Hope interrupted

As a teenager, Ali felt at home here, slushing slurpies while listening to customers8217; stories. Outside work, Ali worked out, raced cars and chased girls. He saved up to soup up an old Mustang. He dated a 8220;smoking8221; Puerto Rican waitress who worked at the local 8220;Hooters8221;. She dubbed him her 8220;Amor Ali.8221;

Then one morning the New York skyline sparked and filled with black smoke. A day of numbness followed before 8220;fear, sadness and anger8221; settled in: fear of more; sadness for friends who lost loves; and 8220;anger that someone had done this8221; and his life might change because of it.

Things started changing quietly. No one attacked Ali verbally or physically. Anger just floated. Officer Cooksie took special care to protect Ali8217;s 7-Eleven, but even the officer, who Ali had known for years, 8220;seemed suspicious, on edge around me8221; unsure what to do with his emotions.

One Saturday afternoon in mid-October the conversation turned to tracking the Taliban. Ali joined the discussion and spoke about the difficulty of dislodging dispersed fighters in the Afghan hills. To this one boy replied, 8220;Our pilots got itchy fingers and we8217;ll shoot at anything that moves. It doesn8217;t matter.8221; The group laughed and Ali joined in, tucking away his horror as he rang them up. He had never been to Pakistan or Afghanistan, but now more than ever he felt some connection.

Meanwhile Ali headed off to Baruch College in New York to study finance. There for the first time he started socialising with other Pakistani Americans his age. It was easy. The pressure to fit in was off. Without realising how or when it happened, Ali8217;s whole social network changed. His closest friends became exclusively Pakistani Americans. He only dated South Asians.

8220;I felt defensive after it all,8221; explains Ali. 8220;I felt like people expected me to apologise for something I didn8217;t even do.8221; Ali put up the American flag on his storefront and was careful with what he said, always trying to make it clear he was with America, not the other guys. He carried his patriotism like a shield, but after a while his arm got tired. 8220;Is England or Canada any better?8221; he asks me.

It8217;s getting late and we go to meet Ali8217;s mom. 8220;Why would you ever leave?8221; she asks us, sounding suspiciously like my own mother who hates the idea of me traveling outside of the country she worked so hard to get into. 8220;You can make any future you want here.8221;

I noticed then another form of patriotism opening up before us, not a defensive one designed to deflect accusatory arrows but an aspirational one, filled with the hope that brought these immigrants to America decades ago.