On War & Immigration:

I think people should know that immigrants leave their countries because of war and no jobs. Immigrants come here to get a good education and have a better life. Many immigrants wouldn’t leave their countries if there were not war in their countries; the reason they leave their country is because of war. War is not a good thing for people because war makes a lot of separation. I think we should be peaceful and respect people. The bad thing about immigration is that after every family gets to the U.S., they leave part of their family back in their home country. When war comes around, nobody asks each other where you should hide to save your life. That’s how separation happens in war. People who get here with all of their family are lucky.

Autobiographical Writing:

Who I Was Before I Came to the U.S.

This is what happened in my life and to my family. When I was in Somalia, I was in a bad situation. I didn’t have good education to support my life over there. I didn’t have any right to think about school because it cost a lot of money. In my family, only my mom was working and we were three brothers. Our mom wasn’t making enough money, so there was no way for all of us to go to school. We didn’t have free food. To get food, we had to start a farm. The biggest problem was when our farm had a lot of food, bad people came to our house and demanded everything we had at the farm. They would take it away and if you tried to say no, they would shoot you. Our mom had to deal with all of these problems. She still tells today us how life over there in Somalia wasn’t easy.

In Somalia, you could not hang out after 6pm because there was a lot of killing going on. When I was in Africa, I was always afraid of going outside at night. The government doesn’t care about you even if you get killed. What is happening is that if you kill somebody and the police find you, they are going to arrest you but you are not going to be in jail forever because your family will collect money and pay the police. Then the police will let you out. The government doesn’t really care. If your family is poor and you can’t pay, you just stay until they make another deal. The government is very corrupt.

Despite the violence and corruption, my friends and I always played soccer. It was difficult for us because we were playing soccer on the ground with no shoes on, but we played anyway. The field we used to play soccer on was without grass. We used to play like that. My friends and I were on the same team, but we were just playing without a coach or captain. Furthermore, we didn’t play with a real soccer ball; it was something we created by ourselves. We started making it with rubber bands and then rope. We just tied them together and made a soccer ball in Somalia.

I was lucky to live in Somalia with my family. No one in my family got killed. My family immigrated to America in 2004. We moved to Tucson and we have been living here ever since.

Who I Am Now

What I am now. I am a very happy person because I have a happy life. I don’t have to worry about life and death from war. I am getting a free education, free physicals and free food. What I need to think about is to study to have a good life in my future. I am proud of my life because I am getting a lot of help to reach my goal. I see a lot of differences in my life. I feel like I am a free person. I am still in high school, but soon I will go to college. I need to improve my education because education is the key in the world.

The big difference about my soccer sport is that I didn’t play soccer in a team before but I am on a team now. I now enjoy playing in a soccer league in Tucson. I am playing Catalina High School boy’s soccer also. I have a lot of friends and on Saturday and Sunday I like to spend time with them playing video games, playing soccer, going to restaurants together, watching TV, and watching movies together. Here I am now. I am not afraid about anything at all because everything is different from my country. I am happy to be here.

Who Will I Be in the Future?

What do I want be in the future? I want be the best soccer player in the world but before that I need to learn more languages so I can travel to Europe to live there. I need to get married and have a big family. I want be a rich man so I can help a lot of poor people who are in a bad situation. I want to go back to my homeland to defend my country and make a new rule that the people should be equal. I need education to support my family. I want be a hero.

I want to be a doctor in my family so my children don’t have to go to the hospital. I want to go back to Somalia and make a new law. I want for the Somali people to stop fighting. I would also like to be the president of Somalia. I want to change everything. I want to create new things in Somalia and open new programs so everybody can be equal.

I want to be an engineer and fix my own car so I don’t have to take my car to the garage. I also want to make my own car. I want to make a lot of money to be the richest man in the world. I want be a business man. I want to be strong for the rest of my life. I want to own a big building that has my name on it.

I am proud of myself being a happier person because I don’t have to think about education because I get that for free. I want to see big differences in my life in the future.