Immigrant life

PREFACE
This book is dedicated to my parents who made the utmost
sacrifice and supported me in my journey to the United
States at the age of 15. Without my two loving parents, I
would not be where I am today, and I owe my life to them.
A special thanks goes to my brother who has shown me the
true spirit of American exceptionalism, by setting up his
own social network and then moving cross-country to
California and then back to New York. He has strived to
become a successful person and, in my eyes, has
accomplished more than any average person would as an
immigrant with no help or push by anyone but himself.
Lastly, I want to thank my new wife, whom I love very
much, and I thank her for being there for me in the past 16
months of our new journey as a married couple.

CHAPTER 1
This journey begins with me in the small and impoverished
3rd country known as Albania in its capital Tirana as a
skinny 7th grader known for keeping to himself and being
socially awkward at times.
My middle school was built in the 1960s. Its Dictator at the
time, Enver Hoxha, wanted his fellow countrymen to be as
literate as possible and he instituted strict laws against
illiteracy. As a result of his policies, most Albanians, 97%
of them to be exact became literate through mandatory
schooling up until the 12th grade. This is by far is the
greatest achievement of a man that brings hatred and vile
comments by most Albanians. People used to say that he
did one thing right and that was the fact that he adhered to
Marxist ideals of communism and treated everyone the

same. We were all poor, used to say my grandmother, God
rest her soul, and none of us had enough food to eat.
People that lived in the countryside were luckier in the
sense that they would grow their own crops and had
livestock however our "dear" dictator fixed that problem by
creating municipal cooperatives that would allot each
family a portion of their livestock and fruits and vegetables.
Grandma used to say that people were so hungry that they
looked like shades of their former selves.
My dad tells me to this day that it was really challenging
for him and my mother to raise me and my brother.
Everything was rationed and families could only get a
ration of cheese and butter, eggs and bread. Milk was hard
to get, and people were forced to ger up at 4am and stay in
line for milk. Meat was rationed and families were given
just enough to get through the week. The system believed

that people should be lean and strong and always ready to
work for the system because their lives should be dedicated
to the prosperity of the communist system.
A great example of communism is modern day China
where the government controls all aspects of the country's
economic and political system. This country is well known
for its 1.3 billion people that live there and how it’s one
child policy has sparked great concerns from human rights
organizations. The Chinese are well known for being
secretive and isolated however they have done some things
right. They opened their country in the early 1990s to the
world and let people come in and out of the country. It is
their belief that this will help their system and it has helped
them tremendously. China's economy is strong, and they
have made leaps and bounds in technological
advancements. It is rumored that the Chinese are good at
stealing trade secrets from other advanced countries such as

the United States however rumors are not substantiated and
therefore 3shall remain as such.
My poor country of 3 million people did not advance when
it finally broke out of the 50-year-old Communist regime,
but it did the opposite. It sunk itself into the deep ends of
corruption and for the last 30 years its ha struggled to
contain its citizens from exiting the country. When I ask
my countrymen the simple question of why they left the
country, the answer is simple: cannot sustain ourselves.
There are a multitude of issues and concerns that plague it
and we can go down the line but the most important one is
job security. The country is marred in total corruption from
the head of the government to the local government. It
seems that the current Prime Minister is trying to fix the
ship however there are many problems. People complain
about food security and life security which are fundamental

rights that every person should be afforded under the
United Nations Convention of Rights for Man.
However this book is more about my experience as an
immigrant in the United States than it is about my old
country so I have to move forward and tell my story
because it is one that resonates with millions of people that
have left their homes in search for a better life.

CHAPTER 2
When I was a young boy probably around 8 years old, my
father told me a saying that I will never forget "grab life by
the horns". This is a phrase that has stood with me
throughout my formative years into my late 30s as I write
this book.
Dad came from a small village in the South of Albania and
he is the definition of suturing to be successful. From the
age of 10, when his father passed away, he was forced to
move into the city and dorm there for his formative years.
He excelled in middle and high school and was given an
extremely hard to get position that involved supervising the
construction of secret government buildings all over the
country. He is proud to say that with hard work everything

is possible, and he sowed the fruits of his labor by buying a
3-bedroom apartment and a 2-bedroom apartment after the
fall of communism.
He was always a mover and shaker so to speak and sought
after every opportunity to make money after 1990. At first,
there was the Libyan embassy and how they asked him to
build an extending of the original embassy then came the
Egyptian embassy and them asking him to build a facade
around the walls of the embassy.
However, the one job that really struck me was the one
with the American entrepreneur. His name was Bennett and
he came from California. I had only heard of the United
States up until that point but never met a person from the
states. He was tall, lanky probably in his late 40s with an
Albanian woman by his side who served as his interpreter
and I found out later, also his mistress. The man exhumed

