Single Somali-Bantu Mothers Farm in Maine (Extended Version) from Amy Brown

When many Somali-Bantu families resettle in the United States, men in polygamous marriages must choose one wife, due to U.S. marriage laws. This means second and third wives are left struggling to support their children in a new country where they have few marketable skills.

In a resettlement community in Lewiston, Maine, a community of single mothers with as many as ten children supplement their meager income by farming the rural land.

This 13 minute film premiered at Frontier Screening Room last Monday.

Maine Watch with Jennifer Rooks revisits Lewiston’s Somali refugee community ten years after the arrival of the first immigrants.

Fatuma Hussein, a leader in the Somali community as well as mom joins Jennifer in the studio along with Stephen Wessler, who is Executive Director of the Center for the Prevention of Hate Violence and Phil Nadeau, Deputy City Administrator for the City of Lewiston.

They discuss what’s been learned, what still needs to happen and what can Lewiston teach other communities with large refugee populations.

A friend invited me to to accompany him on his monthly trip to the barber. In Rwanda the barber shops are called Saloons. In Burundi, they're Salons. You say Saloon. I say Salon. Let's call the whole thing off.

Security is a serious issue in Burundi. After a recent ambush on the road leading to the VHW clinic where beloved driver Claude was killed, security forces accompany every vehicle bound for the clinic. During our daytime drives between Bujumbura and Kigutu we travel with police. But since we were traveling at night we took a couple of military guys. They mugged for the camera after protecting us the entire ride along National Route 3.

It was a dark and stormy night. After a vehicle mix up we got a late start in our drive from Kigutu back to Bujumbura. By the time we rolled into town we were hungry. So we made a pit stop at a restaurant where people lounged under tin coverings, sipping their Amstels, protected from the rain. As we were led to our table, a woman approached me and said, I was the first white person to ever step into her restaurant. We had our picture taken together.

The wild card when filming in outdoor locations is the sun. Clouds come and go. The sun shines brightly, then dips behind some trees. We needed a sheet to diffuse the sun's rays to ensure consistent light throughout the 3 hour interview.

All the sheets that we found had wild prints on them. So we set out to a village near the base of the mountain. There we found a man selling narrow strips of white linen. Across the street: a sewing shop. We may not be Hollywood, but with these few production expenses we managed to revitalize the local economy for the day.

See the final results of the sewing project here:

One of the biggest problems that the doctors of VHW see on a regular basis is malnourished children. Cassava is a staple crop and the leafy vines are ubiquitous along roadsides and in small garden patches. However, cassava offers no nutritional value and leaves babies and children starved of the vitamins and minerals they need to develop properly.

VHW is trying to fix that. They have planted a vegetable gardens and fruit trees. Members of the community come daily to work in the gardens and take home long blue plastic bags filled with sweet potato or carrot seedlings. They take them back to their gardens at home -- fortifying their diets with veggies rich with vitamins.

Watermelons were introduced and planted earlier this year. They are by far the most popular garden item. The flesh of this melon is pinky white, but so sweet and refreshing after a full day of running around the mountainside with heavy camera equipment. And a nice change for the palate after many days of rice, beans and Irish potatoes.

With the VHW founder, executive director, board of directors, and a NY-based architect who will be designing the new women's center, we went on a walked down a dirt path, under African Palm leaves to visit many of the villagers who come to the VHW clinic. We greeted a woman who was well over 70 years old, held a baby that was only 1 week old. We looked at homes constructed from mud and straw. Their poor ventilation is a breeding ground for tuberculosis, one of the diseases most commonly treated at VHW.

A typical evening in Kigutu.

We accompanied the VHW founder on a flower buying expedition in Bugurama, a thirty minute drive from Bujumbura along a winding mountain road. He believes that poor deserve to be surrounded by tranquility and beauty as much as the wealthy. And it with this in mind that he has created a garden oasis, with the help of a large staff of grounds workers. VHW isn't just a health clinic. Entering through the gates, one feels like she's stepped into an Eden.

When Claudine isn't working as a janitor at VHW, she teaches girls educational songs about HIV/AIDS prevention.

While we shot a time lapse of the sunset over Lake Tanganyika from the hills of Bujumbura we were entertained by Best Crew -- a local performance group.