FAUD

INTERPRETER & FISHERMAN

“It feels great because when I interpret, honestly, I feel like I am not there. I am simply the mouth for them.”

I am Kurdish and grew up in Northern Iraq. I was forced out when I was 18 years old and had to move to Turkey where I lived in a refugee camp for four years before coming to the US.

Since moving to Nashville in 1995, I have mostly worked as an interpreter. There were so many Kurds here, and so many of them didn’t know English. I speak five different languages - Kurdish, Arabic, Turkish, Farsi, and English. As an interpreter, I really liked helping people. It feels great because when I interpret, honestly, I feel like I am not there. I am simply the mouth for them.

Interpreting was my primary work for twenty years, but it can be inconsistent sometimes, so I started driving Uber. I learned that I really like it too, and I like meeting new people.

My wife and I have five children – four boys and one girl. I have very good kids - my children are awesome. My oldest son is a pharmacy technician at Vanderbilt. One other son is an airplane mechanic, and he works in Atlanta. My daughter works in health care at Vanderbilt. They are very respectful and very helpful.

I love fishing with my son. Some weekends, we meet up and put on our waders to go trout fishing in the Caney Fork River or the Elk River. I have a big family here in Nashville, and at other times we gather for a picnic at Edmondson Park and set up the net to play volleyball.

Siloam is the place where I can come to get what I need and see a doctor. Everyone there is a person you always want to see.