Every time I visit my grandparents in their huge house in Blaine, I hear a broken record. “I’m so happy you’ll go be a doctor… Read More

Misguided saviors trying to save a simple Muslim girl but they can’t seem to comprehend that I don’t need to be saved, for I have… Read More

I look around, seeing two naked Turkana women carrying a pile of wood above their heads. Sacred red paint covers their bodies. Heavy and large… Read More

The heat pressed against my skin on a humid June afternoon. Carrying change in one hand and bubble tea in the other, my grandmother and… Read More

When I was 12, I declared war on my skin. I spent years squeezing, pinching, poking and feeling pain. I felt beautiful on the inside,… Read More

“Tu hermana tiene autismo.” “Your sister has autism.” Those four words changed my life. In the fall of 2015, my parents, my two sisters and… Read More

“He’s coming,” I told my mom as we looked out of the glass patio door at home, waiting for my dad. “He’s just running late.”… Read More

As I unfolded on the cold, hard ground behind the gym bleachers with tears rolling down my eyes, I sensed that I didn’t belong. Earlier… Read More

I landed in Cairo at a revolutionary time. It was a hot day in Tahrir Square, the birthplace of the Egyptian Revolution. Cars honked, trash… Read More

In the summer of 2012, my childhood friend Ayaanle and I were exploring our dusty and blazing hot Ethiopian refugee camp when suddenly, we heard… Read More

For a couple of years in my early childhood, I regularly slept at night in a car. I would lie in the backseat, my legs… Read More

A 10-year-old girl beats on a wooden drum under the blazing, yellow sun: One, two, one, two, one-two-three-four. Powerful lungs sound the white and orange… Read More

I was only 16 years old. Yet I was down on my knees, changing the diaper of an 89-year-old Vietnamese man. Every day when I… Read More

Once a year, my mom and I take a road trip to the same winding road along the St. Croix River, to the town of… Read More

Imagine being in a classroom where everyone else is in on a secret, except you. What you hear is silence, but their stares say it… Read More