xiaohua

Stories of my two customers July 30, 2010

During the past several weeks, I said goodbye to two of my long time customers: one died of heart attack and the other one went back to Lebanon.

I became acquaintanted with both gentlemen shortly after 9-11.

The first gentleman was in his late 50’s: a white, defense lawyer who came to NV from Florida. He regularly carried a hand gun with him when he came to my restaurant. He was a great talker often stayed in the dining room and talk to me for more than half an hour at a time. He was the one who first warned me about the pervasive presence of Muslims in the United States. He gave me a 700-page book he wrote on that subject and listed hundreds of references on how Muslims are trying to exert influences on government policies, local school board regulations and news media reporting. He also in his book gave a very detailed account of the conflicts between Arabs and Christians dating back hundreds of years in the past. He was divorced and lived by himself. He often came to our restaurant with a young Latino woman and her baby daughter who cleaned the house for him. He had high blood pressure, diabetic and takes many pills every day.

For many months no one at the restaurant had see him. I was told that he got ill and had difficulty walking. He would still send this young Latino woman with her now school-age daughter to buy food for him. Recently I found out he had passed away but I still remembered his voice and his cheerful personality. I also had him to thank for for making me aware of the struggles between Muslims and Christians in light of the 9-11 tragedy.

The second gentleman came to the United States from Lebanon. He was in his early 30’s when I first met him a month after 9-11 when he came to eat at my restaurant.  He asked me about the costs of opening a restaurant in the area and that’s how we got to know each other. At that time, he lived in Arlington with his Lebanese wife and three children: two boys and a girl and worked as a sales person at a company near the Dulles Airport. As we got to know each other, we talked about Muslims, Islam, 9-11, Iraq war and Israel-Palestinian conflict. I told him that I was concerned about Al Qaeda coming to the United States to wreak havoc in NY or Washington DC. He said that Al Qaeda would stay in the Middle East because American soldiers had occupied a piece of land which belongs to Muslims. He was the one who told me that conditions in Middle East would deteriorate and the situation would continue until Americans are driven out of Iraq. He was very negative about United States’ foreign policy and hated Bush for sending troops to Iraq. I could sense the century-old animosity between Muslims and Christians dating back from crusaders period a thousand years ago. It was enlightening to me to be able to get a different perspective on this age-old conflict and it reminded me of the fact that there would be no ending in sight of what to come in the coming years.

With the election of the first black president in the history of U.S., he told me that he was very pleased  to see that Obama had all the right messages to Muslims in the world and he particularly liked the appeasing tone of Obama’s plead for new relationship with Arabs. The happy time for him turned out to be short-lived.

With U.S. economy worsening and jobs starting to disappear, he was laid off from his Dulles job. He then worked as used car salesman but could make a half decent wage to make a living. He quit his car salesman job and commuted to Germantown because he found a job there. He them moved his family to Germantown but still made the 40 miles trip to my restaurant once a while because his children, now in their teens, liked our food. We continued our conversations on Islam, American foreign policy in the Middle East and the merit of Iraq war. Although he had soften his stance on the Iraq war but he still couldn’t get over with what he called the invasion.

About three weeks ago, he called me and said he wanted to meet me again. When I met his family at my restaurant, he said that this will be the last time he’ll see me because he is taking his family back to Lebanon for good. He was totally disgusted with Obama and lost confidence in the United States. He was laid off again and he put the blame squarely on Obama: the recession, the health care take-over, the Afghan war and the lousy economy. He was upset because Obama didn’t pay attention to the economy. He didn’t like the escalation of the Afghan war because he didn’t see the need for it. He didn’t like American’s policy on Israel because the peace is no where in sight. He also didn’t like the huge deficits and mounting national debt because he didn’t like that burden on his children.

With his and his children’s American dreams dead, he said that the United States is going downhill and he didn’t like his children to face the horrible burden. He had moved back to Lebanon because he saw light at the end of the tunnel in the Middle East: largely because of high oil prices for years to come. With that, living standards have improved compared to 20 some years ago when he first came to the United States. With higher oil prices, more jobs become available and he liked his chances back home. He also liked the chance for his children too.

Well, two customers: a white American and a Muslim, with two different stories.

I’ll miss them.