Profile of a Strong Woman

 

Halima Saad

 

Halima came to Canada from Somalia in 1999. At the time, she was 40 years old, a single mother of 6 children and pregnant with her seventh child. She came to Canada as a refugee, after the civil war in Somalia erupted. Even though, Halima spoke English, she faced many challenges at the beginning, such as knowing how to use the subway system, finding a good affordable neighborhood for her and her children to settle in, and the difficulties of being a single mother in a strange and different environment.

 

At first, Halima lived in a government housing project, where she was faced by the fact that a high percentage of the kids there drank alcohol and smoked. She made up her mind to take action against this undesirable situation since she did not want her children to be exposed to such corruption. She started an outreach program and gathered the neighbors to plan a way to make positive changes in the neighborhood which would give the local kids incentives to do better things with their time than to engage in the pursuit of bad habits. The housing community in her neighborhood liked her approach of mobilizing her neighborhood in order to improve the living conditions there, and she received help from them.

 

One day, some minors were smoking marijuana next to her house. Halima asked them to either stop doing it or go somewhere to practice their vice; however, the children continued doing it right in front of her, so she called the police. Her neighbors did not approve of her calling the police as they did not want them to interfere in the activities of the community. To show their disapproval and to get revenge, they broke the windows of her house. Within 24 hours, she moved out to where she is now, and has never stopped being a community activist.

 

Halima has always welcomed opportunities to improve herself intellectually. She started by taking courses in mathematics and English and looked into the possibility of entering college. Once she got her PR card, she was eligible for OSAP, enrolled in college, where she improved on many of her skills, and eventually enrolled in evening courses in the Department of Continuing Education at York University.

 

Halima’s first job in Canada was at a non-profit organization which was funded by Health Canada, as a community organizer. She worked there until she founded her own organization, Madbakh of which she is the Executive Director. Madbakh needed to have links with an organization that could give it support and help and which also had cultural contacts. She chose not to work with the Somali organizations since there are so many of them and none of them met Halima’s criteria for excellence and commitment. Halima instead chose to work with the Arab Community Centre of Toronto where she felt that the Executive Director, Laila Bondukjie was open minded and willing to lend the Centre’s support to Halima’s project. Halima says that the Arab Community Centre of Toronto made her vision become a reality.

 

Halima also founded a literary program which eventually became a part of the George Hull Centre in 2004. The program recruits volunteer teachers, often retirees, who help the children of single-mother-led families, often from the Somali community.

 

As a result of the unwavering dedication and commitment to community work, Halima has received several awards, among them is the Vital People Award given by the Toronto Community Foundation.

 

As a mother of seven, Halima is very proud of the accomplishments of her children, the oldest of whom is 30 years old and the youngest is 9. She insisted that they keep their cultural values and religion, but now that they are older, she feels it is up to them to take the lead in their own lives. During Muslim and other festive occasions, such as Eid, Ramadan, weddings, she gathers people together to celebrate. Halima views her greatest success in Canada as being the accomplishments of her children – two of her daughters are doctors, one of her sons is an accountant, and the other is a computer programmer. Halima also values education and the fact that her children are highly educated, makes her feel that her dream has been achieved. As far as her personal accomplishments are concerned, she also thinks that they have been met by her having helped other people through her work.

 

Her goal is to make Madbakh an international organization that helps those in need both in Canada and in Somalia. She achieved these dreams in just 18 years. When she speaks English, she still has a Somali accent, but other than that when she mingles with non-Somali Canadians, they think she is Canadian-born due to the fact that she is so well adjusted and integrated into Canadian society.

 

Halima’s advices to the youth are: focus on your education and do not get carried away by listening to music and partying. She is also strongly against taking drugs, and believes that a young person, who experiences peer pressure to engage in corrupt behavior, should instead take their role model from those kids who are doing well in life. In Halima’s own words: “follow those who achieve and not those who fail”.

 

Halima is an avid reader and she likes to read about strong women who have made it in life, such as Maya Angela, a black woman, with whom Halima feels she has a lot in common.

 

Halima would describe herself as a Somali Canadian, and wants to keep her culture. Her children would describe themselves as Canadian Somali as they relate more to Canada. She is a single mother who raised seven children, who she feels were the driving force behind her ambition to succeed in life.