Episode 79, 37 min listen
Welcome to this very special series, New Roots, New Voices: Listening to Our Immigrant Neighbors. where we will listen to and lift up the voices and stories of local immigrants here in Greenville South Carolina. In this episode, I have the pleasure of interviewing Ziad Namouz, a beautiful and generous soul who shares a little of his heritage and culture every day through food. Ziad is one of the founders and owners of the Pita House Restaurant and Grocery, a place I've visited for years,. This interview is a reminder of how much richer our sense of community can be when we take the time to make a personal connections with those we see and interact with regularly.
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ADDITIONAL REFERENCES
Learn more about the Pita House Restaurant.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
-Introduction
Ame Sanders 00:10
This is the State of Inclusion Podcast and I'm Ame Sanders.
There is a lot in the news every day about immigrants. And, a lot of it is negative.
What if we went beyond the news? What if we opened our hearts and minds to better understand the reality of immigrants in our own community.
Over the next several weeks, we will listen to and lift up the voices and stories of local immigrants here in Greenville South Carolina. Along the way, we will meet neighbors, families, friends, local icons, and legends. We will come to understand some of the challenges our immigrant neighbors face and how we can become better allies. Welcome to this very special series, New Roots, New Voices: Listening to Our Immigrant Neighbors.
I’m at a restaurant today that I’ve surely been to a hundred times over the last twenty plus years that I’ve lived in Greenville. It is one of my favorite places and is loved by many in the community. Today, I have the pleasure of meeting and interviewing one of the founders and owners of the Pita House Restaurant, Ziad Namouz.
I’m embarrassed to admit that in all the times I’ve come to the Pita House, I’ve never formally met Ziad and didn’t know his name until I met him for this interview through my colleague Wendy.
Maybe you’ve done that too. Visited a place over and over without looking up or taking time, to make that personal connection. This interview for me was a reminder of just how much we miss when we don’t take the time to get to know one another. Our sense of community and of who we are is made richer by making more personal connections with those we see and interact with regularly. When we/I pause long enough to realize that standing across the counter from me is a beautiful and generous soul who shares a little of his heritage and culture every day with Greenville through food.
The title of this series is New Roots, New Voices: Listening to Our Immigrant Neighbors. Ziad is not new to Greenville, in fact, as you’ll learn, Ziad has been in Greenville longer than I have. Still, at one time his voice was new to Greenville, and Greenville is a place where he and his family chose to put down new roots.
So welcome Ziad. Thank you for joining me.
Thank you for having me.
-About Ziad
So Ziad, would you tell us a little bit about yourself, who you are, and I know family is really important to you, so maybe you could tell us a little bit about your family as well.
Ziad Namouz 02:52
Yeah, I came from a big family, 10 members, eight boys and two girls. So I'm a baby of the 10 who are like Christian, Catholic, Palestinian. But it happened to be we were born and raised in Israel. So in the same time, we are anIsraeli citizens, proud to be and also as a heritage, we are Palestinian and Christian, Catholic, born by birth. So as a family, roots is from the holy land of Palestine. And then 1948 when it became state of Israel, they have no other documents they allow to use, but the Israeli citizenship, so they were granted citizenship in Israel. And everybody was born after 1948 became Israeli citizen, and is an Arab minority in Israel, and their religion has nothing to do because there's a lot of Christians, Muslims and Druze, which is different religions of Palestinians who live in the Galilee.
So we are from the outskirt of Nazareth. It's about like 15 minute drive from main cities of Nazareth or Haifa, and in when I finished my high school, I decided, you know, and a window of opportunity came that my brother was here in the States before me, so I thought it would be a nice idea to have a dream to move and pursue in the United States. In the beginning, I was thinking education would be a good route to go. So I came seeking my education after high school, college and so on, and then end up, you know, after two, three years, I decided, you know what, it's time to move on and do something better for myself. An American Dream is a hard working dream. You have to work to pay for your bills. So I just started working in different restaurants, different odd jobs. From the beginning, I started from the lower of the of the ladder and moved up my way. After five, six years, a brother of mine approached us, me and my brother, about opening the family business, and we thought there's nothing to lose. Because as a family, we were raised to be close to each other and work together and achieve things together, because together, we'd be stronger. So we started thinking about opening a Middle East restaurant. But who knows about Middle East food? Okay, yeah, we will try. We'll tell people, we'll educate them and be patient, and he's going to do. And it did in the beginning as a slowly, slowly, one break at a time, we just start going around telling people and passing around the menus and flyers and coupons for a little buckle of a little dessert with your meal, and it worked out. And then they slowly, slowly. After three, four years, we thought there's a big potential for it. And now, after 37 years, here you go. The dream came true American Dream, which is hard work and being a good citizen of United States. After five years, I became a citizen. After I applied for my green card through my brother, and then now I'm being a citizen for 37 years.
