Being born in a country at war
In this column Mohamed Abdulkareem writes about his thoughts as a refugee in Finland.
I’m Mohamed Abdulkareem from Iraq. I have master degree in computer science, but I learned from my life experience that people are looking at my passport before they are looking at my academic certificates. My current target is to express the challenges and difficulties that I have faced in my life to the world.
Not just a number
We do not choose where we are born. I am from Iraq, from Baghdad. I am just 26 years old, but feel I have never had any stability in my life. I always worry about the future, because my country is not a safe place to live in. We are always running from war, from the day I was born till today. Imagine that the first, and only priority in your life is to find a safe place to live and start a family. This is all what you are looking for in this life.
I have so many dreams in my life, but the war makes you look for another place to make a new start. It is a very difficult issue and makes you feel stressed all the time. This is my story, but sadly most of the men from Iraq have similar stories. They have dreams. I hope they will be able to achieve them instead of taking the wrong direction.
What makes it even more difficult is when you start to feel that other people look at you as a person who has made a big mistake in his life. When you travel, you are always the on separated from others, because of your nationality. The way that people look at you when you mention your country, makes you feel that people do not want to be close to you. I feel that from their facial expressions when I just say I am from Iraq.
When I was in Iraq, I saw Finland as a country where I could find something I have missed in my own country. Now, I have arrived to Finland and I have a lot of dreams that I hope I can achieve.
Text: Mohamed Abdulkareem
Photo: Pixabay/Unsplash
Finally, every person in this world has different kind of challenges for example with family, financials and so on. I want to say to you that just be happy, because you were not born in a country at war. You have not faced the most difficult challenge in this life.