About 10 years ago while attending Monash University, Malaysia, my journalism lecturer had the entire class start their own blogs. By 2012, I had graduated with a degree in international relations. In the bid to submit an assignment I opened a blog, posted a few stories and and forgot about it.
Having graduated, I moved back home where the parents had now concluded their investment and it was time to fend for myself. I struggled well well before nepotism landed me a juicy receptionist position at a printing firm. Life was starting to look up. It now felt like I could handle anything thrown my way. I was thriving at work, being given promotions east left center. I was the one, Abi. While I started to recognize the potential of building a career from there, I had little birds in my ears like all other "children of age". "when are you getting married??"
Well the pressure build up, oh not to forget the male species which was also actively participating in persuasion that finally paid off. At 25yrs of age, I got married. The older I get, the more I see how young, naïve and foolish it was for me to chose marriage thinking it would solve my issues.
In this paragraph, I will share some of the terrible reasons that overshadowed my judgment at the time and enabled such a terrible discission. Before going further, you should know that I was born to a staunch Islamic family of four siblings with me being the fourth. Well, I had the pressure of being obedient to my parents so I got married. That's just the first reason, wait till you here the others. I was also sincerely tired of being kept. I felt gated and unable to explore who I truly am under my parent's roof so I applied marriage as a solution. Did I love the man? That's a story for another day. I wanted to try this birthing thing too so again my solution was marriage. As you must have figured by now, the marriage stood no chance and collapsed soon after I discovered my ability to birth.
Despite the dead marriage, I was left with a special heart champion. The beautiful angel, who struggled with a congenital heart condition known as Tricuspid Atresia 1C, succumbed to it in March 2018. By this time, I had quit my job to take care of my daughter. I can honestly say her two years on earth hold some of my most cherished memories. She will always be loved and missed dearly. Her names were Eshaal Eshmail. By the end of that month, results from the US green card lottery were out and "we" had been selected. It was a period of mixed feelings. I had just lost a daughter and was presented with a chance to go live in the US.
If you know anyone who has ever won this lottery, you know that the process also takes life to come to the end. For the entire 2018, I was working to see this process through. Interviews were scheduled in Nairobi, I was in and out of there three times before my passport was finally posted with a visa in March, 2019...one year later.
By April that year, I packed up and moved to the United states, solo mission kabisa. Its January 22nd 2023 and at 7pm I stumbled upon my twitter profile that gave me the link to this blog. I didn't know how much peace there was in writing but wow, am impressed and plan to keep this up.
