I Like Your Goals: Why I Am From Somalia And My Family

My parents have taught me getting a college degree will be my way out of struggling with finances. A college degree is something that no one can take away from me. I want to be able to help my family and community to be more financially stable by helping them learn how to increase their wealth. The next reason why is for young girls who live in small foreign countries outside of the United States and do not have the opportunity to get an education. I am doing it for them because they are not given the chance too. Another reason that I am pursuing an

“No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark” this quote by  Warsan Shire

Am I black? Am I not? Am I Eritrean? Or am I an American? What am I? Who am I? Who is Abebba Araya? I constantly asked myself these questions. Why is it to certain people that I am black, yet to some I am not? My entire existence in this world has been very ironic. However, I now know who I am as a person; I am a second-generation American of Eritrean descent. I am both an American and Eritrean, yet I am not black. An emphasis on the and, which I realized exists between these two cultures and incorporating both of them into my lifestyle.

My primary goal for going to school is to be able to make my family proud and do something beneficial with my degree.

Nowadays there a quite a lot of people that postpone things such as careers, marriages, and children until after they are in their 30s. Not too long ago, it was normal for people to start a marriage and having kids at about 16 years of age. It is also very common for most people to further their education by going to college now, which can also postpone things such as marriage, children, and careers. The problem with this is that people think that because they are in college and having a good time that they are not yet able to settle down, have kids, and have a career. Although this seems to be the problem, there are plenty of people who are married, have kids and are going to college at the same time and making it. College and furthering of education should not be something that becomes a barrier to living life. One way to solve this problem is by being open-minded. Do something that adds value to who you are and don’t let the little things stop you from doing what you want to, especially while you are in your

Everything that I desire hinges upon the quality and depth of my education. Completing high school is merely the beginning of a much longer journey during which I will receive an enormous

America is a great place. It is filled with hope, dreams, love, and success. Immigrant families choose to come over to America because of those reasons. These families have the American Dream in mind. One particular group that comes to the United States is the Somali Refugees. The Somali Refugees see America as their second chance and lucky them, America is able to give it to them. There is one problem though. Many Americans are not willing to contribute or agree to help the Somali Refugee population. Somali Refugees go through a lot all because of their culture and Americans should help them feel welcomed and wanted here.

I am motivated by my dreams, being more success and also living a better life. In the great words of Nelson Mandela “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world’’. So it’s very important to be ahead in life and for me to be focus of my career goals and what I want to accomplish. College also gives you great experience in the fields and real life training, college can also enhance skills set on computers and areas of work that high school didn’t teach you, so it’s important for me to get the education I need. A degree also can provide me with promotions in the near future.

As a middle-class Somali-American, I have an identity that very few individuals in the United States have. As a result, I have never fit into a particular group of people. I had not realized this until college because I had always gone to small schools throughout my academic career. From elementary school to high school, I never belonged to a particular group; instead, I associated marginally with all of them due to the small class size. I had created a superficial sense of belonging with a large amount of acquaintances; however, college’s different environment exposed this superficiality immediately.

I am originally from Somalia a country located in the East Africa also called “Horn of Africa”, bordered by Ethiopia, Djibouti and Kenya. I was born and raised in Kenya. However, both my parents were born and rise in Somalia, they went their school in Mogadishu, Somalia, and built their family there. Five of my siblings, we were born in Mogadishu Somalia, but unfortunately, they did not had the opportunity to experience them early childhood in Somalia. In a brief history the Republic of Somalia has had its ups and downs with unrest, starting with a war, which broke out in the early 90’s. With these conflicts came unbearable life situations and many people searched for opportunities all over the world, mainly the western continents.

I have worked hard through my education and extracurriculars in order to attend a university which will give me the best connections and opportunities to propel me forward. I want to start my own business because I enjoy creating, delegating, and having a leadership role in whatever I am involved in. I want to be financially stable enough to help my family and still travel the world. I want to continue being involved in community service in my college education and into my future. I also desire to have a career in which I make enough money to help and donate to the underprivileged people of the world. After doing all of this I want to start a family and design my own home. I love interior designing, decorating, and organizing and this is something that I really look forward to in my future. I want to raise children who are not only educated in terms of academics, but also educated in the problems of the world like racism, sexism, wars, etc, and how to help these problems. I want to help raise a better future generation. That is my overall American Dream. I believe attending college will be the starting point for my American Dream. It will allow me to gain more experience and skills in terms of businesses which will later help me start one of my own. It will allow me to connect with others and gain a more unbiased view of the world. Attending college will provide me with a

Located on the Horn of Africa, Somalia is a small country colonized in the late 1880s by Britain, Italy and France. In the 1960s, Somalia gained its independence but remained a very unstable place. In 1969, a group overthrew the government and Mohammed Siad Barre, the general of the group, became Somalia’s president and dictator until 1991.

As I endured the prospect of creating a genogram, I allowed myself to reflect and interpret the history and impacts that affected my family. During my review of my genogram, I was able to consider my family within a multigenerational, diverse, and socio-political context. By creating a genogram, a dialogue was started within my head and with my partner about which family traits, issues, strengths, and resiliencies made me who I am today. Subsequently, this dialogue made me aware that being raised in a small family has many advantages along with some disadvantages when acquiring information about influences and the history of preceding generations. Consequently, I did not have to contend with many conflicting recollections but I did have to rely mostly on my own memory, public records, and journals to piece together my genogram. Although all things discovered and recollected are not always fortunate on the surface, they subsist as basis to my personal resilience and strength as a gay man.

Growing up, my parents have been my inspiration. Back in 1999, my family made the tough decision to leave Algeria during the civil war. The country was in turmoil and my parents wanted to escape to the United States. My mother was fortunate enough to be picked for Visa’s for the entire family. I remember my mom holding me in her arms, hearing her heart beat fast, and listening to the small prayers she would whisper. She brought me a government building in the capital, Algiers. My mother had the idea that if she brought youngest child it would increase her chance in the Visa lottery draw. At the time, the Algerian government was giving out a handful of visas to Algerian citizens. The room was silent while people were waiting for their family

Amid this civil war, countless Somalis were internally displaced and put out of work, while numerous others fled in search of food