Meet My Mom

Meet My Mom

I always thought my mom was a strong person. Although she never admitted it, it must have been difficult for her to be an immigrant living in a new country while raising two children as a single parent. In my lifetime, she has not only inspired me to strive for the best, but she has also established herself as a highly sought after, successful pharmacist.

I chose to interview my mom because I wanted to preserve her thoughts on being an ethnic minority living in the United States. The funny thing is, she doesn't consider herself to be a minority because her standards are much higher than that. She feels that if you work hard and have a good education, then you can be anything your heart desires. I really respect her opinion on most subjects so I wanted to ask her some questions in hopes of learning something new about her. Using her as a subject of an oral history will preserve her memory so that future generations of our family can know what she was like.

During the Thanksgiving weekend, I took the opportunity to ask my mom a list of questions I had previously prepared. In the comfort of our living room, she sat with me at our home computer while we typed out her responses. In person, my mom speaks with a very strong Arabic accent. I wanted to preserve the character of her speech by typing out her responses verbatim. When I read through the interview, it feels as though my mom were really there. I feel that this is especially important because the audience can not only get to know my mom, but also get a sense of how she speaks.

I organized the interview questions into separate sections: biographical information, occupation, raising a family, language issues, living in Oregon, local culture, homeland connection, September 11, food for thought, and anything else she wanted to add. Please take the opportunity to get to know a little about her life and the experiences she has chosen to share.

Biographical Information

What is your name?

Elham Rostom

When were you born?

August, 1950

Where were you born?

Alexandria Egypt

What is your ethnicity?

Middle Eastern, Egyptian, American

How long have you lived in America?

25 years, March 2005

How long have you lived in Oregon?

23 years

What caused you to leave Egypt?

I left Egypt to join my husband who came to USA looking for a better career opportunities for our family.

What were your first impressions of America?

I lived in England for a whole year before my arrival to USA. I got used to dealing with a foreign culture and people, big difference between USA and England. England long history and civilization goes way longer than USA, in history and time.

Occupation

What is your occupation?

Pharmacist

Where were you educated?

I graduated as a pharmacist from Alexandria University, school of pharmacy, Egypt. Then I went through the qualification process to get my license to work in USA. I had to pass 5 different exams to be able to work.

Talk about any struggles as a minority in your occupation.

From the beginning of my career I had a hard time finding an opening to get the hours required to work as an intern. I worked for 8 month as volunteer at the VA hospital, while a student graduated from USA school can very easily get a paid job. I was working side by side with them.

How do (customers/co-workers/management) treat/mistreat your ethnicity?

Lots of my customer get kind of uncomfortable till they start really knowing me and they know they can get all the help and they know I am well educated and I know my job very well , they start looking for me by name.

My customer first impression that they were not expected to see and deal with an Arab professional woman in my career. Actually I am the only Arab American a pharmacist which I know of here in our community or near, as a medical professional we usually not discriminated against as the other regular blue collars workers.

What is your response to each type of reaction?

It depends how I was reached, most of them are very kind. Once a while I meet one or two customers, but I always show them they are getting the best they can get from any other pharmacist and change their impression and how they feel about me. Some of them they do not understand me right away, but I always explain to them that English is my second language and I will always have an accent. I learned over the years to speak slower than usual and try to make them listen to me. After a while they are very comfort with me. I met lots of friends over the years. The oldest is 96 years old man. I still take him out for dinner. He used to be judge and just amazing wonderful man, still in good mental and physical health. He just turn 96 on 11/25/04.

Raising a family

Do you have any kids? What are their ages?

I have 2 kids, tome and jerry. (Actually, Hussein is 27 and Sarah is 21)

What lessons have you taught them about their ethnicity?

To be proud of who they are and use their knowledge of both world to achieve and be the best they can be.

Talk about any difficulties you've had raising a family because of your ethnicity.

It was not easy, I am a single working mother tried so hard to provide her 2 kids of all what they need and work on her own career and make sure they are using their background to be the best. Raising a family here in USA alone as a single mother was quite difficult. There was no family support, but I had lots of good American and Muslim friends I met over the years helped me a lot to go ahead with my career. Raising a daughter in USA, it was big challenge for me. There were lots of restrictions on how to raise a girl, way different of raising a boy. I had an open heart and mind and I tried to apply the big precious values I was raised on. And the free life style the kids having it here in USA, I was lucky enough my 2 kids turn to be the best any mother can have, very kind and responsible and well minded children J.

Language Issues

How long have you spoken English? How/When did you learn to speak English?

English was taught as a second language in all the school in Egypt starting 6th grades till the end of my educations in pharmacy school. I learned it from school and we moved to England for 1 year before we came to USA.

Do people find it difficult understanding your English because of the accent?

It happens once a while specially with older citizen, hard hearing already. I try to slow down and repeat myself till they get what they need.

Living in Oregon

How is living in Oregon different from other places in America?

It is such a unique place to live, lots of trees and friendly people all over. Beside the weather is very good. We have access to any where in the world from Oregon, near the ocean and the forest and the mountains.

Are people in Oregon friendlier than in other places of America?

