Dreams Of A Refugee

Dreams of a Refugee is the extraordinary story of Mostafa Salameh, born in Kuwait to Palestinian refugees. After a childhood in the camps and a series of low-paid jobs, Mostafa was given a rare opportunity to travel to London, working in hospitality at the Jordanian Embassy. From there he moved to Edinburgh, where he took up a life of parties and nightclubbing. Religion played no part in his thinking. All this was to change. One night, Mostafa awoke having dreamt that he was standing at the top of the world reciting the adhan, the Muslim call to prayer. He took this as a sign that he needed to accomplish something previously unimaginable for a person in his position – to climb Everest. Despite having no prior mountaineering experience, Mostafa sought help from friends and sponsors and, having failed twice, finally summited Everest on Jordanian Independence Day, May 25th 2008. He went on to become the first Jordanian to climb all 'Seven Summits' and reach the North Pole. In early 2016 he skied to the South Pole, via a new route, completing the elite 'Explorer's Grand Slam' and joining a club of only thirteen adventurers ever to have achieved this feat. Yet exploring is only part of the story. Now a devout Muslim, Mostafa is committed to spreading the message of tolerant Islam, working with refugees and young people to help them further their goals. Through climbing he has raised hundreds of thousands of pounds for charity. His future projects include leading an all-female attempt on Everest, as well as numerous charitable climbs and leadership programmes. Mostafa is also a regular public speaker both in the UK, Middle East and further afield. This new paperback edition of Dreams of a Refugee includes a foreword by His Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan, as well as photographs of Mostafa's climbs and his charitable work. Entertaining, inspiring, and often surprising, Mostafa is honest about both the positive aspects of his life and its past excesses, and discusses his discovery of Muslim faith. His message ultimately is a simple one: 'Each of us has an Everest inside us, which we each can summit, if only we dare to dream'.

Dark Dreams: Australian refugee stories' is a unique anthology of essays, interviews, and stories written by children and young adults. The stories are the finest of hundreds collected through a nationwide schools competition in 2002. The essays and stories represent many different countries and themes. Some focus on survival, some on horrors, some on the experiences and alienation of a new world. This book will have a a key role to play in schools across Australia.

This volume explores the shared expectations that education is a panacea for the difficulties that refugees and their receiving countries face. This book investigates the ways in which education is both a dream solution as well as a contested landscape for refugee families and students. Using comparative, cross-national perspectives across five continents, the editors and contributors critically analyze the educational structures, policies, and practices intended to support refugee youth transition from conflict and post-conflict zones to mainstream classrooms and schools in their new communities.

Because of war and tragedy, Amira's life dramatically changed. Finding themselves in a Refugee Camp, Amira and her mother worked tirelessly in the fields, just to survive. It was their only choice. An existence very different to the life they once led years before, back in Syria. But Amira had hope and dreams. She dared not to give up and she begged her mother to allow her to study in the nearby UN-funded school. To attend the school, however, she would need to make many great sacrifices. Will Amira realise her dreams and goals? and will she ever feel happiness again?

The award-winning, #1 New York Times bestselling novel from Alan Gratz tells the timely--and timeless--story of three different kids seeking refuge. A New York Times bestseller! JOSEF is a Jewish boy living in 1930s Nazi Germany. With the threat of concentration camps looming, he and his family board a ship bound for the other side of the world... ISABEL is a Cuban girl in 1994. With riots and unrest plaguing her country, she and her family set out on a raft, hoping to find safety in America... MAHMOUD is a Syrian boy in 2015. With his homeland torn apart by violence and destruction, he and his family begin a long trek toward Europe... All three kids go on harrowing journeys in search of refuge. All will face unimaginable dangers -- from drownings to bombings to betrayals. But there is always the hope of tomorrow. And although Josef, Isabel, and Mahmoud are separated by continents and decades, shocking connections will tie their stories together in the end. As powerful and poignant as it is action-packed and page-turning, this highly acclaimed novel has been on the New York Times bestseller list for more than four years and continues to change readers' lives with its meaningful takes on survival, courage, and the quest for home.

Written by children and young adults and selected from a nationwide school competition, this anthology of essays, interviews, comments and short stories imaginatively recreates the experiences of young individuals who came to Australia as refugees. From escaping the Holocaust and surviving terrible boat journeys from Vietnam to persevering war-torn Croatia and Bosnia and fleeing oppression in Afghanistan and Iraq, these stories provide a representative sample of the various backgrounds and amazing experiences of asylum seekers in Australia over the last 50 years. Written with both the humor and innocence of children and the frank compassion of young adults, the recurrent theme of friendships that have been lost, broken, remembered, and found emerge as these young asylum seekers relive their escapes and relate their experiences fleeing to a new world.

A touching memoir recounting the journey of a young Cuban immigrant to the US who went on to become a professor and university dean. In February 1962, three years into Fidel Castro’s rule of their Cuban homeland, the González family—an auto mechanic, his wife, and two young children—landed in Miami with a few personal possessions and two bottles of Cuban rum. As his parents struggled to find work, eleven-year-old Gerardo struggled to fit in at school, where a teacher intimidated him and school authorities placed him on a vocational track. Inspired by a close friend, Gerardo decided to go to college. He not only graduated but, with hard work and determination, placed himself on a path through higher education that brought him to a deanship at the Indiana University School of Education. In this deeply moving memoir, González recounts his remarkable personal and professional journey. The memoir begins with Gerardo’s childhood in Cuba and recounts the family’s emigration to the United States and struggles to find work and assimilate, and González’s upward track through higher education. It demonstrates the transformative power that access to education can have on one person’s life. Gerardo’s journey came full circle when he returned to Cuba fifty years after he left, no longer the scared, disheartened refugee but rather proud, educated, and determined to speak out against those who wished to silence others. It includes treasured photographs and documents from González’s life in Cuba and the US. His is the story of one immigrant attaining the American Dream, told at a time when the fate of millions of refugees throughout the world, and Hispanics in the United States, especially his fellow Cubans, has never been more uncertain. “Author and educator Gerardo M. González brilliantly illustrates the joys and struggles of the refugee experience, and the inarguable role of education as an open door to opportunity. This is a delightful read, and one that will inspire you to achieve greatness regardless of the odds.” —Dr. Eduardo J. Padrón, President, Miami Dade College “There can be no more persuasive testimony to the power of intelligence, commitment, and inspiration than Gerardo M. González’s memoir. The contribution of immigrants to America’s prosperity and national achievements is undeniably impressive. Yet, this transformational story of challenge and achievement, while individually exceptional, is nonetheless emblematic of the experience of countless immigrants who have made America better than it could otherwise have been. No finer antidote to the simplistic sloganeering of the immigration debate exists.” —John V. Lombardi, President Emeritus, University of Florida, and author of How Universities Work

Written by children and young adults and selected from a nationwide school competition, this anthology of essays, interviews, comments and short stories imaginatively recreates the experiences of young individuals who came to Australia as refugees. From escaping the Holocaust and surviving terrible boat journeys from Vietnam to persevering war-torn Croatia and Bosnia and fleeing oppression in Afghanistan and Iraq, these stories provide a representative sample of the various backgrounds and amazing experiences of asylum seekers in Australia over the last 50 years. Written with both the humor and innocence of children and the frank compassion of young adults, the recurrent theme of friendships that have been lost, broken, remembered, and found emerge as these young asylum seekers relive their escapes and relate their experiences fleeing to a new world.