Born in Syria
Age: 20
October 20, 2021
I left Syria when I was only ten. The only thing I remember is my childhood - being with all my cousins and relatives because we all used to live next to each other in the neighborhood. I remember elementary school. I remember just being with my family, my friends, not worrying about anything. Just a normal, beautiful, happy life back then in 2010.
We were happy in Syria. Syria is a beautiful country. We didn't worry about anything. My dad was working and my mom was a housewife taking care of all of us, me and my other four siblings. Until things started to happen in Syria. People were angry. People were protesting. People were going crazy. Police were everywhere, taking people and putting them in jail. 2011 is when the war started. It actually started where I was born. Everything was going crazy. I was ten at that time, so I wasn’t aware of everything that was going on. The only thing I remember is my mom telling us not to go outside and play because it was dangerous.
From there everything started getting worse. No electricity, no water. The prices started to go up, even food was expensive. There were no more jobs. Everyone was scared to go out. Late 2012 is when they started to hit us. You would just be home and then the bombs and rockets started. Sometimes from helicopters. Some people have shelters under our houses and my house didn't, so we had to go to the neighbor's house. We had to run without shoes to get there. At the end of that year is when my family and I decided to go to another city in Syria where it was less dangerous. There was a camp there where we could stay. We were running away but we were in our own country. We stayed there for a few months. It was a military camp but they let us stay there. We stayed in one room, all seven of us. It was horrible. We couldn't go out.
Then we decided to go back to my village. Every night after 1am the rockets started, sometimes close to our house. We would wake up, freak out, and run. We didn't have phones, no electricity, no water. We had barely enough food to eat. We were all young. I mean, the oldest of us was me and I was only 10 at the time. Once they hit us with helicopters - rockets from helicopters. It was very close to my house. It was literally above my house. My parents were out to get us food from a different village and I was alone with my siblings. I was 11 at the time. One of the rockets hit next to my house and my house was shaking. The earth, everything was moving, it was like an earthquake. I woke up crying. I had to take my siblings at 3am in the morning, running without shoes, to a neighbor’s shelter. We made it there. I had to do it. I’m the oldest of five.
The next day when my parents came back they were so proud of me because I was so brave. The rockets actually hit our neighbor's house. Even the windows went down because of how hard it hit. All the glass was broken, the door was down. It was horrible. It was the hardest thing that I've ever been through. It's also the thing that makes me a stronger person, a brave person. I’m not scared of anything. I had to save myself and my siblings since my parents were not there. After all, that happened everything else was getting crazy, too. You wanted to get a piece of bread? That was like $5 at the time and $5 was a lot of money. You needed to work at least twenty days to get that money. Twenty days for $5 to get one piece of bread.
While all that was happening when we went back to the village, my dad stayed in the other city to work. He got kidnapped for a whole month. He went out to work and he got kidnapped for a whole month. We didn't know what he was at. We were all freaking out, we didn't know anything - if he was alive if he wasn’t alive. If he was in Syria if he’s in another city. We didn't know anything about him until my aunt called. They had to pay a million Syrian at the time, it was a lot of money to get him out. The same day he got out my mom said, that's enough for us. We had to leave the country.
We left everything in the house and we only took a few pieces of clothing. We took the bus. We went to Jordan because we lived only a few hours away. We went to another village first on the bus and there were a lot of people there. We had to wait until the middle of the night so no one would see us. We waited until 3am and we had to walk three hours to get there. There were almost a thousand of us, a thousand people. We were surrounded by military people who kept saying no kids crying, no lights, try to be quiet as much as you can. Imagine how horrible that is with a thousand people, we all had to walk at the same time.
We were in the mountains, it was cold, freezing. It was February of 2013. We didn't have many clothes, they told us not to bring anything. In Jordan, they don't let you in easily. They take every family's information and all that. We weren’t even in Jordan yet, but we had to wait in the mountains for hours until they got to us. So my dad had only brought one suitcase, so when we got close to Jordan he opened the suitcase and he put all of us in it and put the clothes above us so we stayed warm. But all seven of us from my family made it safely into Jordan.
When we got there they took all our paperwork and they put us on a bus to the Zaatari refugee camp. We had to live in a large tent with a lot of people, all of us in one place. We had to sleep where we were sitting until the next day when they gave us a tent to live in. They built it for us and we lived in a tent with seven people for four months.