Compare specific cities in Oregon and each community's attitude towards your ethnicity

I really do not have any major problem with my ethnicity. I have lots of friends and acquaintance from both worlds. I enjoy living here so much.

How do you feel about being a Muslim/Egyptian in America/Oregon?

I feel great. I have not had any personal bad experience here. I made lots of friends, and most of they wants to know more about Islam and Egypt.

Do you feel safe living here?

Actually I feel very safe living in USA. We live in a good side of town. I do not really had any problems with any neighbor. I have lots of friends every where.

Local culture

Are you connected with those of a similar culture in your community?

We get to meet once a while on social occasions, new baby, some one new coming to town, some religious occasions. We get together and have different kind of food and so on. The group mostly student from Muslim families, away from home, and wives of those students came for educations and on scholarships to get higher educations, and some immigrants will be here for a long time.

Is there a large community? (Number of people/When do you gather)

It varies, different time, different numbers. I am not sure about numbers, I do not count.

We had a group called "We refuse to be enemies" and they are multiculures, Jewish and Arabs and Christians. We get together once a while to discuss how we can make the world better place to be and discuss ideas of how we all can live side by side in harmony and in peace. At the same time we get to eat the best American, Jewish, Middle Eastern food provided by each group. It is amazing to see the possibilities for our big world to be a big happy family, living and working and raising our kids side by side, at the same time keeping our cultures and heritage alive.

Homeland connection

How often do you keep in touch with those in your homeland? How often do you travel back to your homeland?

Once a year, time and money permitting I try to go back home once a year, using the phone and the internet, we try to stay in touch as much as we can.

What do they think about you living in America?

It is great place to be, I really feel so lucky to be able to live and enjoy both world.

What the others thinks of me, well as I mentioned I am a professional person deals with professional Drs and nurses, they like me a lot, and appreciate the hard work I provide.

What are the views on racism in your homeland when you were growing up

Actually, we did not know much about it. We live in Egypt, under one principle, we had different religions. Religion for Allah (God) and Egypt land is for every one.

Were there any blacks or Jews where you were growing up?

Regard if there were blacks, well lower Egypt is very dark skin. My own grand father from my father side was from lower Egypt. My grand mother was from upper Egypt, she was very fairskin. We have all kind of skin shades in our family. We don't really notice. Actually there is say in Egypt that "the dark skin is half the beauty standards." I do not see any Jewish left in Egypt. While growing up, we lived in apartment building in Alexandria Egypt, and we had a Jewish family lived upstairs of us. I remember when they left Egypt 1956, and my mother was crying to see them go. We played together as children.

September 11, 2001

Were your family members in your homeland worried about you after September 11, 2001?

I got phone called from my family trying to see if we are ok, and we were. The whole world was in a big shock.

What do you feel about September 11, 2001?

It was so bad. I do not want to remember it. I feel it was a bad situations, thousand of lives were lost and that was one of the biggest disasters any one can see or live. I got phone calls from several of my customers to see if I was ok, and if any one bothered me. Actually I did not have any problem with any one.

Food for thought

What are your views on diversity?

It is great; it is ok to be different in a good way. Diversity is the nature of life, without it life can be boring. It is good to live here and experience living in Oregon, and see lots of different people with different background

What is your perception of racism?

Just give every one a chance to live and grow and be the best he can.

What are your views on prejudice?

Sometimes it very hard to face it, but be a good example it change the opinion of other people.

What is your perception of your self as a minority?

Work hard, get the best of what you offered, and enjoy life to the fullest.

Do you feel like a "minority" in the population or do you feel the same as every one else?

I feel I been treated fairly enough to live and work and fulfill the American dream

Anything else

Hobbies:

Sewing, art and craft. Unfortunately, I do not have enough time

Interests:

I am interest to learn more about my career and go up the ladder as high as I can.

Travel:

I lived in England, Canada, Eastern USA, California, Egypt, now I am here and loving it.

End of Interview

For the most part, the interview process was very comfortable. We spent almost two hours going over every question, but I tried to stay quiet and just let my mom do the talking. I was very surprised to hear about all of the adjustments she has had to make in order to be successful in her occupation. I've always known that her accent makes her English hard to understand, but I appreciate the patience she has shown towards helping others to understand her speech.

At first my mom was hesitant towards responding to the questions, and I felt as if she wasn't answering them fully. We went over the questions a second time and she was able to elaborate on her thoughts more clearly. The reason behind this was because she didn't know how much information would suffice to answer each question. Going through the questions a second time, she was able to add those wise sayings and translated proverbs from back home. I think that was my favorite part of the interview.

She was very upset when I asked questions about September 11. At first, she wanted to change the subject to something else, but I thought it would be important for her to share her feelings. She was very devastated by the events of that day, but it was heartwarming to hear that instead of the backlash that many Arab Americans experienced, she received support from members of the community who were worried she might get harassed.

In summary, the experience was very enriching and I would recommend anyone to pursue an interview with anyone they would like to know more about. Personally, I hope to interview more people, but especially members of my family. I believe that family is the most important aspect of your life and there's always something new you can learn. Having an oral history of family members can preserve their memory better than any photo album. The best part about this experience is that my mom has always said that she wanted to write a book about her life. Perhaps this could be a start towards recording her biography.