Al Housseine

"Learning to fix things...it's a certain freedom."

By Students of NYC

June 20^th, 2023

"In Africa, going to school was different. You study, but it didn’t mean anything — it didn’t mean you could get a job. Here, when I am done, I will have a job. Over there, something like learning to fix bikes? The government isn’t going to pay you. Internships? They don’t have it over there. Here, in school it is like I am learning how to live in the world. To do something that is useful that I can support myself and my family.

Learning to fix things, it’s a certain freedom. I know how to do something now. I can do it for others, I don’t have to pay them. One day, they will pay me.

I work security at night. 12–8 a.m. I go to school every day. I sleep when I go home from school. On days when I am tired, or feeling lazy, I just remind myself that if I am not working hard, I don’t have anything. You have to do something to have something. The teachers here are helping us; we’re not helping them. All of my teachers ... they are helping me, and pushing us to work hard. They are funny, too. They make jokes. But they are serious when it is time to work.

You have to choose your friends carefully. You can’t have lazy friends. That is what I miss most about home. Being with my friends. Playing around. Soccer, and go to the beach, you know. At night too, we would get together, a bunch of us. At the home, but outside, because over there it is not like this, with the doors. We would sit outside, with no phones, no movies, just talking. Laughing. Joking with each other.

But you see a lot of things over there, in Africa. All the things I've seen, it has helped me over here. You are ready. Elhaje understands that. I know he does. Me and Elhaje will be friends forever. I know this now. We did not know each other before we came here, but now we will always be friends.

Maybe I will go to the army, too. You can become a mechanic there. If you go to the army for five years then you can come back, you can go to college. You can decide. I dream one day I can buy a house big enough for my whole family. All my brothers and sisters. What do you call it? Yes, I want a yard."