ASPIRING DOCTOR YUSEF EMAD REMAINS STRONG

During his freshman year at W.T. White High School, Yusef Emad almost gave up on band.

“The bullying was getting bad,” he says. “Freshman year was my hardest year.”

Yusef is Muslim, and other kids often labeled him a terrorist. One evening after a concert, someone yelled a racial slur outside the band hall in the presence of Yusef’s mom.

“She was upset and wanted to tell the principal, but I told her to just ignore it,” he says, following the advice of two friends, Mirtala Martinez and Jackie Toribio, who convinced him not to quit over a few senseless bullies. “The only thing you can do is ignore it.”

It worked. The bullying eventually stopped.

Yusef has played the bass clarinet in band since sixth grade and plays the saxophone in the jazz band. He excels in science, and after he completes basic courses at Brookhaven College, he plans to enter the pre-med program at Texas Tech University and become a doctor.

Phillip Potter, the assistant band director at W.T. White, describes Yusef as “an incredibly high achiever.”

“He’s always challenging himself to be a better player,” Potter says. “He’s really passionate. We think he’s going to do great things.”

This past year, though, Yusef has seen his father only via Skype. His father has been on contract as a translator in Afghanistan for an unspecified amount of time. They’re told he’s in a safer region of the country, but that hasn’t relieved all the fears associated with such a separation.

“We still worry every day,” Yusef says. “What if something happens to him?”

His parents moved from Kabul, Afghanistan, to the United States, where they married and started their family of three boys, Yusef being the middle child. A certified pilot, his dad struggled to find work after his company, Eastern Airlines, went bankrupt in the 1990s. He became a linguist, working as a translator to train other pilots in various parts of the country from El Paso to Washington, D.C.

In his father’s absence, Yusef and his brothers grew close with their uncle (his mother’s only local sibling). They spent many an afternoon at his house in McKinney learning how to change the oil in a car, building birdhouses and picking blackberries from the backyard garden.

Then came the day that Yusef’s uncle began slurring his speech, and the family soon learned he had several tumors scattered throughout his brain. Survival was not likely.

“It was unexpected,” Yusef says. “He was the last guy you would think would get cancer.”

“You could tell in his face that he was go- ing to die soon,” he says about his uncle’s last days. Headed north on the highway, trying to make it to his bedside, Yusef got the call.

That was his junior year of high school, and just a few months later, his dad left for a job he couldn’t refuse in Afghanistan.

“At first, I was mad at him,” Yusef says, “but then I understood that he has to provide for us. It hit me hard, but it affected my brothers more.”

They stay in touch via a computer screen, talking about life, school, the future and volleyball, their favorite family pastime and a ubiquitous sport in Afghanistan — one that Yusef wishes was offered for boys at schools here.

“He tells me to keep practicing so when he comes back, we can all play together.”

His dad will be home this month long enough to participate in their community’s annual Islamic spring picnic. And before returning to Afghanistan until at least the end of the year, he’ll get to watch Yusef receive his high school diploma.

Yusef not only understands and accepts his family’s less-than-perfect circumstances, but also realizes they are what have allowed him to succeed. And he plans to return the favor someday.

“Maybe when I graduate [college], I can buy them a house.”