1990
It was a balmy July night in Bneid Al-Gar, a neighborhood in Kuwait City overlooking the Persian Gulf. Kuwait could be oppressively hot in the summer but I recall summer evenings being tolerably warm and sometimes nice. I loved Kuwait at night. It seemed like the city lit up (especially during Eid), the lights from modern buildings and towers built in the 1970s and 1980s reflecting off the Gulf.
As my family and I waited for a taxi to take us to the airport, I craned my neck and stared at our apartment building. My family was embarking on a big trip, one that I had enthusiastically fantasized about for weeks. We were visiting my older brother who was attending university in a small town in Southern Illinois. My family had only lived in the flat in Bneid Al-Gar for about a year. This flat was a lot bigger and more modern than the modest apartment in Hawali where I had spent most of my childhood at that point. It was in a fancier part of town, one with a lot of modern high-rise towers catering to “ajaneb” (foreigners).
I kept staring at our building, craning my ten year old neck as hard as I could, to get a glimpse of our flat at the very top. I was proud of our building — full of large windows throughout. It struck me as fancy. I’d spend hours perched on the back of our couch staring out of those windows. From one side of our living room, I could stare out at the American flag marking the American Embassy, with the Kuwait Towers and Persian Gulf behind it off in the distance. From our perspective on the top floor, we could even make out the times when the Embassy had various functions. The other side of our living room faced a large fancy complex of high-rise towers that were still partially in development. We could even see their pool and I envied a man who regularly swam there. I wondered what it was like to be an American or Westerner living in Kuwait. Their lives seemed so much more glamorous than ours with Embassy parties and swimming pools in apartment complexes.
I don’t know why that night I had spent so much time staring at our building. But I’m glad I did it for it was the last time I’d ever see it.
A couple of weeks after our arrival in Illinois (on August 2, 1990, to be exact), Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in an invasion no one saw coming and that changed the course of my family’s life. Like the nearly 400,000 Palestinians living in Kuwait at the time, we were unable to return to our life in Kuwait and sought political asylum in the United States.
There was a time shortly after the invasion where my parents assured me that this will all be over within a few days … maybe a few weeks. We watched in horror the footage coming out of Kuwait on CNN. As we watched footage of Iraqi troops and tanks making their way into the center of Kuwait City, we saw them nearing the Kuwait Towers and the American Embassy. The view I had spent hours admiring from our flat was now that of a war zone.
As the days ticked by, it became clear that we wouldn’t be able to return. We’d need to start a new life in America. As a family of five (my brother was 21 and my sister was 18 at the time), we made the best we could of my brother’s two bedroom apartment. My parents worked on our immigration case, while also attempting to unsuccessfully retrieve their assets and belongings from a war zone. My sister would attend university alongside my brother in Southern Illinois, accepting that none of her credits from her freshman year at Kuwait University would transfer.
And I would attend the nearby public elementary school as a fifth grader.
A fifth grader who had studied some English in school in Kuwait but couldn’t actually understand anything that was being said.
My English fluency was limited to, “My name is Noor. Do you want to play game?” In reality, these two sentences sounded more like, “My [pause] name is Noor. [pause] Do you [pause] want [pause] to play [pause] game?” as my ten year old brain searched for a short list of English vocabulary that up to that point I hadn’t had a reason to use.
At some point in Kuwait (I’m guessing in the late 1960s or mid 1970s), international schools became popular with Kuwait’s affluent middle class of expatriates, especially those hailing from non-Arab countries. These schools taught their curriculum almost exclusively in English and operated like some of the best private schools in the West. Some of my cousins had attended these schools and became fluent in English at an early age. My parents were more traditional in their approach to education and instead opted for my siblings and I to attend a strict Arabic Catholic school that was run by Lebanese nuns. Coursework was difficult and demanding. The nuns and teachers were stern and to be feared. Oddly enough, the New English School was across the street from my school. Every time both of our schools let out for the day, I’d watch English-speaking kids across the street and envy them with their preppy Western uniforms, their Western extracurricular activities, and what I imagined to be a more cosmopolitan curriculum.
