Volume 126, No. 80
Thursday, February 2, 2017 OPINION
Did we need the women’s march? PAGE 9
TRAPPED ABROAD
Second student affected by travel ban identified
SPORTS
Rams win 8th straight game PAGE 16
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday, Jan. 27, temporarily banning entry into the U.S. by citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. The ban is keeping three CSU students abroad from returning to school. PHOTO BY OLIVIER DOULIERY ABACA PRESS
By Erin Douglas & Julia Rentsch @erinmdouglas @julia_rentsch
Saddam Qahtan Waheed, a doctoral candidate studying hydraulic engineering at Colorado State University, describes hearing news of the travel ban that has prevented him from continuing his degree in the U.S. as, “a bullet to the heart.” Waheed, a student from Baghdad, Iraq, is one of three CSU students who are trapped abroad due to President Donald Trump’s executive order last week that prevented green card and visa holders from entering the U.S. if they are coming from one of seven Muslim nations. Iraq is one of those countries.
“I honestly lost my control of my body - I was just crying,” Waheed said, remembering the day he found out the news that he could not return. “I was supposed to make my family happy, but they are sad now.” Waheed began studying at CSU in August 2014, after receiving a scholarship from the Iraqi government to study in the United States. He chose CSU because the hydrology engineering program is ranked as one of the best in the nation. “When I got admitted here I was so happy,” Waheed said. “… Now, I hope that I don’t lose (my visa). It was my dream to be a CSU alumnus, a Ph.D. degree in the hydrology program, especially with my well-known professor (Jorge A. Ramirez). I’m so proud
to be his student. I don’t want to lose that. I’m still fighting for it.” Waheed decided to return to Baghdad after a major surgery – last February, a random test of Waheed’s blood revealed that he needed to remove a tumor on his parathyroid that was causing him to have dangerously high levels of calcium in his bloodstream. When he came out of the anesthesia, he planned a trip back home to see his family after being away for two years. Waheed surprised his parents at the beginning of January with his visit. “I saw my house gate; I could not believe that this was real,” Waheed wrote in an email to the Collegian. “I knocked the door and my father opened it… and my mother as well. They both
Watch the interview with the story online at: collegian.com did not know that I was going to come. It was an incredible moment… we all cried.” He contacted a woman he had fallen in love with two years ago before coming to the U.S. and found out that she was still waiting for him in Iraq. “I met my love again after two and a half years not seeing each other, and we decided to get see TRAPPED on page 4 >>
A&C
Who is this Hare Krishna Ram? PAGE 18