confidence in his words and he invited me and my younger
brother to his offices in the capital several times during that
first-year dad worked for him.
I remember vividly his office and the ornaments that this
man possessed. He was in love with westerns and a huge
Clint Eastwood fan. He had Cd's of western theme songs
that he gave me and my brother as a gift and we would play
the music in our CD player that dad brought from his
business trip to Switzerland. The music was so upbeat and
joyous that I started to imagine what it was like for these
people to live in these deserted towns as cowboys. Back
then the TV would only play Italian TV and German TV,
so I had no way of playing these western movies that I had
heard of and saw in newspapers.
The fun fact about Bennett’s mistress was that her name
was Mandela like the Nelson Mandela of South Africa. She

was this pretty brunette with blue eyes and an incredible
figure. I remember her and Bennett coming over for dinner
one time and the conversations that she would translate to
my father about the United States and how big and
powerful it was. But as a child one thing piqued my
curiosity and that was the shape of her breasts. Now you
would say why would a 11-year-old year have those kinds
of feelings but then I would ask you to go back in time and
ungainly your 11-year-old selves in the presence of a
gorgeous woman. She studied Political Science in the
United States and that's where she nets Bennett as she
applied for an internship in his company in California.
This man had a family back in the states and two teenage
sons and a pretty wife so I always wondered later about the
reason that he would leave his family behind and build a
company in the third world country known as Albania. The
reason was simple, and I realized years after that it is

simply greed. This man had amassed a fortune back home,
but he wanted to expand his construction business and get
to experience life in a place like mine. It didn't hurt that he
had this young lady with him at every step and she looked
full of energy and just happiness.
I remember the one time when I completely spaced out in
Geography class and started looking outside the window.
At that moment of time I thought of what life would be like
in a new country with different people and traditions. I
clutched my classmates’ hand as she was seating next to me
and leaned forward to give her a kiss in the cheek. The
teacher looked petrified as though I had completely lost my
mind and scolded me right then and there. She muttered the
words "what is wrong either you" and asked me to go to the
principal's office. This was the first time as an 8th grader
that I got in trouble at school. I was suspended for a day for
an indecent act as the administrator told me and spent the

day home listening to the radio and songs from the west. It
was the year 1996 and Albania was just beginning to
unravel both politically and economically.
In 1996, my country started getting engulfed in what are
known as pyramidal schemes. This was a simple
transaction and it involved giving money to a person that
represented the company and a month later you would get
your money back with 50% interest. Practically all
Albanians took their savings, and some sold their houses
and put their money in these schemes. Even my parents did
the same and lost quite a bit of money in these schemes. I
remember my aunt sold her apartment and lost everything
in one of these companies. She was completely distraught
and just melted down.
My aunt is the one that raised me from the age of 5 until
about 13 years old. My parents took her in because they

needed a babysitter and couldn't trust that many people
with raising us. She came from the South and was quite
pretty. She has long black hair and brown eyes with nice
features. I remember the guys in the neighborhood used to
whistle and try to get her attention while she walked in the
street.
My dad had a higher position in the government and as
such was able to secure her a position in the Secret Service
as we call it in Albania. She found herself with that job and
dedicated herself. I saw a big difference in her as she would
come home with her 9mm and her badge. She looked
happy and had a purpose in life. A few years later she met
her husband and shortly after got married and moved out of
our apartment.
In 1997 Albania was completely emerged in a Civil War as
a result of the failure of these pyramid schemes. Albanians

were in complete uproar and they couldn't take it anymore.
They took to the streets and demanded a change to the
government. They expressed their disappointment in the
government's inability to stop these pyramidal schemes and
broke down arms depots. Armed with AK-47s and all kinds
of armaments they erratically took to the streets and started
shooting at each other.
This was the bloodiest moment in our country's short
history after communism as thousands of innocent people
lost their lives. I remember the bullets flying everywhere in
March of 1997 as the country went in complete chaos. All
that you heard in the streets were bullets and screams and
to this day I will never forget those moments.
Things got much worse before they would get any better as
many people decided they had enough and took to the
embassies and tried to escape the country in any way

