I am so proud of myself to explain to you guys about when I first came to America. On October first, 2016, I left my country to come here to America. I thought that America was a paradise where all people could live a better life. But it was definitely not what I expected.
After one month, my wife was pregnant. It was very hard for me to handle this situation. I just came here and I did not know anything about America. I was waiting for my green card to start working at this time, and my wife did not have a good job to take care of our bills. The worst thing was the owner of the house did not know that I lived there with my wife. She knew that only my wife lived there. One day when we went out, we saw her face to face. She asked my wife, “Who is he?” My wife answered, “That’s my husband,” and the owner was angry about that. Two days after, we received a letter from the court. The letter said we could not stay in the apartment.
We were shocked about the bad news because we did not have money to move to another apartment. God always has compassion for people who have a good heart. I found my green card right away. God still was blessing me and gave me a job quickly in the restaurant at Logan Airport Terminal C. I was excited because I needed the job to take care of my wife. Also, that was my first work experience in my life.
My first job was as a dishwasher. I was working seven days a week because I needed that money so we could move to a new apartment. My wife could not work the same way she used to because she had morning sickness. She always threw up all the time when she was at work. I remember that I worked 29 days without breaks, no days off. My first check was $1276, and we put everything together. We found an apartment right in time. That was the moment we finally felt like we could breathe. I saw the light start shining on us. Before, we had darkness in our life. We did not see where to go, but God always has the last word.
After everything was changing, things started getting better for us. When we arrived in a new apartment, we started a better life without struggle.
After my wife had the baby, I had to work two jobs, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I stayed at work at the airport until the last flight at one or two a.m. in the morning. During those three months, I was struggling a lot because my wife needed to take care of the baby. All the financial responsibility was on me.
Our daughter was born on August first. I was so happy because my wife gave me a beautiful daughter. I was thinking about how I can surprise my wife because of that wonderful gift she gave me, my daughter. In December, the month of my wife’s birthday, December 31, I bought two tickets, one for me and one for her to Las Vegas. It was a surprise for her. I told her for her birthday we were going to take pictures. We needed to bring clothes so we could take different poses. I packed her bags. I brought women stuff for her like more panties and bras. I told her to bring her makeup in case she needed it. I took her passport, and I left my daughter with my brother. We took a taxi, and we went to the airport. My wife asked me where we were going. I told her, “I'm going to take something from my friend.” I told her, “Let's go.” When we got inside, I gave her her passport. I told her to put it in the machine. When she put it in, she printed her boarding pass and saw Las Vegas on it. She was happy and screaming.
After we came back from Las Vegas, I restarted to work and I lost one of two badges that I had for my jobs. It was very difficult for me. I lost the badge for my best job, the one that paid more. How was I going to pay my bills? There was a process to get the badge back, and it took one month. It wasn’t easy for me at this time.
A lot of chaotic things happened to me. I did not know what I was going to do to have money to pay my bills; one job was not enough for that. The only option that I had was God. I prayed to him because he knew everything, and I just took one month again to come back to normal. Until now we are doing fine with my family, God blessing us day by day.
My future goal is to have my own business. Since I was a child my big dream has been to be an entrepreneur to work with myself. I know that the education is a key. To realize anything you would have to do that because I think without knowledge I couldn’t manage my business. First of all, you can’t leave without a project of business in your mind. That is the first thing we should think about, to get a better life tomorrow with your family. And one day I could leave it as an inheritance for my family. I would not like leaving my life without preparing for the future for my family. And also I would like to help others who need help. I know that would be a blessing coming from God.
I’m taking the online class because we don’t have any other option to learn. Everybody knows because of the pandemic there is no way to go to school at this moment to see each other in person because we have to practice social distance. The online class makes me to improvise my thoughts and my answer quickly instead of sitting in the classroom. I learn so many things in this pandemic. People see their life in a different direction and, you feel like you don’t have time to reach some of your plans.
Online class gives me skills to understand there are so many ways you can achieve things in life. I would like to share my experience about the online class with my classmates and my teacher. Hilary was spectacular. I’m glad that I have a teacher like you. You go above and beyond to make sure you go step by step and make sure we understand everything and learn everything the way we're suppose to learn. Also, you're very patient and you care about your students. I say thanks for all of you guys in the online class. For me it is a blessing from God.