Being born in a refugee camp means entering the world through conflict, displacement, and uncertainty. For many refugees, survival becomes part of childhood long before concepts such as stability, security, or opportunity are ever understood. Refugee camps are not simply temporary shelters. They are environments where poverty, fear, trauma, and political conflict shape everyday life and leave lasting effects on entire generations.
I was born in an Iraqi refugee camp during the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein’s regime. Before I could understand politics, borders, or war, my life had already been shaped by their consequences. As a Kurd, I was born into displacement, oppression, and the aftermath of genocide against the Kurdish people.
For many people around the world, refugee camps are distant images seen on television screens or in humanitarian campaigns. For me, a refugee camp was the beginning of life.
The reason my family ended up in a refugee camp was because we were Kurdish. My parents were born in Eastern Kurdistan, a Kurdish region occupied by Iran. During the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, they were forced to flee their homeland because of their Kurdish identity. Alongside nearly 60,000 other Kurdish families, they fled to Iraq and were placed in refugee camps with little to no access to food, clean water, shelter, or other basic necessities. Conditions only began to improve after assistance from the United Nations eventually reached the camps.
My parents spent nearly twenty years living under those conditions. It was there that some of my siblings and I were born and spent our early childhood before immigrating to Canada as refugees in search of safety and opportunity.
Life inside the refugee camp was marked by severe poverty, instability, and discrimination. Kurdish families were often treated as outsiders and faced hostility simply because of their identity. My family was particularly targeted because my parents did not practice religion and chose to raise their children without being tied to any faith, believing that religion should be a personal choice made later in life. In the end, none of my siblings chose to follow a religion, and we all remained atheists while continuing to respect the beliefs and practices of others. In an environment where religious conformity was heavily enforced, this often led to additional hostility, intimidation, and social isolation.
Fear, hardship, and intimidation became normalized parts of everyday life. Even as children, we experienced systems designed to suppress identity and enforce conformity. In school, we were forced to study the Quran in Arabic despite not speaking or understanding the language, and students were often punished harshly for failing to properly read or memorize passages.
Although life in the refugee camp was already defined by poverty and hardship, the most painful experience was the loss of my younger brother during childhood. Witnessing his death at such a young age became one of the most defining and traumatic moments of my life, leaving a lasting impact that continues to shape me to this day.
Immigrating to Canada did not immediately end those struggles. My family arrived in Canada in the early 2000s, and adjusting to life here was not easy. For several years, we faced discrimination, racism, and hostility because of our background and appearance despite coming to Canada as refugees fleeing persecution, dictatorship, and radical Islam. Learning a new language, adapting to a completely different society, and rebuilding our lives from nothing while carrying years of trauma was extremely difficult for my family.
However, Canada also provided something my family had never fully experienced before: freedom, safety, and opportunity.
My father always used to say, “Canada gave you a second chance at life, so it is up to you how you choose to live it.” Despite all the hardship and discrimination we faced growing up in Canada, he constantly reminded us that our difficult experiences did not define Canada as a whole. He would often say that just because we lived in a poor neighborhood and experienced racism did not mean all Canadians shared those attitudes. According to his philosophy, the only way to truly experience the opportunities Canada had to offer was through hard work, perseverance, and refusing to see ourselves as victims despite everything we had endured as former refugees.
Growing up, that mindset shaped my outlook on life. It taught me that no matter how difficult the circumstances were, nothing could prevent me from pursuing my goals and building a better future for myself and future generations. Canada was a country filled with opportunities, and I was determined to make the most of them.
I went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Alberta and a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from the University of British Columbia. After graduating, I worked with the provincial government of British Columbia, where I supported vulnerable individuals in Vancouver struggling with poverty, homelessness, and addiction.
Because politics had always been deeply connected to my life as both a Kurd and a former refugee, I knew from an early age that I wanted to pursue a career in public service and become a voice for communities seeking better representation and opportunity from their government. That path eventually led me to work on Parliament Hill with the Conservative Party of Canada as a policy advisor for nearly half a decade.
During the last Canadian federal election, I also became one of the first Kurdish women in North America to run for federal office as a nomination candidate for the Conservative Party of Canada. While the outcome was not what I had hoped for, the experience revealed many of the challenges minority women can still face in politics.
Throughout the process, I experienced discrimination while door knocking and campaigning. My Conservative opponent spread false rumors about me, including claims that I was “pro-Hamas” and a “Muslim” immigrant, despite those accusations being entirely baseless. Unfortunately, many people believed these narratives simply because I was an immigrant woman with a Middle Eastern background. The experience was deeply disappointing and demonstrated how prejudice and misinformation can still shape political discourse, even within democratic societies.
Regardless of that outcome, I remained hopeful about my future in politics. During the 2025 federal election, I went on to serve as a deputy campaign manager for the Conservative national campaign against Prime Minister Mark Carney. Although the result was not what I had hoped for, I was grateful for the opportunity to contribute to a campaign that I believed would have moved Canada in a better direction.
Ultimately, my story is not only about hardship, discrimination, or being born in a refugee camp. It is about resilience, perseverance, and refusing to allow circumstances to define one’s future. No matter where a person comes from, how difficult their journey may be, or how many obstacles they face because of their race, gender, identity, or background, success remains possible through determination, resilience, and hard work.
In my case, that journey began as a Kurd in a refugee camp in Iraq. Yet despite every challenge along the way, I never stopped believing it was possible to build a better future and make a meaningful difference in a country that gave my family a second chance at life: Canada.