possible. It was then in October of 1997 that tragedy hit. A
group of immigrants from a seaport city in the South took
to the high seas to try to seek refuge in Italy. Little did they
know that their journey would be short-lived.
The Italian government at first did not take full
responsibility for its actions. However much later the world
realized that a navy ship had hit the vessel filled with
hundreds of Albanians as it crossed to the Italian side and
to the dismay of these poor people, it sunk the ship. Close
to a thousand people lost their lives that day in the tragedy
of Otranto as it is now known.
I started playing basketball at the age of 13 as a way for my
father to know that I was safe and secure from all the
turmoil that was happening in the streets at that moment of
time. I loved the game and still due to this day because of
its complexity and the speed at which it is played. I became

good at the offensive side of the court as they called me the
3-point haymaker. I used to shoot down these 3 pointers
with so much ease and loved the game.
However, my downside was my defense as its lack of it. I
couldn't play it as good as the others and I was relegated to
the bench on game days. However, I loved the experience
and everything that came with these guys that I played
with. They were good to me and even though we all knew
that I would never amount to anything in the basketball
world, they treated me with respect, and I did the same.
We loved to have outings as a team and enjoyed playing
video games in the arcades that popped up all over the city.
We would spend hours playing pinball or Mario Kart and I
truly enjoyed my time with my teammates.

The person that I felt really connected to be my middle
uncle from mom's side. Every time I would go visit him in
the countryside, he would take me to the wheat fields, and
we would talk about life and things that I couldn't really ask
my parents.
My uncle became like a second father to me and I was
distraught when I found out that he was involved in a fight
because someone had hit his cousin. The consequences
were severe because the other person hit him with a rock on
the back of his head and as a result, he became epileptic.
From that moment on, he changed and became aggressive
and was not easy to control. My uncles and father had a
hard time trying to hold him down while he was having one
of those episodes. The uncle I knew was not there anymore
and he transitioned into a person that I didn't recognize.
One memory that I'm found of was when he asked me if I
had a girlfriend and then taught me how to approach

women. I will never forget those bonding moments with
him till the day I die.
Things with my cousins were never good because there was
always a sense of envy that I lived in the capital and they
lived in the countryside. I have many cousins from my
mom's and dad's sides, but I never really felt connected to
any of them. They would say that I wasn't agile enough
every time I would go to the hills with them and just
despised me in the true sense of the word. I felt
disconnected from them and had a sense of uneasiness
whenever I was around them.
The year that everything came together for me was 1998
which was when I lost the dearest person to me besides my
parents and brother.

My grandmother from dad's side was always loving and
caring and I felt good when I was around her. She used to
tell me stories about my late grandfather and how he fought
in World War 2 against the Germans and Italians. She
described him as a short but muscular man with thick
eyebrows and broad shoulders.
She would tell me stories of how grandpa would always
have his two border patrol dogs with him. These were no
ordinary dogs but trained military ones. They were a
mixture of German Shepherd with Pitbull and were scary
looking. Grandpa would always have them chained up and
he was the only one that would go near them to feed or pet
them.
The one story that I would never forget is how one time
when he took his flock of sheep up the mountain he was
surrounded by a pack of wolves and he unleashed his two

dogs. The fight was unlike anything he had ever seen and in
the end of one his dogs lost his life as he tried to protect his
master.
I never really understood how grandpa passed away but I'm
assuming it was from disease. However, I never really
understood the reason and it still bothers me to this day, but
he is in a better place as he had passed long before I was
born.
I got to meet my other grandpa, but he was quiet and did
not have much to speak. He always kept to himself and I
never really got a chance to know him. I always seemed to
connect with him but never did and not sure why.

CHAPTER 3
My grandmother from moms’ side is still alive to this day.
Pushing 90 years old she has started to lose her memory but
at that age it is quite difficult to walk around for her as my
mother tells me. She has been good to me because she has
shown me care and warmth just like all grandmothers do. I
can’t remember having a significant conversation with her
because everyone we would go to the countryside to see
her, she wordless be so busy running errands and cooking
for her large family of 8 children along with grandchildren
and great-grandchildren.
A few years ago, I found that my aunt had passed away
from stomach cancer. My world dropped because she was
relatively young at 50 years old and I was sad because I did
not see her in 20 years and that made me sad. I cried

constantly and could not find any comfort in anyone as my
mother was grieving in her own way.
I got to go to Albania in 2018 a year after aunt’s death and
we went to the cemetery and paid out respects. One thing
that struck me as egregious was the fact that my cousins
had to remove the body from the coffin and clean the
bones. What a harrowing experience it must have been for
them I kept thinking to myself.
When I think of the first girl that I fell in love with one
name comes up, Blerina. She was this cute girl that I went
to primary and secondary school with and we kind of grew
up together. She was someone that I adored and cared for
until one day when I started high school and a friend of
mine invited to a house party.

