12 Sara Hassan

Narrative Summary

I began my interview with Taissir by asking her to tell me about her life in Sudan prior to her migration journey. I asked about what her life was like and what she liked the most about living back home. She started by saying her thanks to God as she said she has lived a pleasant life. Her favorite thing was that she was an extremely active individual in Sudan.
She constantly filled her time by painting and producing art work, as well as arranging organizations and initiatives that empowered women and brought attention to gender-based discrimination. Taissir described that these activities were very rewarding and have instilled a strong sense of self-worth within her. Afterwards, I asked her if she faced any struggles as an expressive woman artist under the brutal regime of the deposed dictator Omar Al-Bashir. She spoke about the ruthless suppression that any artist, writer, journalist, or thinker has faced under the cruel governmental regime. She spoke about how difficult it was to get across any work that had the slightest criticism of the government. She talked about how she always felt some constraints and was never able to fully express herself without a great deal of hassle. After this, I asked about her journey to the United States and what steps she has taken in order to reach here. Taissir was an art professor at a University in Sudan, but life was getting too restraining under Bashir’s government, and so she applied to teach at a University in Saudi Arabia. She got accepted and worked there for two years. However, she did not yet feel free in Saudi Arabia and mentioned that she faced a lot of difficulties during her time there. Taissir then went back to Sudan and applied for an Art Conference in New York City. She said she got accepted in 2015, and has not gone back to Sudan ever since. I asked about her preconceived notions of the United States. She said the first thing that came to her mind back then was the Statue of Liberty! Additionally, she always heard about how the United States was the land of the free, that it was a country of open-mindedness, where you have freedom of thought and expression, and it was also a country where women’s rights were preserved. I asked if there was anything that surprised her about life in the United States. She mentioned that life here was really hard. What made it especially difficult was that she had to start over from scratch as her degrees were not considered adequate here. Although she has her Masters’ degree and had begun her PhD back in Sudan, but here, her education levels were considered as equivalent to a high school diploma. I asked where she had lived in the United States. Taissir had started off in New York when she first came to attend the conference, she then moved to live with her aunt in Michigan, and then moved again to Iowa, which is where she has been living for 3 years now. I asked about how her asylum interview went, how she felt and how she prepared for it. She said she had to wait a very long time to get an interview – 4 years to be exact. She had gone to a lawyer, written her case, and got someone to translate her documents. She had gone to the interview the first time and unfortunately, they had cancelled on her after she arrived there. They asked her to come again after 15 days. But that did not happen. She came again 5 months later. She had her interview, but they did not let her know about the results at the time. She said it took a long time until her results were revealed and her status was finally approved. I asked her to tell me about her highest and lowest moments during her migration journey. She said the saddest thing was that she was always haunted by thoughts about how she should have been with her family and friends. Taissir’s sister passed away and she was not able to go back home and attend the funeral. She said her highest moment was hearing that the oppressive regime in Sudan had fallen, and she wished she was back home to celebrate with her family. I asked about how she finds strength in times of difficulty. Taissir said that patience is a very important virtue. She also said she had an amazing support system of friends here in Iowa City that help ease her pain and bring joy into her life. I asked what factors made her migration especially difficult. She said the biggest thing was language. She wished she could speak English fluently. I asked what she missed the most from back home. She said it was her family and friends. She said she dreams of them almost every night. I asked if she had a special object she had brought back with her from Sudan. She said she had the Sudanese traditional Toub as well as photographs of her friends and family. I asked if there was anything she would have done differently had she gone back in time. She said she was not sure. There are many times where she found herself thinking about whether or not she had made the right decision; was it weakness from her part for running away and coming to the United States? Was she right or wrong in her decision?

Lastly, I asked about her vision for the future. She said she wondered about that herself. Sometimes she has ideas about going back to school here, but then feeling discouraged that she has to start over again.

Personal Reflection

My interview with Taissir has been eye-opening to say the very least. This is due to the fact that Taissir is a very close family friend, as well as my neighbor. I see her almost on a daily basis. Taissir is known for her warm smile and her great sense of humor.

And so, what surprised me the most about this interview was the sense of longing and aching in her answers, which came about so easily. I always thought that I had a good understanding of Taissir’s migration story, but it has occurred to me that there are so many emotions I wasn’t aware of. And that there is much more that has not been expressed to me. This truly brought to my awareness the trauma and the emotional turmoil that occurs within people experiencing migration.

This is important to me because it got me thinking about how refugees’ mental health is often neglected in discourses surrounding migration. When I asked Taissir about how she finds strength in times of difficulties, she mentioned that she doesn’t think there is anything more difficult moving forward than what she has already seen in her life.

It is almost as there is a threshold of pain and she has reached it. As she was speaking, I thought about how pain and trauma can be numbing and desensitizing.

Another thing that I reflected upon thoroughly following my interview was the sense of discouragement that refugees feel in the country in which they are resettled.

Taissir is a remarkable icon in Sudan. She has a solid education and immense experience in her field. She has a Masters’ degree from the College of Fine Art and Textiles in Sudan University. But she talked about how her degrees mean nothing to the people here. This made me envision myself in her position and that would personally do great damage to my self-esteem. I thought about spending years and years in school, achieving all these wonderful work opportunities, arranging nation-wide workshops, organizations, conferences, and talks; accumulating all these incredible experiences – for them to not be recognized in the place where I live.

Lastly, hearing about Taissir’s resistance in the face of Omar Al-Bashir’s regime will always be one of the most inspiring stories I will ever hear.

Taissir has been beaten and arrested for creating “secular” art work in a back then Islamist state. She is a firm believer in art and has always been committed to her principles and her essence. This is wildly fascinating to me because I have always been deeply interested in the power of art in sparking and mobilizing revolutions.