‘It is not a healthy world:’ we spoke to a Syrian student threatened by Trump’s executive order

Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration has sparked widespread outrage across Brown’s campus as students from the seven targeted countries find their educational opportunities threatened.

A graduate student studying film and the arts, Maya*, came to Brown from Syria to continue her studies in culture and the arts. She luckily came back to Providence before the signing of the executive order but faces an uncertain future. Similarly, a Syrian public health masters student was not as fortunate, and remains stranded in Turkey.

Speaking to The Tab, she recounts her story and how the executive order has threatened her time at Brown.

 What was life like in Syria and how has coming to Brown helped with your personal and career goals?

I study and work in the field of art. After the war in Syria, culture and arts were affected negatively, and it became so hard to continue what we were building.

Basic needs like forgetting death, food, warmth, and electricity were controlling us. But many people tried hard to keep hope in the future and find a way to resist death inside or outside Syria.

Studying at Brown is a dream come true. It gave me more courage and insistence to continue in such a crucial and controversial career. Also, it is giving me the chance to touch many professional experiences that I couldn’t have the possibility to deal with before.

Taken by Maya during her time in Syria

Have the recent executive orders threatened your goals or those of your family? 

The executive orders threaten the dream of continuing my graduate studies, which was already interrupted many times because of the war in Syria. The orders also prevent me from the right of moving freely.

I was planning to meet my family in Europe, but I cannot do that, because if I went outside they will not let me in and my Syrian family is unwelcome here.

How did you feel when you first heard about these executive orders?

The recent orders affected me psychologically. I totally understand how many people don’t welcome us. But when the law starts to support this attitude, it turns into a scary situation. It is not a healthy world when human beings thicken barriers between each other. This style of discourse tells us that we don’t have rights here.

Has film and theater helped process or deal with any of the political turmoil you’ve felt throughout your life and how so?

I believe that arts and culture are the best way to override all troubles. During the war in Syria, I chose to express myself through art and use it to give hope for others. These are the best tools to deliver the message of humanity to next generations.

What I understood after the war is that we need art now more than any other time. We need it as we need food and peace. Art itself also can make peace.

Taken by Maya during her time in Syria

How has the executive order impacted your family or people you know from Syria?

The executive order implies that the citizens of these countries are terrorists. As if saying that these countries are responsible for the failure of politics in the world. We, in Syria, are victims of terrorism. Wars happened everywhere and caused harm to innocent people, but this doesn’t mean that all people are terrorists.

What is unique and ambitious about the United States is its diversity and being an international place, so I wish this continues. We dream about a peaceful world that shortens the borders between us, not building new walls.

I’d like to say to my friends at Brown that I was impressed a lot by their reactions, and being in a community that supports multiculturalism gives me hope and feeling of safety

*Maya’s name was changed to keep her anonymity