This was not your ordinary house party. People were
drinking and making out and doing drugs all over. As I
walked around the room both of us opened the door and
long behold there she was. The girl of my dreams was
unmoved as she was my face. She was extremely busy
performing a sex act on one guy while the other one was
doing a different sex act in her back. Later, I found out that
had turned into a different person and enjoyed having sex
with multiple people.
My world was crushed in that moment as I had dreams of
me and her starting a family together when we got older.
Instead I couldn’t shake off the images in my head of her
performing oral sex on a guy while the other one was
giving it to her from the back.
I remember smoking my first cigarette then as an act of
desperation and utterly shocked as to how cruel the world

can be to us. I went to the countryside and spoke to my
uncle and after carefully listening to me all he said was,
these things happen. Here I was waiting for words of
encouragement by him and all he could say was that it will
be.
A pretty sad event that happened to me when I was about 9
years old was when a childhood friend of mine lost his life
at the swimming pool. This was the only Olympic size pool
in the country, and it had three levels of diving boards
where experienced divers would try and home their skills.
Unfortunately for my friend, he thought he had what it took
to dive from the second-floor diving board and instead of
landing in the water he landed on the concrete. It must have
been a pretty gruesome event that I only heard from my
friends and I felt bad and horrible about this tragedy.

When I was about 10 years old, I went to the countryside to
visit grandma and the next-door neighbor was getting
engaged a month later. Little did I know she had a crush on
me and invited me over to her house. She unzipped her
shirt and bra and for the first time in my life I saw boobs.
She had big boobs with pink tits. Next thing I remember
was her putting my head down there and naturally I started
sucking on them. It felt so good I didn’t want to stop. She
then proceeded to unzip my pants and took out my mini
size penis and started fondling it. Then placed it in her
mouth and I ejaculated for the first time in her mouth. The
feeling was surreal, and I didn’t know what to do next. She
swallowed the semen and removed her panties. Then
showed me how to have sex with her by thrusting my body
into hers. This was a magic moment for me, and I will
remember it for the rest of my life.

CHAPTER 4
In 1998, there was a big contingent of religious people that
came from Saudi Arabia. They were mostly missionaries
that preached their religion. I’m guessing they chose
Albania given how poor of a county it was. These folks
were relentless, and they worked day and night to try to
convince Albanians that they should all convert to Islam.
However, they didn’t get the results that they wanted
because Albania was secular for 50 years under the
communist regime and its people were not entirely
religious. I remember growing up we celebrated all the
different religious holidays from Easter to Christmas and
New Year’s. I wasn’t brought up religious, so it didn’t
occur to me that these folks were very serious about their
mission.

My first encounter with them happened at my school lunch
break where I was approached my three of them. They gave
them two notebooks and a pen and told me that I would get
more gifts if I joined their religion. I remember going home
that day and leaving the gifts in the apartment. The next
day they all approached me as I was leaving school and
asked me where the gifts were. I told them I left them home
because they were gifts. After inquiring whether I would
join their religion, they started to threaten me because I told
them I wasn’t interested. A block away from my apartment
building they finally caught up to me and started beating
me with their fists. Thank goodness for my 5th floor
neighbor who saw me and came to intervene because
otherwise I would have ended up in the hospital.
A few days later, my dad woke up earlier than his routine
and found C4 right outside the door. He worked for the

government, so it was easy for him to dismantle the
dynamite.
However, this wasn’t the end of it. A week later we were
away from the apartment and came home and found out
that something had exploded by our doorstep. The neighbor
said that he saw a bunch of bearded guys at our doorstep
and when they left, a big blast was heard. He opened his
door and the material must had exploded leaving the front
door in shambles. I remember dad spending a lot of money
buying one of those heavy-duty security doors that had
three heavy locks in them.
This was a harrowing event that shook me to the core. I
wasn’t sure I wanted to stay there anymore. Fearful for my
life all I kept thinking about was how to escape my gloomy
reality abs leave everything behind. At school all I kept
thinking was of a way to leave the country and my prayers

were answered. My basketball team was invited to
basketball tournament in Chicago and all I had to do was
pass the immigration interview at the US Embassy.
The date was July 3rd if I’m not mistaken and all 10 of us
went to the embassy to see if we could get visas to travel to
the states. Out of 10 players only half the team had their
visas approved and I was one of the lucky five. My father
couldn’t believe his eyes when I told him the news. He has
tears in his eyes and choked up when I told him I was
determined to go. All he kept saying was that I was too
young for such a journey, but I didn’t budge. Close to three
weeks later I was on a plane to Chicago and never looked
back ever since.

