The Chances Era

In the 1960’s, the golden era for the countries of the Arabian Golf started. There was the discovery of oil, which lead to rapid economical developments in the region. As there was a focus on the infrastructure projects, they needed to borrow expert engineers from all around the Arabic world to help in that big construction project. By the time my dad graduated from his engineering school in Alexandria, Egypt, and Syria was under the stress of war with Israel. Therefore, it wasn’t the time for any development projects. As a result, my father went to the Golf where he had a great chance to work as a project manager for paving a long and important highway. It was a big challenge for him. However, he did very well and then he started a successful career over there. My grandfather was also an engineer. Accordingly, my mother felt that my father was similar to her beloved father. She loved him and decided to go with him to start her new family. That decision had affected my family life in different ways.
One effect was my mom’s agony for living far from her family which she was very attached to. Her dad had died when she was pregnant, and it was too hard to tell her the bad news. One day –after she gave birth- she dreamed of her father writing her a farewell poem. Since my father couldn’t tell her himself, he decided to ask her friend to tell her. Though days passed, I still remember my mother’s tears every time she tells the story. In fact, it frightens me that if something happened to my parents and I am far here in the United States, I will feel the same anguish.
The second effect was my dad’s absence during that period which, affected my siblings and me in a negative way. I think that was the price for the success he achieved in his career and the wealthy life we used to live. In fact, he was responsible for two generations. The older one was my grandmother and his two older sisters’ generation. In our tradition, if the sisters didn’t get married, their brothers are responsible of them financially after their dad. The second and younger generation was his kids; he established a good base for us to start from. As a result of his absence, the pressure of raising us was mostly on my mom. She sacrificed her job as a psychiatrist in order to bring up her kids. I think she did a great job because she was always there for us. Still, we felt the gap of his vacancy. I remember myself pretending that I had some math problems, which meant waiting for my father late into the night to help me solve them. In fact I was longing to see more of him.
The third effect was when my dad started to feel sick and quit his stressful job. He had a problem with blood pressure. And in the memory of his dad who died at a young age because of high blood pressure, he decided that it was time to go back to Syria. For him it meant retirement, but for us it was more like a fresh beginning. It wasn’t an easy transition; I was in high school by then, and my brother and sister were in college. However, we were very excited to be close to each other once again.
The economical evolution in the history of the Arabian Golf caused an economical boost in my family life too. My dad had a good retirement. We went to colleges that where fancy and not everybody could afford. Still I can’t feel completely positive about this experience because of the life quality we lost. However, I think my parents didn’t have better choice. In fact, it was tough in different ways. However, we got the ripened fruits at the end.