Help Bring Peter's Wife and Son to the U.S.

Dear friends,

I am asking for help to cover the costs of bringing my wife, Nyandeng Adeer, and our son, Atem, to the United States from Africa, so we can finally be united as a family.

Nyandeng and we were both born in South Sudan during the Civil War to gain independence from Sudan. I'm part of the community known as the Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan. The Lost Boys and Girls were separated from our families at the beginning of the Civil War, and we walked together across Sudan to Ethiopia in 1987 to reach the safety of a United Nations refugee camp.

In 1991, the refugee camps in Ethiopia were attacked, and we walked from Ethiopia to the safety in Kakuma, Kenya, in 1992. Many Lost Boys and Girls were finally able to immigrate to safe countries with the help of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. I was blessed to have been welcomed to the United States in 2001. I have been able to finish my education, learn to drive, and find steady employment.

In 2017, I was able to travel back to South Sudan in Africa and get married. My wife Nyandeng is a citizen of South Sudan but currently lives in Kampala, Uganda, because South Sudan is not a safe place for her. Nyandeng and I have a son, Atem. Atem was born in 2019. Atem is a U.S. citizen because I became a U.S. citizen after arriving in the U.S. before he was born. Atem can travel to live with me, but Nyandeng Adeer does not yet have the approval to travel to the U.S. I started the process for travel approval to the U.S. in 2019 and it seemed that travel approval might be granted in 2020, but then the COVID pandemic struck, and the US embassies in Africa stopped processing travel requests. I have been paying all the costs to keep Nyandeng and Atem safe for the past three years and have also been paying my own food and shelter costs here in the United States. I have not been able to save any money to cover the costs for Nyandeng and Atem to travel from Kampala, Uganda, to the U.S.

The U.S. embassies have now resumed processing visa applications and I believe that we are very close to finishing the visa process for Nyandeng Adeer. Unfortunately, the US embassy in Kampala, Uganda, has not been re-opened for the processing of visa applications. All pending visa applications from Uganda are now being handled by the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya.

We received the scheduled appointment on August 26, 2022, for the medical exam, which will be done in Nairobi, Kenya. After that step is complete, the Nairobi embassy will schedule a final visa appointment for Nyandeng. Neither the embassy nor international can tell us how soon they will set appointments.

I need $5,000 before the medical exam, and will need approximately $15,000 total to cover the costs of relocating my family from Kampala to Nairobi, the shelter costs for two months in Nairobi, and airfare for Nyandeng and Atem to travel from Nairobi, to Uganda, and to the USA. Would you be able to contribute to my fundraiser? A donation of any amount would help me bring my family here and will be greatly appreciated.

Please, if you can share my fundraiser link with your friends and family, it would mean so much to me. You are also welcome to share my request for help on any social media you use. I believe as more people here about my family’s desire to be united here in safety in the United States, the quicker I can reach my fundraising goal.

With love and so many thanks for any help you can offer, may God bless you for taking the time to read about my family's travels to love and safety.

Peter Atem