"May we all live the life that we desire."

On Friday, January 27th, President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily banning more than 218 million people from entering the United States. 

Many of them had dreams of attending college in the United States. 

Some of them even had dreams of coming to Tulane. 

This is an e-mail from one of them, an admitted merit scholarship student now likely unable to join the Tulane class of 2021. Our Director of International Admission reached out to him after the ban. This is his response. 

With his permission, we have printed it here. 

Dear Paul,

I’m writing this email to personally thank you for the time you put into writing your email and considering talking to me among the countless students in the admission pool. I would also like to thank you for accepting me as a potential member of your community and offering me a generous scholarship. Tulane is definitely one of my top choices and given the chance to study there, I would be more than happy to join; however, with the new visa ban, I don’t remain optimistic.

I was fortunate enough to know that character is forged through hardship. Without endings there will be no new beginnings; without pain there will be no joy; and without despair there will be no hope. To be sure, this incident will not bring an end to me or my aspirations, but will set a new chapter in the story of my life, the story of a teenage Iranian boy dreaming of changing both his life and the life of his fellow man by getting an education abroad, the story of a dedicated student who stayed up until 3 am studying for his national college entrance exam and then lived alone in Cyprus for three months to take the SATs because they were not held in his country, and the story of a crazy man who went against the flow, who did not listen to his friends or relatives telling him what he should or shouldn’t do – not because he was arrogant or wanted to avoid others – but because he had a goal. He knew that the point of his existence was to help others and wanted to use his profession as a vehicle to achieve that goal. He wanted to spend the money he earned as a doctor to buy homes for the homeless and restore the dignity of prostitutes. He wanted to cure the people who weren’t fortunate enough to have the money to pay for their medical treatments. He wanted to adopt a child. But instead, he had to watch all his goals and dreams crumble because his presence was considered detrimental to the stability of the United States.

Yes Paul, this is the story of soldier wounded in the frontiers of life, but this soldier will not surrender – not because he’s fighting for himself – but because he’s fighting for the lives of those innocent men, women, and children which he has the capability of changing in a positive way. I will continue to fight although it’s difficult and because the challenge of the journey is the part of the real-life experience that will enrich both me and my character.

I would like to conclude this email with a quote from Josh Turner: "Life is a series of punches. It presents a lot of challenges. It presents a lot of hardship, but the people that are able to take those punches and able to move forward are the ones that really do have a lot of success and have a lot of joy in their life and have a lot of stories to tell, too."

May we all live the life that we desire.

Best,

[name redacted]