Helping out at home
Semih Bulbul spent 35 years responding to refugee crises around the world. Now he's ready to serve his adopted hometown of Beverly.
I’ve written before about how much I appreciate the people who volunteer for city boards like the Planning Board and Zoning Board of Appeals. It’s a lot of work for no money, and it’s work that makes the city run.
But I don’t think I’ve ever seen a city board volunteer with a resume quite like Semih Bulbul’s.
Bulbul is the latest appointee to the Beverly Human Rights Committee. Let’s just say he might be over-qualified. He spent 35 years as an officer with UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency. He grew up in Turkey and has worked in places like Cambodia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Macedonia, Iraq, Tanzania and Afghanistan. He’s seen countries torn apart by war and has helped refugees and asylum seekers as they try to put their lives back together. He’s been caught in a crossfire in Bosnia and survived rocket attacks in Baghdad.
And now he’s on the Human Rights Committee in Beverly.
“I spent more than half of my life working for refugee rights, asylum seeker rights, and they are human rights as well,” Bulbul told me. “My objective is to create some public awareness and sensitize the community of Beverly and beyond for refugee rights and asylum seeker rights.
“I know that Beverly is a very welcoming city in terms of refugees or asylum seekers or immigrants,” he added. “But still, of course, there’s always some misunderstanding or lack of knowledge about what refugee rights are and what they have gone through.”
Bulbul ended up in Beverly because his wife, Helen Stevens, is from North Andover (they met in a remote village in Cambodia when she was also doing humanitarian work). Her father lives at The Current assisted living facility in Beverly, and her sister lives here too. When Bulbul was assigned to work in Baghdad in 2014, the families of UN workers weren’t allowed to live there for safety reasons, so his wife rented a home in Beverly. Bulbul, who is a naturalized American citizen, retired in 2023.
Bulbul said he’s a cyclist and loves the fact that Beverly is a “bicycle-friendly town.” He described the people of Beverly as “very nice, very educated and very open-minded.”
“People that I’ve met, they have an interest in what is happening around the world.”
Bulbul, 63, said his dream growing up in Turkey was to work in the tourism field. After graduating from university with a degree in English literature, he got a job working for a travel agency. At about the same time he also applied for a job with the United Nations, even though at the time he said he knew nothing about refugee work.
He was hired by the UN and got a job in a branch office in Ankara, his hometown, as an interpreter and clerk. Thus began the journey that took him to all those countries. He was often out in the field, accompanying refugees to settlement sites and coordinating services. He dined with the president of Tanzania, met with a princess in Liechtenstein, played soccer with Malaysian soldiers, and drank vodka with Bulgarian police officers.
“I traveled to places where most westerners would never go,” he wrote in his memoir, “My Journey As A Humanitarian”. “Remote border crossings, no-man’s lands between countries, and conflict zones!”
In Afghanistan, after the U.S. withdrew its troops, Bulbul taught a human rights class to the Taliban. Whenever he traveled to a remote village, he was protected by Taliban soldiers carrying Kalashnikov rifles — the same Taliban that during the war vowed to kill any American.
When asked about the danger he faced, he said, “In 35 years, in all those places, I ended up being lucky.”
Bulbul also served stints at UNHCR’s headquarters in Geneva, and was in Bosnia during a time of relative peace. In fact, that’s where his kids went to school. But he estimated he was away from his family for 10 of his 35 years with the UN.
Asked to sum up his career, Bulbul said, “It was a life-changing experience to actually realize what’s happening around the world and how much people are suffering. It is also not very healthy to see all that suffering by your own eyes. I’ve been in all those post-war, post-conflict situations and observed very closely families being destroyed, lives being destroyed. But on the other hand it gives you some joy and happiness when you see people starting to stand on their own. To see families reuniting and hugging each other after being separated for decades and then rebuilding their lives and becoming more self-reliant. We have this really, really sad, negative side, but then on the other side it’s very rewarding.”
Back to Beverly. Bulbul is joining the Human Rights Committee at the same time that the City Council voted to eliminate the diversity, equity and inclusion director position to save money (after Mayor Mike Cahill had reduced the position to part-time). Bulbul called the decision “really sad,” but also said he didn’t know all of the details of the city budget.
Bulbul said he’s been saddened by the massive cuts in humanitarian aid spending by the United States, and he wants to use his position on the Beverly Human Rights Committee to raise awareness of issues surrounding refugees and asylum seekers.
“Everybody knows this country is going through difficult times and the rhetoric around these topics are not very positive,” he said. “I just want to contribute a little bit to change that rhetoric. This negative image of refugees and asylum seekers and immigrants is a very dangerous thing.”
By the way, the Human Rights Committee is still looking for members. If you’re interested in serving on that committee, or any others, you can apply here.
As for Bulbul, he’s ready to go.
“I really love living here and I hope I can contribute,” he said.
We are grateful that Semih will volunteer.
Proud to have him helping our city!!👏🏼