Tracey Anderson – författare

The contrast between how the West views newcomers versus how immigrants picture themselves is stark. New residents in Canada and the US are often misunderstood, disrespected, or poorly labeled due to inaccurate assumptions and stereotypes held by all parties. What does it take to attend university in a second or third language? What are the common denominators amongst people arriving in the West wanting to pursue "the American dream"? What are the impacts of cultural and social adjustments, academic and professional advancement? How do new Canadians and Americans maneuver through prejudices and discrimination coming from not only those born on western soil but also from other immigrants?

My Silver Lining, volume three of a three-volume memoir, is a window into the hurdles that settlers face and the support they get from those who welcome immigrants to their new chosen homelands. Peer through this window by reading the story of a young man who navigated from Ethiopia and Yemen to the US and Canada to establish his identity and purpose. The story shows how Adel Ben-Harhara succeeded after leaving behind everything he knew and attempted to embrace an unknown way of life on a new continent.

What happened to one of the oldest nations on Earth, the cradle of Arabian civilization, the home of the Biblical Queen of Sheba, consort of King Solomon? Yemen, with ties to the Semitic lands to its north and to the cultures of the Horn of Africa across the Red Sea, is frozen in time and still practicing medieval traditions. Illiteracy and constant tribal conflicts serve as catalysts in suppressing development and modernization, keeping the country and surrounding areas suspicious and threatening.

Hope in the Sky, Volume 2 of a three-volume autobiography, speaks about millions of Yemen''s Muwalladin (foreign-born Yemenis) struggling for equal rights and citizenship. One young man spent a dozen years in Yemen, where he suffered from prejudice, discrimination, and the effects of civil war. He endured harsh treatment because he wore dark skin, was born in East Africa and was unable to assimilate into an underdeveloped society living according to primitive cultural traditions.

He stood strong and managed to depart his ancestors'' country, not because he was tough but because he had no choice.

Care to uncover the inner circle of Yemeni lives through the struggles of a sixteen-year boy who immigrated to his ancestors'' land? Read on.

Adel Ben-Harhara is a certified Professional Project Manager. He holds a master''s degree in Business Administration (MBA) and an undergraduate degree in technology/engineering. Over the past 30 years, he has worked in multiple industries including high tech, health care, engineering, oil and gas, and international aid. He has also taught management courses at a local college.

A proud father of two daughters, Adel has run over twenty marathons and, as an avid hiker, has conquered countless mountain peaks worldwide including Mount Kilimanjaro.

When life is defined and debated through sound bites and social media, who would want to read a story about a boy who traversed multiple cultures, languages, religions, and geographical areas?

To Have Nothing, the first volume of Adel Ben-Harhara''s three-volume memoir, delves into the voyage of a boy who was separated from his mother as a toddler and was essentially orphaned at the age of five when his father died. With his mother''s inability to provide support, the boy was homeless, often left on the streets between the ages of eight and eleven. How did he survive?

The boy was born in Addis Ababa to a poverty-stricken, fifteen-year-old Ethiopian mother and a wealthy fifty-year-old businessman, who was a retired British soldier from the Middle East.

As a child, the boy received extensive religious teachings in Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. As an adolescent Marxist in Ethiopia, he was imprisoned for taking part in a communist party youth movement and barely avoided the death squad''s bullets before moving to his ancestors'' land: Yemen.

This is the story of that boy, an inspiring tale of perseverance and survival.