But as much as I fancied the international schools of Kuwait, the idea of attending a real American school in the heartland frightened me. I didn’t speak the language. I didn’t understand the culture. Heck, half the time I didn’t even understand where we were. St. Louis? Illinois? Missouri? Edwardsville? The idea of living in a state or in a metropolitan area outside a major city (and across two states) was foreign to a kid who grew up in a country the size of a postage stamp. I lived in a country called Kuwait and a city called Kuwait. That was it — there was nothing more to it.
About a week or so before school started, my family and I visited the elementary school that I’d attend that year. Even though I was ten, I had already completed fifth grade the prior year in Kuwait. Given my age and my need to learn the language, the administration thought it best that I repeat fifth grade so that I could be in a classroom with other children my age. They also assigned me to Mrs. K.’s* classroom. We met Mrs. K. that day and she seemed warm. I don’t remember what was said that day (you know because of the whole not understanding the language thing) but I do recall a lot of assurances on both sides. Looking back now, I wonder if Mrs. K. was surprised to see an entire family of five (including their adult children) visiting a school together to enroll their youngest daughter. If she had any hesitation or qualms about teaching an ESL kid or concerns about an immigrant family living in her community, she didn’t show it. I genuinely don’t think she did because the kindness and respect she showed my family that day and throughout that school year can’t be faked.
My first day of school was a half day and even in that short amount of time there were clear signs that everything about my new school was going to be different from my old school in Kuwait. Mrs. K. was warm and kind to each child, some of whom knew her already. There were plenty of hugs all around. I don’t ever recall hugging a teacher in Kuwait. Most kids seemed to even know the principle and eagerly waved to him when we’d pass him by at recess. I knew very little about my principle in Kuwait, other than to fear her and every other authority figure in the school.
At my new school, each student sat at a desk that popped open so you could keep some of your supplies and books at school. Even though we had a homeroom in my school in Kuwait, it was just that — a place I’d go to attend my classes. It wasn’t a place for me to nest or feel at home. I loved popping my desk open — it felt very American. I must have seen it done before in an American movie or TV show.
The desks in Mrs. K.’s classroom were arranged in pods of four. That first day of school, Mrs. K. led me to a pod of desks where I sat across from Melissa, a sassy black girl, and Shannon, a working class white girl with large red framed glasses (think Sally Jessy Raphael) that took up half her face. I don’t recall the fourth kid who sat in our pod or if the seat next to me sat empty (sorry fourth kid). When Mrs. K. introduced me to the girls, I recall Melissa sitting back in her chair confidently and Shannon leaning forward as her eyes grew big when she learned I came from another country. And not any country but that country Kuwait that was on the news all the time.
Most of our first day was consumed by an assignment designed for our teacher to get to know us. We were each handed a white lunch bag with a list of questions that had been pasted to the front. The questions were the type of conversation starters any ten year old would appreciate. Favorite color? Favorite food? Favorite animal? Hobbies? A 1980s cartoon cat (wearing a prerequisite 1980s sweatband atop his head) sat at the top of the sheet of paper, ready for us to color.
I used a lot of pastels.
At the bottom of the list of questions, there was one question that I do clearly remember: my goal for the school year. I wrote that I wanted to learn English. But I didn’t need that list of questions to help me reflect on that goal. I already knew coming to school that day that I wanted to become fluent in English by the end of the year. In fact, it was something I obsessed about and saw as a giant obstacle in my way. A shortcoming I needed to overcome. Something I needed to work hard at.
Melissa and Shannon immediately adopted me as their friend. They wanted to help me learn how things worked in our school, how to navigate the building, and where to sit at lunch (clearly with them). They were both kind and sweet to me for no apparent reason (remember I barely spoke any English at the time) other than they had decided that day that I’d be their friend.
