Many refugees seeking safety in Canada end up in shelters for months

Many refugees' hopes for a smooth transition are dashed as soon as their feet hit Canadian soil, finding themselves sleeping on a mattress on the floor of a homeless shelter.

Every year, refugees come to Canada fleeing war , violence and persecution. But their hopes for a smooth transition are often dashed as soon as their feet hit Canadian soil. Many find themselves sleeping on a mattress on the floor of a homeless shelter.

Khairiya Abdul-Mumin fled Ghana one year ago. She had no time to prepare or save money and arrived at YYC  with $50 in her pocket and months of frigid winter weather ahead of her.

“When I got to the airport they gave me the address of the shelter because I have nowhere to go and I used that $50 to take Uber,” she said.

She spent three months at the shelter. “Life there was something else,” she said.

Not long after she arrived, she found out she was pregnant.  “I was throwing up and having to go to the hospital all the time, it was very uncomfortable and difficult,” she said.

Abdul-Mumim met another woman who was on an almost parallel path as her own, hunkering down at a Calgary shelter with no money and nowhere else to go.

“It was very hard but I had no choice, I was fleeing for my life,” said Nawal Abdulkarim, also a refugee claimant from Ghana and five months pregnant with her third child.

“You don’t know where to go at  first, you don’t know how to get access to anyone who can help you, you struggle,” said Abdulkarim.