Shamsiddin is a 15-year-old boy from Uzbekistan who now lives in Stockholm, Sweden. He discusses his childhood in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, and how his family escaped to seek a better life and education for him and his brothers. His family faced many hardships but his parents worked hard to provide for the family. Since moving to Sweden, his life has become much easier and both of his parents have found work. Shamsiddin is grateful for all of his parents' sacrifices and wants to make them proud by succeeding in life. He enjoys various sports and martial arts, and is currently training for a half marathon.

1. Hello
from
Stockholm!

2. Hanin Zuhair, 15 years old
Hello!
My name is Hanin Zuhair. I live in the capital of Sweden. I`m 15 years old and I live with my mum,
brother and sister. I was born in Sweden but my roots are from Iraq and Pakistan. I`m in the 9th
grade.
My favourite subjects are history, geography, economics and chemistry. I spend my spare time
Watching movies and football with my older brother. I also like playing football, reading books,
listening to music and cooking. I listen to singers like The Wanted, Olly Murs, Lana Del Rey, Christina
Agiulera and Eminem.
I can cook Indian and Italian food. I`ve always loved Indian food because its spicy and very delicious.
I`d love to vistit India, I`ve always wanted too. My biggest dream is to travel around the whole world and
see different cultures and learn different languages. It`d be really exciting to get to know you all in
person.
I’d like to know your names, ages and your intrests. We may get the chance to speak to you through
skype!
Sincerly yours,
Hanin Zuhair

3. Umida, 17 years old
Hello!
My name is Umida. I am 17 years old. I live in Sweden with my family. I have one
brother. He is 30 years old. He is married. He has two children. My favourite colours are
black, white and blue. I enjoy reading books and cooking during my spare time. I also
enjoy cleaning the house.
Good bye!

4. Arsen, 15 years old
My name is Arsen. I’m fifteen years old and currently doing 9-th grade at BetaSchool. I have
dark hair and brown eyes.
I live in Tumba, a suburb of Stockholm. I have two brothers. My elder brother Armen is 22, and
the middle brother Karen is 20. By the way, we have one more member of our family, the
parrot (we all have a different name for him, so we call him what we want) we love him very
much.
My Mum is 39 or maybe 40; she is half Armenian and half Georgian. My Dad is 50+, he is an
Armenian. I have only one Grandma, I love her, but she lives in Georgia, so I haven’t seen her
for 2,5 years.
I have many friends. But I have two true friends, and both are in Armenia their names is Anna
and Hayk. We were always together and meet each other every day. Anna and Hayk are
siblings.
On my first day at school, when I was in grade 1, Hayks mother come to me and said to me
"Do you want to take picture with my child?" i said ok , after that we become to be friends and
then best friends.

5. Even now while I’m in Sweden and he is in Armenia, we still contact each other regularly,
either with Skype or through Facebook.
My hobbies include making videos or animations which I enjoy very much. Soon I will graduate
from junior high school and I have to choose a profession. However, I have not a lot of
different interests, for example, dance, music, animating and do some videos so it’s not so
easy to choose an occupation. My parents want me to be a doctor, but I don’t really want to,
although I wouldn’t mind seeing an operation being performed by a skilled surgeon.
But my dream is to be a director of music videos or make horror movies and i really hope my
dream will come true!
Regards,
Arsen

6. Zahra, 16 years old
Hi!!
My name is Zahra and Im 16 years old, my family is from Iraq but I live in Sweden and was born in
Stockholm. I have three sibilings, one sister and two brothers. I like my big brother becuse he helps
me with English and math homework everyday.
My favorite food is Italian food, especially macaroni, and my favourite color is pink becuse I think its
for girls and cute. I like reading books before go to sleep becuse its nice!
I’m a shy and quite person but Im also a honest person. You can really trust me so (dont worry about
leaving your money with me). My best friend is Fatma and she is also my cousin. We are actually like
sisters, we love each other, we like the same things and have the same clothes. We also help each
other if we have any problems.
I’m in the ninth grade at Beta school, my favourite lesson is Math becuse Im good at it. I was
wondering if you have any favourite subjects, friends,or food?
I would appreciate if you could help me to become better in (english) this subject.
Yours sincerely,
ZAHRA MOHAMED

7. Jennifer, 14 years old
Hello!
My name is Jennifer, I am 14 years old. I live in Stockholm, Sweden with my mom
and
brother. My brother is 16 years old and my mom is 42 years old. I have a rabbit and
his
name is Dante.
My favorite colors are pink, blue and white. During spare time I usually go ice-
skating
and bake cakes. My hobbies are drawing and playing hockey. My favorite band is One
Direction and favorite song is "Irresistible "
Goodbye!
Jennifer Bergman

8. Maftuna, 16 years old
Hello!
My name is Maftuna. I am 16 years old. I come from Uzbekistan. I love my family.
I like to play volleyboll, tennis, bowling and I would like to be able to ice – skate but I m
not very good at it just now. I like fantasi films. I hate spiders.
I cannot speak English very vell at the moment. I can speak Tajik, Uzbek and swedish.
My dream job is to be a nurse. My favorite subjects are Maths, English, Swedish, Biology,
Chemistry, History and geography.

