"Al-Shabab Awalan" Presents: Najah Diaries: Taqiyoul's Story
9 Jun 2008 in Education, Employment
"Al-Shabab Awalan" ("Youth First") series will share five Najah success stories in Point of View. The final story in this series features Taqiyoun Deen Badarneh, a young man initially ashamed by his farmer father, who changes his views and decides to contribute to the family business instead of looking for work overseas.
I’m a 21 year-old man… I did not complete my secondary education, and I never even tried to look for a job in my life! I’ve always had this exciting dream of traveling to the Arab Gulf… I was waiting for this dream to come true, and I did not even realize that dreams will never come true unless we work on them! How can I travel and find a decent job when I don’t have the minimum qualifications?! How can I enter the job market when I do not have the skills to do any job?! Who, in the Gulf, would even think to hire me just to fulfill my dreams?
My father asked me to help him run our small farm. I refused! I did not want to even consider doing such a humble job. I never thought that I would work in agriculture or farming… I had my dream; a dream that would make me proud! And don’t ask me about my dream, because I wasn’t sure what it was all about! But I know, it was nothing close to my father’s job… That job was shameful, in my eyes and in the eyes of my friends… Farming! No way… not for me… I had something else in mind.
When I heard of Najah, I thought that it would get me closer to fulfilling my dreams and traveling to the Gulf! I figured I would benefit from the IT and English language trainings, in addition to other skills… Then, my travel would be guaranteed! Najah could be my passport out into my dreams…
I joined the program, and our journey started… I began to realize that the problems were not all in my community… they were related to me as a person! As a young man, like other young men, I thought that running away from my problems was the solution! With every activity we did in the training room, I was getting closer to facing the reality I was evading… I started realizing that I was responsible for my future… I am the one to blame for seeing things negatively.
"Our misconceptions of the shame and our lack of appreciation for our culture were created by our misguided minds. In reality, our culture respects work… work is a kind of worshiping."
As the days went by, even my parents were noticing the changes… I was becoming a different person; a mature, aware and responsible man waking up from a bad dream into a more positive reality! I learned that my reactions should be mature, and that dreams need awareness to be achieved… We got down to the job market in Irbid… there we saw the truth… unemployment was of our own making. Jobs were there; we simply could not see or seek what was available… we did not know how to find these jobs… We could not accept what was available inside our country, although many of us would not mind cleaning the dishes anywhere outside Jordan.
Our excuse was that our community underestimated those who worked in such jobs, while other communities did not judge them… we were back to blaming our community… Now, the dream of traveling became less dominant… The dream was changing… Part of the training was to carry out a voluntary activity in order to develop a sense of responsibility towards the community in which we live. This activity was carried out in the S.O.S village and it was during the Holy Month of Ramadan. We identified the needs of the orphans. We promoted those needs inside the private sector. We advocated for those needs. We ran an awareness campaign… Everybody we approached listened, understood and cooperated! They all participated and donated something. The orphans felt acknowledged. There was a smile on each face; there was love in their eyes… I looked around me and suddenly I realized why I loved this country… How could I even think of leaving it!!! I would stay to work here. I finally have found the road to my future…
Now, I work with my father in our farm… I have the skills to develop it with excellence. I would work hard in order to manage the resources and make them grow. I leaned how to respect the rules. I learned how to respect my new manager who is my father. He is now my employer. There is a new level of discussion between us… There is a new language of negotiation. I can now put up a plan to determine what goals I need to achieve and how to assess them.
We were blaming our culture! I discovered that the culture should not be blamed… Our misconceptions of the shame and our lack of appreciation for our culture were created by our misguided minds. In reality, our culture respects work… work is a kind of worshiping.
I now work in my father’s farm, I raise herds, I live in Irbid and I am a very proud young Jordanian living in his home town where everybody should live and work!
Taqiyoul Deen Badarneh
Najah - Irbid
