I arrived in the United States in 1999, when I was 9 years old. Although I entered the country legally, I didn't have a green card. A green card is basically a document saying that you have permission from the government to live long-term in the United States even though you're not a citizen.

I didn't have any choice about coming to the United States. I was born in Tunisia, in North Africa. I lived with my mother, who was very poor, and two brothers and a sister. We lived in a pretty desperate situation and often didn't have enough to eat. When I was 5, a French woman bought me for $100 and eventually brought me to the United States.

During the four years that I lived with her, she was so abusive that she nearly killed me. A month after we got to the U.S. I escaped from her and went into foster care. I had no way to contact my family back in Tunisia. I had no one.

I ended up in a Residential Treatment Center (RTC). Besides dealing with the trauma from my past, I also had to endure teasing from the other kids in the RTC.

Wanting to fit in

I was Muslim, and I didn't speak English – only Arabic and some French. I dressed differently and prayed five times a day. Especially after 9/11, many teased me and called me "terrorist." But I was just a kid who wanted to fit in and have friends, and the kids' teasing made me feel as if I did not belong.

Once the staff took nine of us kids on a trip to Six Flags. We were bumping along in the van, listening to hip-hop on the radio. Then the Biggie Smalls song "Juicy" came on the radio. As soon as Biggie said "blow up like the World Trade...," the other kids all looked at me. One kid, Jamal, said, "Fekri did it, you f-ckin Muslim. Why did you do this to us? Go fly away on your carpet!"

I'd been told by many staff that kids would say things to hurt new people they didn't know. It still hurt so bad. I took in those words and held them inside so I wouldn't look like a punk.

But that night I was depressed, questioning God's doing, wondering why he would let them tease me like that.

It didn't stop there. Many staff would not let me say my prayers, and even though it's not allowed for Muslims to eat pork, sometimes I would be forced to because that was the only thing served for dinner. I'd tell them I wasn't supposed to eat pork, and they'd just say, "What are you going to eat, then?" So as a kid, I figured I didn't have a choice.

I wanted so much to fit in that I decided to convert to Catholicism, which was easy enough since my RTC was run by the Catholic Church. After that, things got a little better, but the kids still said things like, "Get your green card, you immigrant."

Becoming "legal"

I was tired of dealing with the harassment. I decided to speak to Paul, my social worker, to see if he could help me get my green card so I would be a legal resident of the United States and eventually get U.S. citizenship.

Paul responded by telling me, "It's not important." He said he was busy trying to deal with other issues, like older residents who had been in the RTC for years and still needed things done. Paul never seemed to make time for me because he had so many other cases. I got the message he did not want to work on my case, which was the biggest and most complicated.

Even though I had my Tunisian passport, no one had a copy of my birth certificate, I wasn't in the country legally so I had no Social Security number, and I didn't speak very good English to explain how I'd come to be in the United States or to help them figure out how to get the documents. I didn't even know how they could contact my biological family back in Tunisia.

I thought if I could just get my green card, maybe the teasing would finally end. I wanted people to see more of me than just that I was an African Muslim and an illegal alien. I wanted to do something for myself that would make people describe me as a person with people skills, someone who has been through a lot and wants to help others and not be looked at any differently than anybody else. Getting my green card seemed like an important first step.

At 16, I started to realize that there were other reasons to have a green card. I needed to be able to work, and to work I had to be a legal U.S. resident. I learned that I also faced being deported if I got in trouble with the law and didn't have a green card. That ran through my mind so much because if I was deported back to Tunisia, I would not know where my family was and what to do. I would be completely lost.

Meanwhile, staff had started talking to me about the process of aging out of foster care. I realized that I needed things to start happening fast with my green card, because once you age out, the foster care system no longer helps you get it. I didn't have many plans for my future because Paul never seemed to want to work on my case. I lost faith in him and decided to get my green card and other documents myself.

Working my connections

I decided to talk to supportive staff about the fact that Paul wasn't helping me to get my green card. Some staff who I really respected encouraged me to do it on my own. They realized I was becoming older and had to learn how to be responsible for myself. They told me where to find the phone numbers for the Tunisian Embassy and the U.S. Immigration office.

My first step was to call the Tunisian Embassy here in New York. I said, "Hello, my name is Fekri and I would like to get information so that I can become a legal U.S citizen." One embassy staff cursed me out in Arabic and English: "You f-cking Americans and your stupid country." He seemed enraged at the fact that I wanted to become a U.S. citizen.

It would have been easy to give up at that point, but I persisted. The second person I called was Mr. Salah, the head of the Tunisian Embassy in Washington, D.C. He was much nicer. He told me he could help me get it done and he sent me the green card application.

I felt so relieved, but I was also overwhelmed because the application was only in French and Arabic, and I don't read either. So I asked Claude, a security staff at my RTC who spoke French, to translate.

The application asked for my name, where I was born, how I entered the United States, and what I planned on doing with the green card. It also let me know what I could and not do once I had the card. For example, I wouldn't be allowed to use the green card as an ID, and I couldn't travel outside the country for more than 90 days at a time or I'd lose my card.

Success at last

In the meantime I set up an appointment at the Social Security office to apply for a Social Security number. I woke at 7 a.m. to go with a staff to the office with my RTC campus ID and passport.

At the Social Security office, we had to sit in hard chairs and wait for 3 hours and an half until my number was called. The office was hot, there were ripped things on the wall, the bathroom was dirty, and people were sleeping on the seats. The staff would yell "Next!" over and over.

But all my efforts paid off when I finally received my green card at 18. It took two years, but finally it was done. Mr. Salah also helped me get in contact with my mother and the rest of my family. I asked, "Since you work for the Embassy of Tunisia, is it possible to help me find my family?" He said, "Give me two weeks."

One day, Mr. Salah called my cottage at the RTC and said, "Your mother would like to speak to you." I got on the phone and they transferred the call, all the way from Tunisia.

"Fekrrri," she said, with an r that rolled like a boulder on a hill. I said "Omi" which means "Mom" in Arabic. I had not spoken to her in 14 years. It felt great knowing that my family still had concern about me. They all told me they loved me. I will always remember that day.

I now have a new social worker, and I'm seeking help from him and my caseworker to set up a trip to Africa to visit my family. The funny thing is, Paul continues to keep in contact and lets me know when he hears something new about my family, like how they continue to ask when I'm coming to see them. I would have liked more help from Paul when I was getting my green card. But I learned that some people only want to help when they realize that you are willing to help yourself.

And when one person isn't helpful, you can't just get discouraged. You have to look around and find other helpful people, and then keep a good relationship with them. Sometimes you have to man up and take responsibility for the things you need done. You have to be your own support.

Need your green card?

For more information about getting a green card in foster care, visit www.youthsuccessnyc.org. Click on the "Special Resources" link, then "Resources for Teens and Staff" and scroll down to the section about green cards.