The camp was new and they didn't have schools yet. It was horrible living there. The public restrooms were far away. We didn’t have a kitchen, nothing at all. There was a public kitchen that you had to go and wait for if you wanted to cook something. The Jordanian people who ran the camp treated us badly, too, they would always call us refugees. The food and everything, that support was from all over the world. It wasn't even from Jordan. I think everything was from Europe.
You can’t get into Jordan unless you get a citizen to cover for you. Like if anything happens. It would be their mistake. If we did anything wrong, that person would be the one who they blame. Of course, we didn't find anybody, even though we knew Syrian people there. Everyone just cared for their own, so we had to run away. We had to run from the refugee camp, rent a car, and sneak out between the trees without them seeing us go into Jordan. That's the only way it could work. That's how a lot of people did it too because living in the camp wasn't for us. Basically, you're slowly dying because it was just horrible. It was freezing, it was cold, there was no school, it was dirty, we slept on the floor. I wish I could just explain it to you. It was horrible, especially for my young siblings.
So after four months, we went to Jordan and my dad finally found a friend there who's also from Syria. He lived one or two hours away from the camp, so we stayed at his house. But we still couldn’t be out without having an ID and stuff, so we needed to find somebody from Jordan who could cover us. So my dad’s friend found us an old Jordanian man who was able to do that for us. He went with us to do the paperwork and they told him that signing those papers meant that if any of us made any mistake, if we yelled at any Jordanian, cussed at any Jordanian, if we didn’t find work, he would have to pay $5,000 for each one of us.
We did that and because we did that he told us that we had to stay in his apartment. They had a little apartment complex and he gave us the first floor. It had two rooms and a restroom. They weren't even combined together, they were outside. You had to go outside to go to the other room. His oldest son lived above us with his family and they were also Jordanian. They were always cussing at us and throwing trash at us. We lived there for three and a half years in Jordan in the same house because we could not move out since he was the person covering us. He told us not to turn any lights on so he wouldn’t have to pay for electricity. We didn’t even have a kitchen. They were fighting with us because they knew we couldn’t do anything about it. Even if we wanted to go visit relatives who lived in another city we would have to tell him so he knew. He would threaten us saying if we went anywhere without him knowing that he would stop covering for us. My dad was the only person working. It was horrible. That was three and a half years of our life.
We wished we would have just stayed in Syria because they treated us so badly. They would call us refugees everywhere we went. They would say that we took their bread, that we took their jobs - even though we all speak the same language, have the same religion, and have similar cultures. None of the schools accepted us - principles used to tell my mom that they couldn’t accept us because we were refugees. I had to stay home for a whole year. I missed sixth grade. My younger sister missed two years. Even at school, we were treated differently than everybody else. Jordan is a poor country and they barely have anything to eat so people felt like we were stealing everything from them. My mom worked at a preschool just to get my brother into it. She would clean the rooms, make the teachers food and tea - just so my brother could go to school.
In 2016, in either February or March, my dad got a call from the UN and they asked if we had the chance to go to the USA would we want it. My dad said of course, what else would I be asking for? That was when we knew our life was going to change. At that time I was in middle school, I was in eighth grade. We hadn’t even filed with the UN, but that was when Obama was President. He was asking to get Syrian refugees from around the world and he asked for a phone number. They basically just choose people from that, and we were one of the chosen ones. We had never even thought of getting to the US because we didn’t even know how to do that, but you know, God is God.
It happened very quickly. For most people, it usually takes a year to a year and a half but for us, it happened in three and a half months and then we were here in the US. They called us first and told us that we had an interview in a week, so we drove to the capital for it. They took our paperwork. In the second interview, we met with an American lady. There were a lot of interviews and questions. After two months they called us and they said that our plane would leave in 22 days. That was the happiest news that we ever could get. Not only that, we were coming to the USA but also because we were going to be done with Jordan. Our plane left on June 8, 2016. I had just turned 15 on June 1.