If someone tried to bully me (a rare occurrence that year), they would both (Melissa in particular) come to my rescue, defending me from the offending party. A few months into the school year, a girl took me to task for not being in Kuwait to defend “my country.” A young male relative of hers (a brother? a cousin?) was being deployed as part of the American troops that led Operation Desert Storm. Melissa and Shannon were quickly there to tell her to knock it off. How does a ten year old explain to another ten year old that the country you were born in (that you loved and saw as your home) isn’t your country and doesn’t want you back? I couldn’t and I didn’t. The geopolitical complexities of being a Palestinian born in Kuwait were hard enough for me to understand, let alone to explain to a Midwestern kid with a limited worldview.
Math was my favorite subject that year … partially because I had always liked math up to that point and partially because it didn’t involve learning a new language. Math was a universal language. It also helped that I had learned the same material the year prior in Kuwait as a fifth grader. I felt smart as I quickly breezed through all the material that I already knew. There were some benefits to repeating the year in the US.
In Kuwait, my classmates and I all wore uniforms to school. In Illinois, we could wear whatever we wanted to school. Some boys who were fans of Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer modeled their hair cuts after them, shaving lines and sometimes intricate designs into their hair. I remember Mrs. K. admiring one boy’s new haircut one day. I couldn’t imagine the Lebanese nuns that ran my school in Kuwait tolerating that kind of personal expression. In the winter months, they’d throw a fit if you wore a sweater over your uniform that wasn’t the correct prescribed shade of navy blue. Dare to wear a light blue sweater over your uniform? Off you go to the principle’s office.
Reading was something Mrs. K. heavily emphasized that year. We’d regularly have reading time every week. Mrs. K. allowed us to read whatever we wanted and we could sit wherever and however we wanted, as long as we spent the time quietly reading. She even allowed us to sit under our desks while we read, a favorite position for most of us.
As much as I loved reading time and the whimsy of being encouraged to sit under my desk, reading time initially brought me anxiety and embarrassment. For my first reading time book, I had checked out a Baby-Sitters Club book from our school’s library. If we had a school library in Kuwait, I don’t remember it or even being allowed to borrow anything from it. Meanwhile in Illinois, not only did we have a school library but an amazing public library in town with an entire basement floor dedicated to kids books. I fondly remember spending hours on Saturdays with my brother checking out piles of books (and a lot of Garfield comic books).
I don’t remember exactly how I had learned of the Baby-Sitters Club books. I may have seen other girls in my class pick them (or possibly through a recommendation from Melissa and Shannon). I was intrigued by the illustrated covers and the idea of children my age being independent enough to run a business in their small town. But the book that I had borrowed was far too difficult for me to read. I spent that very first reading time staring at the English words and trying to make sense of them.
I didn’t understand anything that was on the page.
Later that afternoon when I came home, I told my sister about what had happened — that I couldn’t read my book or understand any of it. She calmed me down and then proceeded to read it to me, all while translating the English and cultural references that I didn’t understand. We decided that it was a bit too soon for me to read the Baby-Sitters Club books and that I needed some easier books to start with. We picked out several children’s picture books for me to take to school. I remember being anxious and embarrassed about reading a picture book designed for children much younger than me. When I pulled out my book, I worried that the other kids would make fun of me for reading such a baby book. But no one did, I even remember one girl (possibly Shannon) smiling at me and telling me how much she liked reading the story I was reading. I breathed a sigh of relief.
Several months later, I was eventually able to check out that same Baby-Sitters Club book and be able to read it and understand it all by myself. I was so proud.
Mrs. K. would also spend time reading to us every week. I really enjoyed this time with Mrs. K. because she was a great animated narrator. Her voice would go high and speed up at critical points in a story and go low as she read the voices of malicious characters. I can still picture her reading Matilda to us.
Our school participated in the Book It! program, where we tracked how many pages of reading we had accomplished. Mrs. K. would sign our Book It! tracker for the time we spent reading in school and our parents would sign the tracker for the time we spent reading at home. After reading so many pages, we’d earn a free personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut! I remember the first pizza I had earned and going to our local Pizza Hut with my brother to pick up my pizza. I felt so independent and very special for I was the only one in my family with my very own free personal pan pizza.
