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An Immigrant Love-Hate Story of What it Means to Be American You know that feeling of being at the wrong end of the table? Like you're at a party but all the good stuff is happening out of earshot (#FOMO) ? That's life - especially for an immigrant. What happens when a shy, awkward Arab girl with a weird name and an unfortunate propensity toward facial hair is uprooted from her comfortable (albeit fascist-regimed) homeland of Iraq and thrust into the cold, alien town of Columbus, Ohio - with its Egg McMuffins, Barbie dolls, and kids playing doctor everywhere you turned? This is Ayser Salman's story. First comes Emigration, then Naturalization, and finally Assimilation - trying to fit in among her blonde-haired, blue-eyed counterparts, and always feeling left out. On her journey to Americanhood, Ayser sees more naked butts at pre-kindergarten daycare that she would like, breaks one of her parents' rules ("Thou shalt not participate as an actor in the school musical where a male cast member rests his head in thy lap") , and other things good Muslim Arab girls are not supposed to do. And, after the 9/11 attacks, she experiences the isolation of being a Muslim in her own country. It takes hours of therapy, fifty-five rounds of electrolysis, and some ill-advised romantic dalliances for Ayser to grow into a modern Arab American woman who embraces her cultural differences. Part memoir and part how-not-to guide, The Wrong End of the Table is everything you wanted to know about Arabs but were afraid to ask, with chapters such as "Tattoos and Other National Security Risks," "You Can't Blame Everything on Your Period; Sometimes You're Going to Be a Crazy Bitch: and Other Advice from Mom," and even an open letter to Trump. This is the story of every American outsider on a path to find themselves in a country of beautiful diversity.



About the Author

Ayser Salman

Ayser Salman was born in Iraq back before it became a curiosity and moved to the United States when she was a toddler. She spent much of her childhood in the 1970s trying to fit in among her blond-haired, blue-eyed counterparts and telling everyone to call her 'Lisa' because it was "just easier that way."After shunning her parents' dream of her becoming a doctor in favor of journalism school, Ayser worked as a news producer in Kentucky where she learned to end each sobering newscast with a video of a cuddly rodent waterskiing. She currently resides in Los Angeles where she is a writer and producer/editor for promos and original content for clients such as Miramax Films, Disney, Universal Pictures and FX. You'll probably also find her skating on the beach (old school roller skates thankyouverymuch)



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