We didn’t know anybody in the US. They asked us where we wanted to go, we told them we would go wherever they wanted, and they said it was going to be Austin, Texas. It took us 22 hours to get here. The Houston airport is huge. We basically didn't speak English and we came with three other Syrian families, so it was four of us. We did have somebody to help at every airport, but they weren’t Arab so they didn't really speak, they were just trying to help us get where we were supposed to go. Whenever we had to take another plane from Houston to Austin, and people were getting on the plane, we lost my little brother for 30 minutes. We looked everywhere. We were crying, freaking out. We didn't speak English. No one helped us, not even the Syrian people who were with us. Imagine - everyone just cared for their own - until a white old American man came to us. He was trying to talk to me, he was very nice. I didn't understand him so he was using his translator, and I tried to tell him that we lost my little brother. He helped us, he left everything. Then my brother was under a chair sleeping so we found him. So we went on the plane but then something was wrong, so we waited a whole hour and then we had to get on a new plane. Whenever we got to Austin, that American man came to us and he gave me his phone number on a piece of paper. He wrote a message to me through the translator in Arabic saying that whenever we get settled we should message him, that he would love to help us out with anything we needed. He’s from Austin, we’re super good friends now. He helped us with a lot of stuff. It's awesome because he chose us. He came to us. Everything was new, and he helped us.
We got here and people were waiting for us with signs that said welcome in Arabic. They took us in the car to our first apartment. We were all crying because we just couldn’t believe we were here. It’s just a weird feeling. Getting out of there, was a new life and a new journey for us.
It was hard to start over but we did have help from the refugee organization in Austin. They rented the apartment and covered it for 4-6 months until my dad started working. They helped to get us beds to sleep in, food, and to get our social security cards. It was crazy, we didn't understand anything, you know, we didn't speak the language. It's a new country, a new culture. It was very hard at the beginning. I was crying because it's really up to me to figure a lot of things out. It took us a few years to get used to it.
We got here in June and we started school in August. I am Muslim and I had to wear my scarf. As a teenager, I was terrified by that. I kept wondering if they were going to say something about my hijab because that's how they know I’m Muslim. I was worried that Americans would not like us and that they would make fun of us. Right at the beginning, a teacher would ask me my name and I would respond with yes because that's the only word I knew. I got made fun of a few times but that was fine. It was very hard at the beginning. Everyone was different, the school system was different. I would get home at five or something which is not what I’m used to. Classes are long. We would usually just have one class in our country that you would stay in and the teacher would come to you. I would always just be sitting by myself thinking everyone's looking at me because I'm Muslim. The first person I met was Fatima. She also didn't speak that much English because she was also new.
I went to school with no English. Before I even got to school I was practicing English at my house. Just the little stuff like how are you? What's your name? Where are you from? All that. As I spoke a little more I was a little more confident talking to other people. It was especially hard for me because my family didn't speak English at all and then the refugee organization only helped us for four months. After that, they didn't care, so I had to understand everything at 15. We don't have any of these things like paperwork, taxes, utilities, bills in my country. So I had to learn all that. I had to be the translator for my house. I learned English very quickly though, which was cool. In about two months I started speaking. I used to go home and go online and practice Arabic into English. I love the language.
That was basically the first year of me being here. Whenever we would go to public places, like a doctor's appointment or something, I would think people were staring at me but it's just how people are. I would think people are actually staring at me and my mom and I would be terrified. Until I started actually talking to people who are not Muslim, like friends at school. It made me more confident, actually talking about where I came from and about my religion. Everyone's from a different culture. So that's what made me start to talk about it. It's not that big of a thing. That's where I gained all my confidence. I was happy at the time, but it takes time because for us all we know, back in our country, is that Americans don't like us because we're Muslims.
Now I don’t feel that at all. I've been in Austin for five and a half years. I've never had anybody be rude to me. I love Texas. Even right now, I wish like right now, I'm telling you. Even if somebody comes and talks to me about it, I would be happy because I want to give them answers. Like, tell me. What do you have inside you? I'm ready to talk. I'm ready for it. I understand, I don’t blame anybody because they don’t know, they just hear things from the internet. Like if I had seen an American person in my country I would have been terrified too because all the ideas we have about them are based around us being Muslim. I didn’t know anything. People have probably never even met a Muslim person before. That’s the thing. The internet is always fake. The news is always fake. They just say whatever they want to say. The first thing I would do would be like, let's go out together. Let's do something. I wish somebody would have come and talked to me like that.
I’m way more confident right now. Whenever I moved here, everything has changed because I've seen people around the world. I have met people from everywhere. I know how everyone just has their country, their religion, their culture, everyone is different. Everyone is different. I should love where I came from and I should be proud of where I came from and the way I look. I should be a person who stands up for my people. As a Hijabi girl, I want to be a model for everyone. I want to be an idol. I want people to look at me and I want people to think of all the other Hiajbi girls, or all the other Arab people, or all the other Muslim people who are just like me. I want to give a better picture of who we are, you know?
