Piero Martinez

Professor Ezzeldin

Intro to Modern Middle Eastern Studies

December 15, 2016

            I did something a little different than everyone else in the class. I called my friend, Jaffer Mehdi, who is from Palestine and currently a student at Montclair University. I have known Jaffer since middle school because we were both in the same baseball little league team. Everyone in the class made their paper or interview based on them being Middle Eastern. However, I decided to interview Jaffer over the phone and had him explain to me his dad’s story about migrating from Palestine to the U.S. With this information, I can thus write the paper about Jaffer’s dad. While on the phone with Jaffer, he expressed his concern to me about the presidency. This gave me the idea to interview my housemate Sean since he finds interest in current events and politics.

            The phone interview with Jaffer about his father taught me a lot. It opened up my eyes and made me realize details I was not aware of. First, Jaffer’s father was named Abed and he was fairly young, around his young twenties when this all occurred. Jaffer began by telling me about his father’s life in Palestine when he was little. Abed’s childhood didn’t consist of too many things; he and his family did whatever it took to survive. Once Abed became a teenager, he began working right away to help his family. Eventually Abed and his family were financially stable enough to afford to move to a better location. They choose to move to Jordan, so Abed, his sister, and parents all moved to Jordan where Abed and his father both found decent paying jobs. This brought the whole family some happiness after such a rough life in Palestine. Two years after living in Jordan, everything seemed perfect. Their lives were finally coming together: Abed’s sister was going to school, his mother was a stay at home mom, and his father and Abed were making enough to support their family and be happy. A turn of events caused things to go downhill for them though. It began with the bankruptcy of the company that Abed and his father worked for, which resulted in Abed’s sister having to drop out of school. This put their family in a very tight situation because they had no income, bills to pay, and Abed and his father still needed to put food on the table. This resulted in Abed and his father, the men of the house, to venture out to an unknown land, the United States of America. Abed and his father left Jordan to find a better future in the U.S., with the goal to find jobs, become financially stable, and with time eventually bring his mom and sister to the U.S. as well.

            Once Abed and his father got to the U.S., they rented a tiny room to live in while they figured out their situation. So, every day they would wake up, have a slice of toast each and head out to try to find a job. Abed’s English was a lot better than his father’s, thus giving him an advantage in his job search. Also every night, Abed would stay up late to read about how to start a business. Eventually they both find factory jobs and began saving money. A couple of months later, out of nowhere, Abed’s father suffered a fatal heart attack. Abed is now left in a foreign land alone, almost out of food, money, and worst of all now, without his father. Abed was devastated at first, but realized that he needed to pick himself up, for the sake of his family. He remembered why he ventured all the way to U.S., because of his mom and sister. He used the love he had for his family to motivate him to succeed. He didn’t want to let his mom and sister down, and definitely not his father, so Abed gave 200% every single day at whatever he was doing.

            It has been two in half years now since Abed got to America and a full year since his father died. Abed managed to get a second job, and for the past year Abed probably slept 2-4 hours at night because he was determined to open his own business. The third year was coming to a close and Christmas was approaching. Abed’s hard work eventually paid off since he managed to bring his sister and mom to the U.S. mid December. His sister and mom both started working right away, his mom was cleaning houses and his sister was working as a secretary since her English was pretty good from going to school in Jordan. Abed’s sister and mom made Abed quit his second job so he could start going to school and follow his dream to open his own business.

            Today, Abed owns his own limousine/car rental business. His family is comfortably stable. I personally know Abed because of my little league teammate Jaffer. Abed is one of the men I hold my upmost respect for because of everything he did and went through just to succeed in order for his family to live a comfortable life style. The moral of the story is when you feel like giving up, think to yourself about the reason why you started.

 This is my housemate Sean. Sean is a current Rutgers Business School student who is very well informed in current events, politics and the new presidency. He will be voicing his opinion on what will happen to the relationship between the U.S. and the Middle East now that Trump is president.