By Anthony Rifilato
Dohmen expected life in another country to mirror all those brochures and advertisements she read back home, with happy students toting books and smiling. Instead, she found herself shuttled from one untenable living situation to another.
Finally, after nearly six months in the country, she has settled with a stable host family in Baldwin, who asked not to be named. But the 17-year-old has become disenchanted and says she can't wait to return to her small German hometown after she graduates from Baldwin High School in June.
"Sometimes I would sit there and say, 'Why am I here?'" she said.
Despite her friendly demeanor, she and her host families have not gelled. Since September, Dohmen said, she was kicked out of her first host family's home, left her second sponsor's home because of unbearable living conditions and neglect, and was given an ultimatum by the school district to find a place to stay, or else. To top it off, she said, the organization that brought her here, World Heritage, had no contingency plan to help her through her ordeal.
"I thought I'd be here and get a second family and have a good time," she said. "Twice I ended up with crazy people."
'I never thought it would happen to me'
Dohmen, wearing a black sweater, brown pants with large pockets and hip red shoes, has high aspirations. She eventually wants to become a surgeon, and among the reasons she came to Baldwin High School were the excellent curriculum, the school's proximity to New York City and, of course, the chance to visit America.
In her hometown of Neunkirchen, Germany, Dohmen signed a contract with World Heritage, a non-profit organization. Her parents paid the $7,000 cost, which goes toward insurance and other expenses, and the organization placed her with an American family in Baldwin.
"I heard of exchange students who had trouble, but I never thought it would happen to me," Dohmen said.
She arrived at the airport last Sept. 5. In a sign of things to come, the 17-year-old said she waited there for seven hours because her Baldwin host family never came to pick her up.
Karen Cobin of Floral Park, a new World Heritage volunteer and area representative, screened Dohmen's first host mother, Linda Richards, a Baldwin Harbor resident. Host families receive a tax-deductible fee of $50 per month, and Cobin gets $400 for each student she places.
Cobin determined that Richards and her family would be suitable, but things went wrong almost immediately. Stranded at the airport, Dohmen called the World Heritage emergency number and was hooked up with Cobin.
Cobin picked her up at JFK, and after spending the night in Floral Park, the pair drove to the Richards home the following day and was told that the family had been away in Florida. Dohmen said Richards apologized for the mix-up.
Dohmen began attending high school and settling in. The precocious teenager is in extremely rigorous courses, including advanced-placement chemistry, which even school administrators say is difficult.
Facing a new school, new friends and a load of homework, Dohmen said she was required to babysit Richards' daughter for several hours a day after school. When the babysitting ate into her study time and she began falling behind in math and chemistry, Dohmen said she told Richards she wanted to stay after school for help twice a week. But Richards said no, Dohmen said.
"I had no idea how to deal with the situation," Dohmen said.
Distraught, she said, she approached a school psychologist in the hope of some kind of mediation. But when the school psychologist called Richards, she was less than receptive. School officials declined to comment.
"They're a very unreasonable family," said Cobin. "When the psychologist called Richards, she took it as a sign of disloyalty."
Repeated phone calls to the Richards home by the Herald were not returned. In an article in Newsday, Richards faulted Cobin and Dohmen for the problems, and was quoted as saying, "She's a very manipulating child."
From there, things did not improve. In late October, on the day Cobin was to meet with Dohmen for their regular monthly meeting, she arrived to find Richards and her family toting suitcases outside, and Dohmen crying. She had been asked to leave.
Round two
Dohmen was fortunate to find a new place to stay a couple of days later, after a girl at school told her she could live with her in North Baldwin. When she moved into a small downstairs apartment with her friend and her mother, Dohmen said the landlord, Cheryl Astirita, became her host mother because she agreed to provide room and board.
At first, Dohmen said, she and Astirita got along. "We were out all the time," Dohmen said. "She would tell everyone she was my sister."
But eventually, Dohmen said, the landlord became overbearing. She would leave signs in the kitchen saying things such as "Germ Police: Wash Hands." After a couple of months, Dohmen said Astirita would not allow her in the kitchen and ignored her altogether, not even giving her money for food. One time, before things went completely sour, Dohmen had a fever blister on her mouth and Astirita took her to the emergency room. Dohmen said Astirita began complaining to World Heritage about the germs and about Dohmen's going out.
"She's crazy with germs," Dohmen said. Astirita did not return phone calls.
In February, Dohmen left to live with a family friend in West Babylon. But after two weeks, because Dohmen was not living in the school district and was commuting, Cobin said she was given an ultimatum by school officials that Dohmen had a week to find a place to stay or she would have to leave the school.
After aggressive maneuvering, a friend of Dohmen's who was away at college said Dohmen could live at her house on Milburn Avenue. There Dohmen finally found a receptive host family who couldn't believe her travails.
Both Cobin and Dohmen said the situation could have been averted had the organization provided more support. "They got the money and said, 'Sorry, you have to figure it out on your own,'" Dohmen said of World Heritage. Cobin said she has done everything she could for the distraught teen, and even Dohmen said that if it weren't for Cobin, her situation would be much worse. The problem, they said, is that too much of the burden in a crisis situation such as Dohmen's is put on the area representative, and Cobin said she could only do so much. She said she reported the problems to World Heritage's Northeast area coordinator, Eileen Coen, but was met with tepid responses.
"I'm disappointed with World Heritage because the onus put on the representative is way too much," Cobin said, explaining that the organization has no database of families or contingency plans in emergencies such as this.
For her part, Coen said the organization has done all it can to help. "I do understand she had a very unfortunate host family situation," Coen said. "In this case it was brought to our attention when Daniela was already in a desperate situation." Coen also explained that she did make calls to the school about the situation. But she admitted that World Heritage has no database of prospective host families and said that much of their work relies on networking. "I don't know Baldwin," she said.
But Cobin said the organization was aware of Dohmen's problems from the start, and that Coen did not call Dohmen until December.
Despite the turbulent trip to Long Island, Dohmen keeps trying to make the best of things, but even that isn't easy. During her time in Baldwin, she has gone on auditions for the Alvin Ailey dance company in New York City, where she was told they don't take exchange students. She also auditioned for a part in a school play, but didn't want to take a lesser role, and she tried out for the girls' basketball team but didn't make the cut. Still, she said she has made friends and hopes to go to the prom, and though her experience here has been anything but easy, she still remains optimistic.
"I'm not going to change," Dohmen said. "There's still nice people out there."