CHAPTER 5 (USA)
I arrived in Chicago at the end of July 1998 with a wooden
suitcase and the financial support of my parents back home.
You see mine is not the usual immigrant story where the
person comes with nothing and they try to make it in the
new country. I came from a well-off family that had
everything in its home country but the one thing that we all
humans crave and that is life security. What I mean by that
is that life was not protected in Albania by any means and
the government was not really in the business of helping its
citizens. Instead are politicians were too concerned with
lining up their pockets with as much money as they could,
and corruption was rampant and still is to this day maybe
on a smaller scale.
I remember arriving in Chicago and in awe I was
mesmerized by the big city with bright lights. You see

coming from the capital of Albania did not serve me well
because this was a city that at its peak had close to 700.000
residents back then. Chicago on the other hand is close to 4
times that of Tirana and offered a different perspective on
life.
We arrived at St. Paul University in the outskirts of
Chicago and that is where I stayed for about a week before
embarking on my new journey to Cleveland, Detroit, St.
Louis, Boston, then NYC.
When I arrived in Cleveland, I was greeted by this man in
his 60s that my father wired money to do that he could keep
me in his house. Instead I end up in the basement of the
house with very little lighting and not much else. That first
week in there I admit I cried like a baby because I was not
used to such conditions and a foreign place. To top it off,

the people that I originally stayed with were not exactly
welcoming to say the least.
The family had two children that were all grown up. The
older son was married with a young child. He worked in the
factory making minimum wage. The daughter was my age,
but we never really got along. She was arrogant and not
welcoming which was not what I expected. The father
figure was an airport courier that transported luggage from
the lost and found in the airport to the people’s houses. He
was enamored with his job because he had found peace and
quiet and loved driving and listening to politics on the
radio. After I left them a few years later I found out that he
was deported to Albania with his wife. I did not have any
feelings towards the subject matter because I did not have
permanent resident status and was on an extended tourist
visa.

After I left the first family, my father found a way to come
to the states on a tourist visa and started with me for 6
months. This was truly a much-needed experience and I
loved every moment of that time. We had such a great time
and dad even hired a driver/bodyguard named one eyed
Pete because he had lost his left eye in some sort of freak
accident at work years ago. Us three became close and Pete
took us to so many cool places such as museums, zoos,
different cities and states. I remember one time when my
dad found out that the guys that I stayed with after the first
family had tried to beat me because I didn’t want to do the
laundry and was the dishes. They didn’t like the fact that I
was stubborn and didn’t want to leave the apartment while
they were trying to have sex with their girlfriends. One
time one of them even tried to hurl a VHS cassette at me
and narrowly missed me.

Pete ended up finding that one person and let me tell you he
made him pay. He grabbed him by his neck and then
sprained his wrist. Then he broke his three left fingers just
to tech him a lesson never to mess with me. I was in awe of
Pete’s natural strength as he stood at 6”4 and 250 lbs. solid.
He used to tell me how when he was younger, he lifted
weights and even tried for a bodybuilding contest.
My time in Cleveland came to the end when the school
year was over. Dad had to go back home, and I had to leave
the city and travel somewhere else because I couldn’t stay
there anymore. I had burned my bridges so to speak and I
felt bad because I finally started to like the city.
My next destination was Detroit, and this is where I met my
dad’s cousin. They hadn’t seen each other in ages but dad
had no choice but to reach out to him out of desperation.
This man didn’t look nice at all and was overweight and

had a funky smell. He worked as a dishwasher in the
outskirts of Detroit and his wife was a cleaning lady. He
had two younger sons, one in 7th grade and one in 3rd
grade. I stayed there for two months but never really felt at
home with this family. I met a beautiful young lady that I
liked very much, and she was neighbors with the family.
One-time dad’s cousin found us making out in the backyard
and he chided me saying that was not the reason I was
there. A few days later I had a nasty argument went his
older son because he called me an orphan and told me to go
to an orphanage. I lost it and clocked him as hard as I
could. He fell on the floor and didn’t regain conscience for
a few minutes. I realized that I had punched my ticket out
of that town. The next day I gathered my belongings and he
drove me to the airport. He left me there without any
directions and I felt horrible because I felt so sad and alone.
I called dad and told him what happened, and he was angry
but corny really do anything about his cousin. Instead he

told me to go on the Greyhound and go to St. Louis where I
worked try to live with a family that agreed to take me in.

