Nearly five years ago in Feb. of 2008, junior Aisha Malik immigrated to America from Karachi, Pakistan.
Malik was only a little kid when she and her brother moved here with her parents. When they came here, they lived with her uncle for about a month, attempting to adapt to the new American cultures they had never experienced before.
For Malik, the new environment in America was a huge change, but she wasn’t blown away by any of it.
“Pretty much everything about America was different: the weather, the language, people, houses, clothing, even the streets. Honestly, I wasn’t really surprised by much. I’d seen too much TV as a child to be shocked by much here,” Malik said.
It didn’t take Malik and her family to a lot settle down in America. Once they got their own apartment, everything just fell into place.
As for language barriers, Malik insists that she actually did not have any trouble. Schools in Pakistan teach students English starting from preschool, so she already knew how to speak and write in English just as much as she knew Urdu. The issue Malik faced with language was the idea of having actual conversations with people in English, since she wasn’t very used to it. However, according to Malik, it became easy for her once she got the hang of it.
Keeping her Pakistani culture alive, Malik eats Pakistani food almost everyday. Along with the food, Malik also wears the traditional Pakistani clothing, the salwar kameez, on special occasions such as Eid. She and her family sometimes spend their free time watching Pakistani TV as well.
“I don’t think most people in my family, including me, will ever get used to eating ‘American’ food,” Malik said. Her favorite dish is biryani, which is flavored rice with many spices and herbs mixed with cooked chicken, beef, or lamb. However, Malik has found that nothing here beats the biryani she would have in Pakistan.
Today, Malik is a very involved and innovative student here at Niles West. She is currently taking APUSH and other honors classes, such as physics and math analysis. She created gardening club and is also a member of the Color Guard. Last year, she was rewarded the You Make a Difference award for her determination towards gardening club.
Even though she loves living here in America, Malik still misses her homeland. She loves Pakistan because of all the memories she has, since most of her childhood was spent there.
“While Pakistan seems like a pretty violent place, and it is, there’s so much more to it. I can’t really describe it, but there’s something about it I will always love no matter how bad everything there gets. Maybe it’s because I was born there and most of my best memories are from there. Nevertheless, I will always love and miss Pakistan,” she said.
