doors to immigrants and refugees. In 2016, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Lancaster County was home to more than 23,000 refugees. The Amish population there is approximately 33,000.
“Everyone knows when you Google ‘Lancaster County,’ the first thing that comes up is Amish folks,” Nuur said. “So I knew the Amish would be my neighbors. I realized, coming here, that America isn’t one place, but all the different places together make it what it is.”
Nuur said one “uncle” dinner resulted in his going hunting in West Virginia. He was given the nickname “Big Billy Joe” and didn’t kill a deer, he said, because he made too much noise and couldn’t sit still. Later, the family went line dancing.
“It was the most fun I’ve had in a long time,” Nuur said. “It just goes to show, you put yourself in another person’s space, you will know them.”
The meal included pot pie as well as eggplant stew, samosas, and chicken and rice dishes. Afterward, the Amish served whoopie pies. When the meal was over, Ahmad Khilo, 22, talked about his family’s journey from Syria to Turkey, then to Lancaster with his parents and four siblings.
Khilo said his home and the family business were “destroyed by bombs.”
