A little over a year ago, Venita Pimley found herself piling a couple with 10 kids and over a dozen suitcases into a van and driving them to an apartment she had just finished setting up to start their new life in America. The family from Afghanistan spoke minimal English, and Pimley mainly communicated through the oldest son. She was very stressed and nervous, but one of the youngest sons, no more than five, reached over and gave Pimley a fist bump. At that moment, she knew she had to do this again.
Pimley, a speech therapist originally from Boston, has been living in the Pittsburgh area for about 12 years. Not new to volunteering, she has been involved with both Literacy Boston and Pittsburgh, teaching English to people of all ages.
“I have always had a love for teaching,” Pimley said. “I think everything I do has a teaching element.”
When Pimley got an email about volunteering for Hello Neighbor, she knew she had to sign up. She wanted to be “helpful and relevant” with her own neighborhood.
“The first thing I did was help sort donations and help refugees ‘shop’ at the donation center,” Pimley said. “This is when I realized how large Hello Neighbor really was. I had lived in Pittsburgh for over a decade and didn’t know how many refugees were here and were in need of such basic needs… it was a reality check for me.”
Pimley immersed herself in the behind the scenes aspects of Hello Neighbor, helping reorganize the donation storage center, collection and sorting through recycling every month and setting up apartments for new arrivals, even making home cooked meals for when refugees first arrive. She slowly started to become more involved, making meal and clothing deliveries, even babysitting for mothers while they were at doctor appointments and running other errands.
Pimley prepares a fresh salad for a new refugee mother on February 18, 2023. She has been volunteering with Hello Neighbor for a little over a year. While some volunteer events have not been so glamorous, Pimley feels rewarded through the work she does.
“The babysitting was not my favorite, but I have the time and the resources while so many others don’t,” Pimley said. “Hello Neighbor is so organized, and they make volunteering so easy that most of the time it doesn’t even feel like work.”
Pimley continues to work with the donation center, helping families in their first 24 hours in the United States and recently has started making meals for the Smart Start program and delivering them to the new mothers.
“While we don’t get to see the newborns, I can just imagine them opening their eyes wide and just having the whole world in front of them,” Pimley said. “They are going to grow up with so many more choices and not have to endure what their mothers went through as refugees.”
Pimley hopes to continue volunteering and provide more of her language expertise to Hello Neighbor. She is “open” to mentoring families in the future and wants to “grow” with the organization.
“I think as a country, especially with Afghanistan, that we have created a lot of problems for others and that it is our duty to fix it,” Pimley said. “I can handle a lot, so I think this is the perfect area for me to help.”
