From Syria to Jersey City, Against All Odds

No time to pack or say goodbye, the Al Roustom family fled one of Syria's hardest hit cities, becoming among the lucky few to arrive in America

Syrian refugees Hussam Al Roustom and his wife Suha in their home in Jersey City, New Jersey, on Nov. 9, 2015. They left Homs, Syria in 2013 with their two small children. (Samira Bouaou/Epoch Times)

Suha shows a photo of her and her new friends in Jersey City. (Amelia Pang/Epoch Times)

Five months on, the children are in school and Al Roustom works overnight baking pita bread at a bakery in Ridgefield, N.J.

Since all their photographs were left behind in Syria, a lone tennis racket hangs on their apartment wall in place of pictures. They have been too busy to take and print new ones. 

Al Roustom tries to make use of every moment. Although he leaves for work at 8 p.m. and doesn’t come home until 9 a.m., he refuses to be an absent father. 

He curtails his sleep in order to check his children’s homework and play Super Mario video games with them.

Al Roustom also squeezed in time to attend a recent Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on security and the U.S. refugee program. He met with lawmakers and advocated for more resources for Syrian refugees. He said it felt surreal, to go from a refugee camp with no water or electricity to the floor of Congress.

Al Roustom was invited to go to Washington to speak with lawmakers again on Nov. 13. 

“I’m a star,” he joked in English.

So accustomed to glowering, laughing or joking still feels foreign to Al Roustom. But he is slowly getting used to it. He smiles whenever he watches his 3-year-old daughter and 7-year-old son play in a park. 

“They didn’t play in a park for five years,” he said. “It’s very difficult to laugh or smile. But I always do when I see my children playing.”

Nadia Ghattas contributed to this report.