CHAPTER 6
St. Louis was quite a remarkable city and I had a really
good experience there. I remember meeting the older
couple and realized that the wife had taken over the
household. This was not a good omen for me because in my
culture is the man that runs the family. Right away the lady
was demanding and asked me to do chores for her. She
wanted me to clean the apartment twice a day and go food
shopping. Right away I put my foot down and told her that
I was there to study and didn’t want to engage in any other
activities. She didn’t take it well and told me that she works
not cook for me and I had to fend for myself.
At that moment of time I realized that my only escape was
the library and that’s where I set up shop. I began reading
books as well as magazines. This helped me tremendously
with the English language and I became friends with an

Albanian guy and a Bosnian guy. At school things were not
going as well as I hoped for, but I had faith that it was
going to get better. There was a constant battle with or her
we ethnic groups and especially African Americans. Not
sure what it was but one day it spilled over and things got
ugly. I don’t remember all the details but as a result, three
of my friends got expelled and a bunch of kids from the
other side as well.
But this wasn’t the end of it. I had to first deal with an
angry Albanian man who accused me that I stole his
belongings and he tried to beat me with his son. If it wasn’t
for another Albanian man that I became friends with, things
were going to turn ugly quickly.
To top it off, the African American kids were not finished
with us yet and started to pressure us and wanted to fight us
at every chance. One time they surrounded me and all 7 of

them started beating me down. Thank goodness for an
Albanian family that had called the cops because I didn’t
know how bad things were going to get. Afterwards the
lady that I was staying with threatened to throw me out
because she didn’t want troublemakers in her house.
However, this wasn’t the end of it. A few days later as I
was attempting to cross the busy intersection, a car was
going at 35 mph and didn’t stop in time. I was thrown
upwards and fell into the windshield, breaking it
completely. Not only that but the headlight got smashed
and the car was in bad shape from what I was told a few
days later. I ended up in the ICU where I remained for 5
days in a critical state until I escaped death. The doctors
told me that the reason that I was lucky that my body hit
the windshield and not the concrete. I had 5 broken ribs, a
broken vertebra and was in bad shape.

I remember the lady and her husband came to see me at the
hospital and all she said what that she was shocked I was
still alive after that ordeal. She said I was better off being
dead at that point because no one cared about me anyways.
I cursed her out and told her to leave. Broken-hearted I
realized that these folks hated me and couldn’t stay with
them. I called dad from the hospital but didn’t tell him what
happened but just told him that it was time to move on from
that family. Dad wholeheartedly agreed with me and we
decided to try another place and city. I left St. Louis with a
broken heart because I felt so at home there with s as lol the
friends I made in that year. However, as they say, life has
other plans for you and I took my belongings and found the
Greyhound station to my next and last destination of my 2-
year journey, the city of Boston.

CHAPTER 7
My stay in the city of Boston was a short one as I got there
in the beginning of July 1999. My father’s relative picked
me up at the airport and I started my short-lived journey at
his apartment that he shared with another roommate. I
realized very early on that I wouldn’t be able to stay there
too long because this relative was stern and direct when he
announced that when he needed to get laid, I was to leave
the apartment and find a place to stay for the night. I found
that very bizarre because I was going to pay him his share
of the apartment so there was no need for him to act this
way but here I was, forced to spend the night at a local
coffee shop that was open 24 hours. I met his girlfriend as I
came back to the apartment the next morning on multiple
occasions and she was not a friendly person. She never
directly spoke to me but always ignored me when I spoke
to her.

I gave up trying to build a relationship with this long lost
relative and already was thinking about my next move
when the phone rang, and my dad was on the other line. He
said that both him and my mother were granted visas and
they were coming to the states right away. Within the next
week I grabbed my stuff and booked my trip to New York
City though Greyhound.
I loved the bus company and still due to this day because it
is such a convenient way to travel in the United States. It is
affordable and well-priced, and I have found it to be easy
enough to travel.

