During the Summer of 2018, I had the opportunity to intern for La Liga Espanola Pro Derechos Humanos, or the Pro Spanish Human Rights League, in Madrid, Spain. Through the AU Abroad Summer Internship Program, I traveled across the world and adapted to a new working environment in my second language. I wouldn’t trade the internship I had for anything in the world because of the amazing opportunity it afforded me to expand my worldview and gain invaluable experience unlike anything I had experienced before. Read on to find out what my day-to-day was like interacting with Venezuelan refugees and learning every step of the way.

The bell rings. I rise with a jump to follow the sound through the darkened hallway. Behind the heavy dark door, faces appear on our doorstep, asking “¿Puedo pasar, por favor? / Can I come in please?” Hour after hour our appointments fill the office with stories of oppression, war, hunger, sickness, persecution, and the like; unfolding as I relentlessly scribble bilingual notes relentlessly. I stay quiet but keep my ears wide open so I can catch every detail. I am quickly learning about the culture of violence, repression, and fear familiar to Venezuelans as my supervisor and our clients speak of the torn and traumatized land they left behind.

Some days are passed silently— reading about the faces that will appear tomorrow or the next day, at our mahogany wood round table, dusty and cluttered with notes and reports of countless cases. Other days are spent immersed in accounts of voices silenced, loved ones lost, and homelands abandoned. The stories we hear share a common thread: human rights violations. And at La Liga Española Pro Derechos Humanos, I have learned that good guys don’t always wear capes. Sometimes they are clad in invitingly casual attire, bearing nestled in second-floor office buildings on a side street of Spain’s capital city, fighting for the fundamental rights and safety of those who need it most.

From the start, it was clear this position required me to fight a steep learning curve. I had little to no background in international law, nor had I a sliver of a clue how truly outrageous the human rights violations occurring in Venezuela were before starting this internship. The majority of my academic focus at American University is on domestic politics and law. I know a whole lot about the U.S. Constitution, but in the grand scheme of international politics and law, the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights reigns supreme.

In this sense, I think my role has been to listen and develop a greater sense of awareness for what’s happening outside my small circle of politics in the United States and to reflect on that in an open and honest way that lets me connect with those who have diverse and unimaginable situations. I study Communications, Law, Economics, and Government (CLEG) and Spanish at American University. This internship has helped me further my language skills by immersing me fully in a technical, legal side of the Spanish language I hadn’t yet been exposed to as well as interpersonal development by allowing me to interact with a diverse set of individuals using the language. I am forever grateful that I chose to pursue the goal of become bilingual and stuck to it, especially given that I would not have been able to listen, learn, and share more than I would have ever been able to with just English under my belt. 

At La Liga, I was entrusted with greater responsibility to compensate for short staffing. I overcame language barriers quickly to conduct client interviews and complete legal research exclusively in Spanish. I studied international human rights law intently. By practicing empathy and active listening, I learned to navigate difficult conversations and understand situations apart from my own. My adaptability and understanding of empathy as an active skill are crucial to working with immigrant communities.

I was sitting in the office one day reading a report that I was sent about a certain Venezuelan opposition leader who had been targeted for her political opinions and persecuted by the government. This kind of case is not uncommon by any means in our office, but this woman’s story intrigued me. As I pored over the details of the case, including attacks on her office buildings at the National Assembly of Venezuela, harassment by the police force, denial of food and medicines, and other atrocities, my supervisor held out his phone and asked if I’d like to speak to her. I was a bit shocked and thought he might be joking, but I quickly realized that he wasn’t. He handed me the phone and a young woman answered. As a young opposition leader for Voluntad Popular, the main opposition party to Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela, she had been subject to unimaginable repression and hardship. Speaking to her had me at a loss for words in either language. But being able to put a face to a report allowed me to experience the work I was doing in an entirely new way.

Though her story was not unique to those I went on to hear every day, hers was among the first of many that changed me. Hearing the resilience in our clients’ voices ignited my passion for service. They are strong, driven, sacrificing individuals like my father, who fled the 1979 Iranian Revolution to build a better life for me. What cemented this realization was meeting this young woman and so many others with diverse and heartbreaking stories face to face; we talked about everything from their struggles and hardships to my life in the United States. The connections I formed from the sheer amount of people I have met in such a short time have certainly humbled me and expanded my understanding of how to interact with those worlds apart from me.

My Iranian heritage is central to my desire to serve immigrants, especially refugees and asylees. Because of my father’s hard work and resilience, I have the opportunity to realize my dreams. I want to use the skills I have built to continue to passionately fight for dignity and autonomy for immigrant families. After two years of listening to immigrant stories and a lifetime of living one, I want to focus on empowering immigrants to take agency in their development. Behind my passion for immigrant advocacy and academic interest in the legal field is my desire to continue to advocate for immigrants with empathy. I took part in the good work— helping those in need of assistance to navigate the asylum process and secure refugee status on a daily basis. This work was life-changing for the clients we worked with. And these cases added to a larger organizational goal of prosecuting the Venezuelan government for their international human rights violations. I want to continue to make waves like this, even if it starts with tossing stones and making ripples.