Isra grew up in Damazin, Sudan as the third of five kids. Her father made furniture and fixed roofs, her mother worked at home raising the kids and the food for the family. Isra married at age 15, then worked as a medical assistant in a local hospital until her first baby was born.

In 2011, violence in Sudan forced Isra (age 21) and her family to flee to Ethiopia, where they lived in refugee camp for six years. “We were sad,” she says, “because we lost a lot of people.” Isra had two children when she arrived in the camp, and two more were born there. Her first husband had passed away, and Isra met and married her second husband in the camp.

In 2017, Isra’s family of six came to the US with two bags. They spoke no English upon arrival, and the first year was especially hard for Isra. With the kids at school, she stayed home alone all day with no way to communicate with her neighbors. She slept all day and stayed awake all night. But soon her English improved and she started working.

Isra misses her family back in Sudan; her mother and three siblings still live in the refugee camp in Ethiopia. But she stays close to her culture through cooking Sudanese and Ethiopian food and “drinking too much coffee and tea,” she says, laughing. Isra now has three children and hopes to have more. “I love kids!” she says. She also loves to sing, especially to Sudanese music.