CHAPTER 8
New York, New York. The city that never sleeps. Sinatra
has said it best and I was shocked that everything that I
thought of this big city was true. I imagined its bright lights
and never-ending lines of cars with the loud sounds of
trains underground that portray the city that never sleeps.
I arrived in August of the year 2000 with my parents and
we first moved to Staten Island in an attic of a 3-floor
house. It was kind of quirky because we couldn’t really
stand all the way up and had to bend to enter the attic and
leave it. We found some amazing mink coats in there from
a previous tenant who was a famous Polish singer that left
unexpectedly as she was fighting her immigration case. My
thoughts and prayers were with her because she left all her
belongings there and must have left in a rush. We asked the

landlady about her but all she said was that she is fine and
is ok but doesn’t have her new address.
Our transition to New York City was by no means an easy
one. We came from a country where people are close to
each other and socialize quite a lot, to a place where
everyone seemed to mind their own business. One thing
that my parents noticed right away was that there was a
sense of selfishness all around and not a soul that wanted to
help.
Or first interaction with the immigration system came in
the beginning of 2001 where we first appeared for our
master calendar hearing. The lawyer that we retained was
ethnic Albanian from Montenegro. He seemed ok at first
but decided to not show up for the court hearing. This was
truly a disappointment for us because we weren’t used to
dealing with crooked lawyers and their schemes. The

immigration judge was fuming at us and said that this was
not the way to start our court process. Dad tried to say that
the lawyer lied to us but of course that fell in deaf ears.
Our next lawyer was a nice lady that seemed to right the
ship up until she fell through and didn’t come to our court
hearing. She called the judge and apologized but it was too
late for any excuses. The next court date she did come but
the judge ended up denying our case.
A few months later we sent our case to the Appeals Court
and of course it didn’t take to long for them to deny our
case. A year later we were faced with the dim prospect of
leaving the country and going back home. At that moment
me and dad got together and decided we were going to
fight till the end and that’s exactly what we did. We found
an amazing lawyer that dealt with Federal Immigration
cases and he was as good as they came.

During these first few years in the new country we were
faced with a multitude of challenges from jobs to school
and a used car to top it all off. Both parents found inventory
jobs that required them driving long distances to New
Jersey and Long Island, but they did it, nonetheless. I was
working a security job with long hours sometimes 64 to 72
hours a week and life was rough.
My brother came to the United States using another child’s
Green Card and we paid a fortune for that to happen. He
came in the states like a whole new person and just seemed
harsh and not friendly at all. He must have really suffered
back home by himself and his facial expression showed it
all. His acclimation process took quite some time as he
enrolled in middle school and excelled in his studies.
Afterwards he went to high school and graduated in 3 and
half years with pretty good grades.

After a 9-year-old journey we eventually won our
immigration case and life took a more positive turn.
However, things were still tough because the Great
Recession came upon us.
In 2009 I lost my nonprofit job at a health insurance
company and was stuck looking for work. I spent a year
and half applying for jobs and in the meantime, I enrolled
in my second masters in Teaching this time. In two years’,
time I graduated and received my license to teach.
While going to school I did apply for substitute teaching
jobs and was lucky to work in the high school near my
apartment. It was a good experience and got me through
some pretty tough times.

A few years later I ended up getting a job with the housing
authority and that didn’t really last that long. I was shocked
to see the squalid conditions that these folks were living
under and the use of drug paraphernalia and filthy elevators
really got to me. To top it off the residents didn’t really
care about privacy and they were getting hot and heavy
wherever they could which meant the staircases or the
elevators. I witnessed so many sexual encounters that it felt
like I was in an ongoing orgy with these people engaging in
all kinds of provocative sexual positions right in front of
my eyes. The worst was when a young lady was giving oral
sex to a guy and I opened the elevator door now of climax
and let me tell you it wasn’t pretty at all. I was lucky that
the seven didn’t travel to me, but it came close enough, so I
escaped that harrowing ordeal. The worst part of it all is
that no one even tried to apologize but just got out of the
elevator and went on their merry way. The way these folks
were living was like the medieval ages with dog feces and

urinating animals all over. I felt like I didn’t belong there so
after a year I decided to call it quits.
In the meantime, my mother was diagnosed with cancer
and she beat the disease until 15 years later when it came
back. Thank goodness she is cancer free now, but it goes to
show you the true immigration experience is one of many
challenges and grateful moments because this is the place
where everyone wants to be and live.
I love talking about the immigrant experience because I
have seen so many ups and downs, but it has been amazing
to say the least. I witnessed my brother coming here and
struggling to acclimate with his environment but then
succeeding and eventually opening his own company at the
age of 21. He started a startup that was successful for 4
years but eventually folded because of financing issues.

