The latest chapter in the lives of Cleveland's Lost Boys of Sudan begins at Whole Foods Market. More precisely, in the back of the new store that just opened in University Heights. Daniel Mubuoi is crushing cardboard boxes with a big hydraulic machine as part of his brand new job.
Daniel Mubuoi: Take care of the store and keep it clean, and that's all I do.
It's not glamorous but it's a good job. Full-time work for $10 an hour and good benefits.
Daniel Mubuoi: The new life and the new job are just doing good, yeah. It's absolutely fine, yeah.
It's also a big change for Mubuoi. Like his Sudanese "brothers" in Cleveland, Mubuoi struggled to get enough work-enough hours and money to pay bills and go to school.
In a back conference room at the Whole Foods store, about a dozen other Lost Boys crowd in to chat with me. They are Mubuoi's co-workers now. The store hired 15 of the Lost Boys.
It's the store's grand opening, and Coc Coc, one of the new employees, is impressed.
Coc Coc: It's amazing. It's amazing. The way the food arranged. We never saw that before.
One of their mentors stops by to see the men on their first day of work. Tim Evans is a high school teacher and helped them get the new jobs.
Tim Evans: For the first time in the five-and-a-half and six years some of these guys have been here, it's just the greatest advance that they've had.
It was just over four months ago that their lives in America hit a low point. In mid-December, Lost Boy Majok Madut was gunned down while waiting for a bus on Cleveland's east side. There's still no motive or suspect in the case. The irony of the murder was not lost on Majok's friend Akol Madut.
Akol Madut: We came out from the war, and we came here and we thought it was a home. But when we came here, and they try to shoot a gun for us, we thought okay, again, it's Sudan coming back behind us.
Shortly after the murder, Madut told a TV reporter that he felt like returning to Sudan. But, as Tim Evans says, the murder was actually a turning point for the Lost Boys in Cleveland.
Tim Evans: Out of that tragedy was born basically this concerted effort to try and get these guys with some serious progress, so that they all didn't end up with tragic endings like their brother Madut.
So here's what happened. After the murder, some volunteers met to discuss how to help the guys out. They formed a committee and vowed to provide them with better street-smarts, education, and jobs. The local paper included Tim Evans' phone number at the end of some of its articles on the tragedy. That's when Shari Weisman called.
Shari Weisman: You know, their story, you know, it just touches me, and I get all emotional whenever I talk about it.
Weisman was the store manager of a Whole Foods in Pittsburgh. There she had hired a few Lost Boys who were great workers. And, around this time, she was tapped to open the new Cleveland store.
Shari Weisman: So I called Tim up and said would you please bring them to our job event, and I'd love to have them hired here.
On opening day at Whole Foods Akol Madut is much more optimistic.
Akol Madut: We see now, the community surrounding us they're trying to help us now.
Madut has a big smile and his Whole Foods uniform drapes on his lanky body. He and his fellow Lost Boys - they call each other brothers - tell me about what they went through in Sudan: how they fled on foot, escaped attacks by people and animals, and ate mud to try and get water. Their world today could not be more different.
Nearly every corner of the store has a vendor handing out samples and pitching the virtues of their natural foods. The Lost Boys are still learning some of the names of the foods, and the sophisticated tastes of customers are mostly unfamiliar. Since moving to the U.S., their eating habits have gravitated toward much simpler fare - Daniel Mubuoi really likes hamburgers.
Daniel Mubuoi: I'm still 145 pounds. I need to be 200 pounds! I don't care what anybody say! (laughter)
It's now two weeks after the Whole Foods opening, and volunteers are gathered at a pot luck dinner for the lost boys - the third since Majok's murder.
Father Tim Gareau: Lord Jesus, we thank you for our dear brothers from the Sudan. We thank you that they are part of this wonderful body of Christ.
Father Tim Gareau leads the prayer. I was expecting just a few volunteers, but over 150 came to the event at St. Raphael's Parish in Bay Village. I asked Lost Boy Akol Shamir if he was surprised by the turnout.
Akol Shamir: Yeah, actually I'm so surprised because a lot of people have come to see us, and hear our case. It's beautiful. I love it!
Over the past few years, it's been mostly churches and religious groups who have helped the men during their time here. Sister Mary Francis Harrington has been perhaps their biggest ally. They call her the mother of the Lost Boys, as she's one of the few people who's kept tabs on them since the beginning. She recounts how bad things got for them in the months and years before Majok's death.
Sister Mary Francis Harrington: They had been shot at, they had been robbed at gunpoint, beaten up, told to go back where they came from.
Why wasn't there more support in Cleveland over the last five years, until Majok's death?
Sister Mary Francis Harrington: You know, in hindsight, we should have had this mentoring program up and running for them. But that's what we're trying to do now. We're trying to play catch up now.
Akol Madut: Ladies and gentlemen...
After the meal, with his brothers by his side, Akol Madut takes the mic and introduces a traditional Sudanese dance. The men join in a circle, taking turns dancing in the center.
After the ceremony, Akol Madut sits on a stoop outside the church. He tells me how he became a leader for the Lost Boys when they were staying in Ethiopia-and about his time as a child soldier. Since I met him two weeks ago, I've been struck by how consistently happy and friendly he is. He says it's because the other Lost Boys have become his family.
Akol Madut: Even though my father, my mother, I lost them, I didn't lost this guys, and I'm not lost from the God.
As we're talking, a few of his brothers step out of the church and tell Madut it's time to go.
Akol Madut: These guys. I think they need me.
Madut says he'll always be a leader for the Lost Boys.