Along with reading, we also spent a lot of time playing games and being creative in the classroom. One day we played hangman together, a game I wasn’t familiar with and that Mrs. K. and the other kids in the classroom taught me how to play. When it was my turn to guess a letter, I said excitedly, “ITCH.”
Itch? Nobody understood what I was saying. I kept repeating myself several times until Mrs. K. finally recognized the letter I was trying to guess. “Oh, you mean aiyyytch,” she said as she elongated the H sound in her nasal Midwestern accent (an accent that I too now have).
I spent months after that day correcting my own pronunciation of H in my head. “Aiyyytch. Aiyyytch. Aiyytch,” I’d think to myself over and over again until it became a permanent part of my pronunciation.
Before I knew it, I quickly became fluent in English and sounded “American.” My vocabulary was still limited, my reading was slow (I’m still a slow reader compared to my English native speaking friends), and my writing was atrocious. But I could understand everything that was being said in the classroom, I could read my tests without crying because I didn’t understand the words, and I could communicate with my teacher and classmates.
I was so proud. It was the first big goal that I had set out to accomplish in my short life.
I have such fond memories of my first year of school in America, much of which are thanks to Mrs. K.’s kindness. Mrs. K. ran her classroom in sharp contrast to the way my teachers ran their classrooms in Kuwait. Mrs. K. showed me that children could have loving relationships with the authority figures and adults around them without fearing them. She showed me that school could be fun and a place where creativity could be nurtured. Most of all she showed me that school could be a place where kids could be kids.
As much I enjoyed school that year and as much fun as I had, my first year in the United States wasn’t without anguish. My family’s financial situation was dire at best. I remember the distress on my father’s face that August as we purchased my school supplies from Kmart. For as long I had remembered, the two of us had a weekly tradition on Wednesday nights (at the time in Kuwait weekends were observed on Thursdays and Fridays) where he’d buy me art supplies and toys, rarely saying no to anything I had asked for. As I watched him penny pinch over markers and crayons in that Kmart, it dawned on me that we were now poor. Along with worrying about learning English, I also worried about our immigration status. I didn’t understand all the steps we had to take so we could stay in America for good. I remember my dad spending hours typing an “affidavit”, a word I didn’t understand but quickly learned held the key to our situation. I didn’t understand all the meetings we had to attend with our legal aid lawyer or why the US government needed my fingerprints. I couldn’t wait until we’d earn our American citizenship, a dream that became a reality for me a decade later in December 2000.
There’ a narrative that some Americans ascribe to: immigrants come to this country, drain our resources, and steal our jobs. I can see one of these folks reading my story and having a similar reaction. I got free public education from the State of Illinois from fifth to twelfth grade, with a fifth grade teacher who spent far more of her time and efforts with me than with other students. My undergraduate degree at Southern Illinois was free — I cobbled together federal and state grants, along with two scholarships. I paid for my graduate education at Michigan through a combination of federal and private loans, a scholarship for one year from my program, and a graduate student instructor position I had for a semester.
Yes, I benefited from the generosity of federal and state governments. But what these folks don’t realize is that the process of being an immigrant in America doesn’t have a clear beginning and a clear end. You’re not afforded special opportunities merely for being an immigrant. It’s not like you land in this country and you’re awarded jobs and free money at the airport. Immigrants are given the same opportunities that these same Americans are given. But rather than squandering them, immigrants latch on to every bit of good fortune they receive because they don’t have any other options.
I struggled and persevered for a long time. It wasn’t just that first year. Every year I was in school was an exercise in patience and perseverance. Some years were easier; some were harder.
But I didn’t have a choice. I had nothing to fall back on. I didn’t have another country. I needed to make it work here.
My exact goal for my life changed and morphed as I grew up, learned more about myself, and learned more about what the world offered. But at its core, my goal was always to be independent, financially secure, and in control of my own destiny.
Much like how I had imagined the lives of those Americans and Westerners I watched from our living room window in Kuwait.
*Note: I’ve changed all names in this story.