My brother moved out to California and led his business
from there until it folded in 2014. His story is one of
success and failure with is what makes this country great. I
love how it gives you chances to succeed over and over and
that’s why America is great and the best country in Earth.
I went from being a shy kid in Albania and really
blossomed in America because here is truly the place of
opportunity. It is unlike any other country because it you
work hard and keep grounded then you have a chance at a
pretty decent life.
The reason I wanted to write this short book was to show
whoever reads it that hope dies last and in America there is
always hope because it is the place of opportunity. Many
people have come and made this country their home
because it has always stood for hope in the world of
uncertainties.

I remember my uncle leaving Albania back in 1990 when
the borders opened and how he was mistreated by the
Greek border police. They beat him mercilessly and left
him for dead. He was then sent back to Albania bruised up
and in bad shape. After a few attempts he decided that it
was not worth it because he was never successful at
establishing himself and always got sent back home. A few
years later he ended up getting married and tried to make a
life in Albania’s capital from what my mother tells me.
I have heard of so many stories of immigrants suffering and
struggling to make it that I wanted to dedicate this book to
the lost souls that perished during their long and arduous
journeys and never reached their destinations. Life is cruel
sometimes as you don’t know the hand that you will be
dealt with.

CHAPTER 9
The rest of this short book will be dedicated to the stories
that I have heard from immigrants of many nationalities
during my 22 years in the United States. These are
unfiltered stories that have stuck with me for all these years
and wanted to share them with the world.
Even though I am writing this book under a pseudonym
because I feel that at this moment and time it is the next
decision for me but that doesn’t mean that I can’t reveal my
identity but that will be a decision that will be taken at a
later time. I wanted to first publish a tabloid of one person’s
journey from a third world country to the greatest country
on Earth and this is a homage to all of those that couldn’t
make it in their individual journeys to a better place.

Auggie was a pale kid from Bosnia whom I met while in
high school in Cleveland. He was the same age as me but
had this older look in him. He had a few visible scars in his
elbows and arm but the one scar that wasn’t visible was the
one that he was burdened with for a lot of years.
His story started in Mostar with was a city in Bosnia. In
1995 he witnessed the horrific tragedy that was bestowed
upon his people as the Serbian police forces disembarked
upon his city. The chaos was unbearable he said to me as
he witnessed his city burned to the ground by the Serbian
military. They then rounded up women and children and
executed them and left their bodies for the world to see.
The carnage was too much to bear for my friend as took
refuge in a small village in the border of Bosnia and Serbia.
From there he managed to flee to Germany where he was
granted asylum with his family and a few years later he
decided to come to America and try the American dream.

He said that he would never forget the atrocities done to his
people by the Serbian forces but only time will tell whether
his wounds will heal. I have not seen Auggie since I left
Cleveland in 1999 so I’m hoping that he and his family are
ok.
I met Isatu while I was in college and she came from
Rwanda. Her story is also gruesome because it goes to
show the level of carnage that we humans can carry on
against one another. She was a Tutsi which was the higher
class in her country of Rwanda and the others were called
The Hutus. The Rwandan genocide is well documented so
there is no need for me to go into details but from I was
told by Isatu, her family was slaughtered and only she and
her sister were able to escape because a missionary from
the United States took them under their wing and
eventually got them outside the country and adopted both
sisters.

The third and finally story came from someone of the
Jewish faith. He immigrated from Poland in the aftermath
of World War 2 and was a guest speaker at a conference I
attended many years back. This man spoke so eloquently of
the mass murder that was initiated by the Nazis in World
War 2 and the suffering of many Jews in concentration
camps. He was placed in Dachau and that is where he
stayed up until Germany surrender to the Allied forces in
1945. He spoke of families killed and executed in front of
him just because of their faith and nothing else. He also
touched upon the gas chambers and the many different
experiments that the German doctors did to the Jews in
these concentration camps. Horrible things were done to a
whole slew of people which is why he decided to come to
the United States to start a better life in 1946 and he never
looked back.

There are countless stories of suffering and carnage all
around us and it is important to understand that everyone
has had a story which is why it’s important for us to listen
and try to grasp the enormous challenges that these folks
have encountered in their lives.
There were many times when I wanted to give up and go
back home in my early years in this country, but I had to
muster the courage to persevere because things had to get
better band they did with time. As my grandmother used to
say, hope dies last which is why we must all cherish stories
from immigrants not only because I am one of them but
because there is so much to learn from their struggles to
find their identities.

Immigrant life

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Immigrant life