SIOUX CITY — Husen Jagir planned to embark on a months-long trip to his homeland in East Africa in August. He looked forward to seeing old friends and familiar sites.
He never got the chance to make the trip.
Husen, 56, a native of Eritrea, came to the United States in 2011 seeking a better life. Fleeing violence and instability in his home country, he moved to Columbia, Missouri, then Des Moines, then Denison, Iowa, and, finally, to Sioux City, where he worked at the Seaboard Triumph Foods pork plant. He lived in Sioux City only seven or eight months.
His nephew, Shila Dide, of Carroll, remembered Husen as a hard-working, devout, good man, who stressed to young people the importance of pursuing an education and trying to do great things with their lives. Husen had worked as a motel housekeeper before finding jobs in the meatpacking industry. He never complained about his work, no matter how unpleasant a given job may have been.
“He was very focused on his religion,” Dide said. “He just cared about like, people, you know.”
In August, Husen had planned to visit the Sudan, a neighboring country of Eritrea, where he had friends. He wanted to spend six months in the region, but his travel plans had been stymied by the coronavirus even before he got sick.
Husen likely contracted the virus at work. His illness lasted only a week, before he succumbed to it on May 1.
“I was wondering, how’d that happen?,” Dide said, referring to his uncle’s rapid decline and death. “He was sick, like the Friday, and the next Friday, he passed away.”
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