I come from generations of working class people. My grandparents as well as my parents grew up and lived in Albania during the communist regime of Enver Hoxha. The country had jobs and prosperity but it was a very limiting time during which those who wanted to pursue or be anything outside of the norm were heavily persecuted. My paternal grandmother for a example was a Kaloshi, a family that had been “wealthy” by the standards of the time before the communist regime— this just meant they owned more land for planting or more cows— so when the the communist regime gained control of the country my grandmother’s family was “marked” which meant they had more difficulty getting jobs or marrying off their daughters, because who would want to marry the daughter of a family that the dictator’s party did not approve of— in fact as strange as it may seem to me now my grandmother often tells me that she was shunned by her in-laws for her family name. Her husband, my grandfather, was an ambulance driver, who did his best to support his family until he died in his late forties, leaving my grandmother to take care of their five children with the salary that she made as a cooperative farmer working on the fields and with the cows. She has always been a tough woman and for as long as I could remember I have always seen my grandmother with her cows right behind her either heading to the field early in the morning or coming back home.

My maternal grandparents were slightly better off living in the city; after a few years of serving as an officer in the army, my grandfather became a tailor, and my grandmother along with my mom and her sisters worked in factories.  None of my grandparents got a college education, in fact my grandmother only attended school for 4 years, but they cared for their children the best way they could and they instilled in them family values that have been passed down to me.

Both my parents describe their lives during the communist era as not having much but no one really did so it couldn’t really be considered being poor since there were no rich people to compare to. Communism did however provide school, training and jobs for everyone that could work. My father did his military training, as all boys were required at the time, and then became an apprentice for a carpenter. After high school my mother trained to be a pediatric nurse and continued to work in that field for seventeen years. My parents married at the end of the communist era and my brother and I were born in the early years of democracy in Albania, which were really hectic times politically, although Albania’s political system has yet to reach a stable and reliable state that isn’t ridden by corruption and bribing.

I grew up in Albania, in a family with a middle class income, with my grandmother the farmer, my grandfather the tailor, my mother the nurse, and my father the carpenter who ran his own business, and they all taught me that education was important; I was encouraged by my family and teachers to do my best and succeed in my studies, however it wasn’t long before I had to leave Albania and come to America and start a completely new life. My parents had to give up their family members, their social circle, their jobs, and home to start over again. As children we did not have as much trouble adjusting, with our parents providing everything we needed we were able to learn English and continue our schooling without any trouble. My father has worked two jobs since the day he moved here and not having had the privilege of attending college he’s had to make through life with manual labor. Regardless of their own difficulties my parents have always had a positive outlook on life and taught us that with hard work anything can be achieved. They haven’t had any particular influence in their community and they do not come from prominent or privileged families but they’ve ensured that their children get all the opportunities they deserve. My father especially has instilled in all of us the value of hard work. He has a funny expression that he uses all the time when he complains about us not doing enough or trusting the system that rips you off too much, it’s that “I mencuri mendon gjith naten se si ta haje budallin,” which roughly translates to a smart person stays up all night thinking about how to profit from stupid people. He uses this argument when he tells my brother that video games are a waste of life and when he encourages us to be more mindful of our financial decisions.

Choosing to be on the pre-med track, although supported by my parents, was not influenced by their desires for me to be financially stable and have a high paying job but rather by my experiences throughout childhood. I have never been particularly passionate about anything but growing up with my mom as a pediatric nurse I was always in the hospital and have always enjoyed being there. I also have a great love for children and caring for people’s well being in general and that is what led me down this path. I don’t know of any doctors in my family but it is my family’s values of hard work that most likely stemmed from the communist regime in Albania that have gotten me to the point in my life that I am in right now and I am grateful and proud to have been raised by the people that I was.