Oregon Public Broadcasting

A year ago we met an Iraqi interpreter named Haider Nahell. Back then he was just glad he escaped the bloodshed in Iraq.

Haider Nahell: "It really became crazy. I know at least 15 person and they are friends of mine and they are interpreters all of them got killed. All of them."

In part two of our series this week on Iraqi interpreters, correspondent Anna King catches up with Haider Nahell in his small apartment in SeaTac, Washington.

What she found is this: He might have escaped the craziness of war, but life for recent immigrants to the U.S. in a down economy can be bleak.

When you visit Haider Nahell don't refuse the tea. He pops two mugs into the microwave.

Haider Nahell takes a moment to smoke a cigarette on his apartment balcony in SeaTac, Washington. The former Iraqi interpreter says he regrets coming to the United States.

Haider Nahell: "The tea is the thing that people offer you when you come as a guest to their house. If you don't take what they offer you it is insulting."

Anna King: "Good thing I said yes."

Turns out tea, like most things in Iraq, is more complicated than Americans understood five years ago. The hot brew can even be used as a political tool.

Explaining the complexities of tea, and other cultural rules to Americans, was part of Nahell's job as an interpreter. He says it took a while for Americans to understand how little they knew about his homeland.

Haider Nahell: "Americans made a huge mistake when they came to Iraq without knowing anything about those people. Even they barely knew what is our religion. This a huge mistake what they've done in the beginning. They were behaving like a stupid kid with a gun."

Nahell worked with the U.S. forces for about four years. That's until a roadside bomb left him badly hurt. After multiple surgeries Nahell applied to come to the U.S. to start a new life.

Haider Nahell: "I liked a lot of things as I told you. Education, the system, the technology, the service, the community service, the freedom, police service -- everything is great."

Nahell came here with just a couple of suitcases of clothes and not much else. He landed a job at Fort Lewis, Washington teaching the Iraqi language to U.S. soldiers.

Nahell even bought a car. But the Army laid him off. And he's running out of money. All this in a down economy that's even hard for Americans, let alone a recent immigrant. It won't be long before he has....

Haider Nahell: "Nothing. I don't have even job right now. Really. Maybe barely I will pay my two next months rent and after that I have nothing. Is this what we came for?"

Before the war Nahell used to have a pretty good life as an electrician. He says it's hard to reconcile his dreams of America with his actual life here.

Haider Nahell: "Like you live in heaven but you can not touch anything in it, so what is the use of it? So this is heaven for me instead of my country for me. This is heaven. But there is no use of it. I can not do anything here. I have no job, I have no future, I have nothing here."

Nahell is no longer able to support his parents back in Iraq. He's lost his country. He's lost his family. He seems changed from last year. Thinner. No more jokes.

Haider Nahell: "Maybe I will one day take a decision, buy a ticket and go back to Iraq. Whatever. Maybe I will get killed there, I don't care anymore."

Anna King: "You don't care if you are going to get killed in Iraq?"

Haider Nahell: "Yeah, Yeah. See, at least you are going to get killed and your family is around you."

Nahell says he takes some comfort that he has a few good friends here. And he's not giving up quite yet.

He gets a call from a friend. There's news of a possible job.