Of course, there are two different cultures. America is a whole different culture, but America it's a very cool culture. I feel like I am in both, I try to fit in both. I would never leave my culture behind. No, I'm actually proud of my culture. But I also like to belong in American culture. I'm actually proud to be here. I just applied for my citizenship. I'm just so proud that I got this opportunity. When I moved here it was hard for me and I worried about how people were going to accept me. My dad would tell me all the time to not be friends with American people because they were just going to make me take my hijab off. We didn't have any idea. But actually, the thing is that America is such an awesome country because you actually get to tell people about your culture. Like you get to be whatever you want. You have freedom of choice. You can say whatever you want to say, you have freedom of religion, so you're just being yourself. There are immigrants from everywhere here. People have their own culture, everyone is learning, it’s just awesome.
One of the things I love about my culture is how families are close to each other and how they stay together. How they stay in touch all the time. Here, whenever kids are 18 they move out, they don't see each other for years. For us we stay very close with each other, we help each other. We have very close family members, we’re always in touch, and we do stuff together. Back in Syria, we saw family every other week. We would have lunch or dinner together or go out to the bar. That's one thing I like about my culture, that families are super close. It’s different here. I would never want to stay away from my family even though I'm older. I would always stay in touch with them. I would call them every day, I would see them whenever I get the chance to because I feel like family always comes first. I know that's how it is here, too, but it's a little different because everyone lives in different states and is far away. They only see people whenever they have a chance to.
Another thing that I love about my culture is my religion. I'm proud to be a Hijabi Muslim girl. We have so many things that people don't know about us. Not just being Muslim and that's it you know? There’s a lot of dynamic in that. How we actually also respect other people, how we respect other countries and other cultures and other traditions and other religions. People think we don't and I don't know why, but we actually do. We have our own traditions like cooking, clothing.
In terms of American culture, I love all the holidays. That's a thing. They're just awesome. They give kids happiness. There's a lot of stuff to do. I love that. I love how everyone has their own freedom. They can talk the way they want, you know, freedom of speech. They can have their own religion, they can do whatever they want. I love that everyone is following the law too, and if you don't, there are consequences for it. It’s not like that in other countries. In most countries, nobody listens. I feel like that's how a country stays stronger and stable. I love how American people love to learn about other countries. People are curious.
People don't know that immigrants who come to the US don't just come here to be in the US. We all have goals, we want to do something, it's a great opportunity for us to come here. It's not easy for us because we have to start from zero because we have to move from a different country, we have to learn a new language, we have to fit in within a new culture, we have to fit in with all the new laws and new rules, we have to learn all that. Immigrants are people who actually work very hard - very, very hard. Why? Because we came here to be better, to make ourselves better, to get all the opportunities we can. The US is all about opportunities to grow, to study, to get educated. We don't come here just to be in the US or to just sit and do nothing. We're actually very hard workers, all of us. It's a big thing for us moving here, for everyone as an immigrant, because we all know it's a great country. It’s hard for us because everything is different. Everything. You come from a country with no rules, no laws, where everyone just does whatever they want. Government is very weak. There's literally just nothing, you never grow. You're just there. But here, you can always start from zero. We work on ourselves, we go to school, we study, we learn the language, we start jobs, we get certificates.
If I wasn't here at this time, if I was still in Jordan, I know that after finishing high school I wasn't going to be able to do anything else. I wasn't going to be able to go to college because there were fewer opportunities. We would have had to spend a lot of money to go to college and they might not even have accepted me as a Syrian.
There was no future for me there. I knew I was just going to be at home until I got married. I never had any dreams in Jordan because I knew what was coming up for me if I stayed there. But since I was seven years old, the first movie I watched was Home Alone, and when I saw that movie my only dream was to come to the US and finish my education. When I was seven I had that dream. I graduated from high school in 2020.
Now all the time I keep reminding myself of how it used to be back then. That’s why I'm here today to make a change. I'm not here just to make money and drive a car. Hopefully, I'm going to be a citizen very soon. I want to go to college, hopefully starting in January. I want to be a nurse because that's what I always wanted to be. I want to improve my English and I would love to get involved with organizations that help refugees. I want to help my family as much as I can. Hopefully, we can have our own business one day and buy our own house. It's all getting better. Bit by bit, you know, things happen.