9. Nuriddin, 13 years old
Hi!
My name is Nuriddin and I am 13 years old. I study at the 8th grade. I do a lot at my
sparetime. I like ice-hockey so I go ice-skating a lot because I think that it is fun. I also like
martial arts and I have trained taekwondo for a year.
I live in Södertälje but go to school in Hjuslta. It is a long way that takes me more than one
hour so I have to wake up early at the morning. My mom drives me and my siblings to school
every morning and she is a teacher in my school. Her name is Jamila and she is 36(?) years
old. Dad is a busdriver and he is a really hard working person. Sometimes he comes home at 3
o’clock at the night. He is 49 years old and his name is Mukimjon.
I have 5 siblings, the youngest is my little sweet sister Anisa who is three years old. Nafisa is 5
years old and she is often quite and can sit and do her homework for hours. Muhammad is two
years older than Nafisa and he trained taekwondo with me 1 year. My older brother’s name is
Shamsiddin and he is 15 years old. He also trained taekwondo with me and Muhammad. He
and me often gets in fights because we have a lot of brotherly – love.

10. I think I am quite positive as a person but a little impatient. I am a hard working person
sometimes because I try to do my homework in time and do my chores at home and
school the best and the easier way because I am really lazy sometimes. Im a little bit shy
when I am at a new school or somewhere where I don’t know anyone. But when I get to
know a bit better they often see that I am not a shy person.
Sincerly,
Nuriddin Mahmudov

11. Sandra, 13 years old
Hello,
My name is Sandra and I am thirteen years old. I live in Stockholm with my family. I have two
siblings a sister and a brother. My favourite colours are blue and pink. I love activites such as
gymnastics, weight lifting, boxing, martial arts and. I have an orange belt in karate even
though I have only been doing karate for a year and a half. But i am going to practise martial
arts soon. My favourite subjects in school are maths, science ( physics, chemistry ), english
and swedish. My idols are a group called One Direction whose music has helped me through a
lot of stuff, so which is why I really look up to them. I really do love them.it is five boys who
are singers.
When I grow up I want to be a doctor or start my own hospital, but my dreamjob entails
becoming famous or work for such as CIA or FBI and investigating dangerous cases. I like to
plan my work or future because I like being organised and setting up different goals in my life.
When it comes to work or other important things i am very strict and picky. I like to play games
that involve strategic thinking because they help me to think strategically.
I am looking forward to talk to you over the coming months and I hope we will get along along
with each other well.
Yours sincerely,
Sandra Faraj.

12. Shamsiddin, 15 years old
Hi!
My name is Shamsiddin but most of my friends call me Shams, Shamsi, or Shamse. I’m
fifteen years now but soon, on the 11th april, I’ll be sixteen. I was born in Uzbekistan but
we escaped to neighboring Kyrgizistan. I started school there. I did first, second and
third grades there. We came to Sweden on the 8th November and I started school in the
4th grade on the 4th of februari 2008. We lived in a village named Hällefors, 81km from
big City of Örebro. It’s about 250 km from Stockholm.
My childhood has been very good, my parents have taken care of me and my
brothers even when their lives were at stake. My dad translated from Arabic to
Uzbek and from Russian to Uzbek. I remember how hard it was for him and
how it was for us and he did it just for us. He wanted us to study at a good
school and half of his sallary went towards my and my younger brothers school
fees.

13. We could have gone to an ordinary school were we wouldn’t have had to pay any fees but he
knew we wouldn’t learn anything there, so we went to a private school. My mom she was
teacher for 10-15 kids in a house with 3 rooms! She taught them from the Holy Quran, arabic,
english, russian and helped them with their homework. She took care of 17 kids just for us,
just for the money, money that we could live on.
Life became much easier when we arrived in Sweden. We received money from the goverment,
while mum and dad studied SFI. Then mom started work as teacher. In the beginning she was
a home-language teacher but was then promoted to an assistant teacher for Uzbeks who
couldn’t speak Swedish. My dad studied to be a bus driver and passed his exams. He became a
bus driver as he wanted but could never find job in Hällefors so we moved on to Stockholm.
Here he found a job where he still works. He loves his job and enjoys driving a bus. My mum
has taken many different jobs as an assistant teacher and home-language teacher. And among
those jobs she started here at Betaschool. She loves, I mean really loves this school, which is
why she is still here. I can never thank my parents enough. I have to make them proud of me,
it’s my duty to them, That’s why I want them to see me make a success of my life.

14. When we lived in Hällefors i tried lots of sports, hockey, soccer, indoor-floorball etc. I
loved to be with Swedish guys and learn so much Swedish, it was like heaven for me. I
learned swedish in less then 4 months. I could talk and understand pretty good at the
end of spring. In june when I started to play soccer i could understand my coach and talk
with my friend very good. I learned the language so fast because of my parents, they
allways gave me papers to do and that i didn’t understood I asked my swedish friend and
they explain it very good and with lots of love. I estimated it. I can never forget my
friends from Hällefors, either my teachers who gave me lots of their time to me. I still
keep contact with some of my teachers and with almostly all my friends. When we came
to Stockholm I started at Stockholms språkskola. I went there in one and half year and
moved my school to Betaschool. Now I have lots of friends in both Stockholm and
Hällefors. I love them very much, they did so much for me. In Stockholm I started to
exercise martial arts as Aikido, taekwondo etc. I succeeded in Taekwondo, I have 2 gold
medals and one silver from my three competitions. I quit with Taekwondo last season
and now I’m training to half marathon.
Yours sincerly,
Shams Mahmud.