EUSEBIO GARCIA

Discovering Passions & Purpose

As a newcomer to Toronto and to Canada, Eusebio faced many obstacles, but he refused to let them stop him.

When Eusebio got to Toronto he had “basically nothing.” With no English and no job, he faced many challenges. But as with the stay in the detention center, Eusebio kept positive. He enrolled in ESL classes and started looking for a job. With his refugee status, his living expenses were covered until he found work. And find one he did; after nine months he got a job as a spray painter in a factory and worked there for 2 years.

Working was not all Eusebio was doing. He started attending community groups at Friends House. This connected him to other Salvadorans and helped him build a community. Going to all those groups made him “realize [he] really enjoyed doing community work.” He made the choice to continue his education – he picked George Brown College’s Community Work program – to become like the workers who had helped him on his journey.

School was a big change. “At first [he] thought [he] would have to stop working at Quaker House, where he had been hired to help refugees find employment in order to do the [mandatory] community placement but George Brown was happy to accept [his] work at Quaker House as [his] first placement.” His second year placement was at the Ministry of Community and Social Services, but he wasn’t gone from Friends House for long. He kept attending events and soon after graduation he was working at Friends House full time.