After seeking asylum, families at this shelter take their first steps in the US
LOS ANGELES — Five-year-old Rood Morancy Siverne huddled close to his mother, who sat tired, yet hopeful, waiting to check in to what would become, at least for a time, their home.
Rood and his parents had fled Chile and made the month-long trek north through mountains, Panamanian jungles, and the length of Mexico, until arriving at the U.S. border to claim asylum. After yet more travel, they had come to Riverside County and a shelter for immigrants.
Rood quietly stole looks through the office window behind him, where children played outside in a courtyard. Shelter staffers then gave the family a cart brimming with groceries, and the key to a room — their own room.
But there was no time to rest for Rood.
He giggled as he belly-flopped into one of the two twin beds. He hurriedly changed his shirt, pulled up a pair of shorts and ran.
"I don't need shoes!" he said to his mother in Spanish, sprinting barefoot out the door and waving off a pair of sandals she held.
"The kids want to be outside, they want to run," said Gloria Gomez, co-founder of , which opened in 2010 and provides