-Tell Us About Your Roots
Ame Sanders 06:12
So I'm a gardener. And when I think about immigration, I think about our roots, of course, and you've talked a little bit about your roots, your family roots, and transplanting yourself. So where you transplant yourself and put down your new roots matters. It helps determine whether you're going to thrive or not. So one question I have for you is, why Greenville?
Ziad Namouz 06:36
Okay, when you come to a foreign country like United States, you're pursuing the dream, but you have to have somewhere to start, like, you know, beginning. And then a brother of mine was here because a friend of ours went to school at Sherman Chiropractic College. He was a colleague of his and from the same hometown, and they were like next door neighbors to my parents. And a brother of mine did a job in Tahiti. And then when he finished his contract with that company, it was Israeli company. He came to visit his friend, and then he liked it so much he decided to stay here. He was, like, four years before me. And then, since he was in the United States and I was in high school, oh, we talked on the phone, I want to come to United States. I want to come to get my education. He said, no, you just do what you do. Do and worry about your life, because it's not easy as an immigrant to live in United States. I said, Well, I'm young. Have nothing to lose, so I decided I'm going to pursue that dream, and thank God I did that. I made that decision back then. Was hard decision to move another country, and my parents weren't for it, and they didn't want to us to immigrate. They want us to stay. But I said, If I don't make a new change, a new a new window for myself, we're not going to get nowhere, maybe, but maybe I will. But I give it a try, and I got here, and things started to move forward to the better. So I decided to stay the course, and now I'm so grateful I did that.
-What Does Home Mean To You?
Ame Sanders 08:08
That is wonderful. So another thing that I think a lot about, and I know you probably do, too, is home, and home is where the heart is, and it's also where our people are. And you've talked about how you came here with your brother, and I know your family's here. Tell us about what home means to you.
Ziad Namouz 08:27
You know home is where you find your comfort. And I lived there, and I was happy, and I still in connection. I still have family there. I still have a family property which belong to me, which are still not going to let it go, till my children decide to do that. Because I think this is the connection to keep us connected with the homeland. But you know, the most important connection is the family and the roots of you know, childhood and friends who you left behind when you were twenty. So every year or so we go visit, and I make sure at least once or twice a year we visit, but sometimes the circumstance doesn't allow us. But I made sure I married a woman from my hometown and from the same faith, and now she's been with me here for 35 years, happily married, living in the upstate. Our kids born and raised here, so we are the first immigrant, our kids, the first American generation born here. And this is the pride like you look at yourself like when you visit the family and you take your children, you introduce them to the family, you introduce them to the culture. You want them to sink in and be part of that culture, because you don't want them to disconnect. And it's some very important, because those are values. You don't want to let it go, you know, like family values, friends. What that means to have a friend. I have a friend who I left 45 years ago, 42 years ago. I still go back. We're still friends. We still connect. They married, they have kids, and everything else. We still have the childhood memories of high school, the way we played basketball together, we did things together, and then back in the days, believe it or not, it was like a hard decision, because they thought, no, no way you do that. You leave us here and go, and they start all over. I say, Well, I'm gonna give it a try, and now I go back and then talk about the issues and how how lucky I was to pursue the American dream and become so successful in my business and raising a family, and all of my kids getting recreated in United States, they look at me saying, You know what? Back then we thought you made a wrong mistake or made a wrong decision. Now we feel like we’re proud you made the right decision. You have a longer vision for the future of your generation to come. So not everybody come to America become so successful, but at least if you try, there's no way you have to. You stay the course. You do the right things, and you open your heart and your mind and you learn America is, is a dream to come true if you persist on it. But if you start to play that game of trying to put yourself into, yeah, they might. I'm a foreigner, they don't want me, you know, like, this is, this is beyond me. I mean, I don't look at these people, these people, they're not going to stop me from pursuing what I want in my life, and I just I say, You know what? It's their problem. I just have no problem. I want to live with everybody, and I want to love and accept everybody in this country, and I love this country, and I would do anything for this guy.
-Community and Belonging
Ame Sanders 11:38
One of the things that it makes me think about is that when I think about community, I think about being welcomed and belonging and safety, and maybe you've kind of alluded to that in what you just said, but maybe you could share a moment or a time when you remember feeling that you belonged or were included or accepted and safe here,
Ziad Namouz 12:02
Yeah, it is a moment like you feel like you know what they're gonna be rejecting me. They don't. They're saying, Oh, you're coming from another country, taking over. I'm not taking over anybody. There's opportunities right there. It's just you are there to take care of yourself and move on forward, or you're gonna sit and dwell on issues and problems that people talk about. Immigrants come and take in other people jobs. Nobody is taking, nobody's job. This job is there. You want to go have it. Be better person. Be productive, be good and be achiever. You will achieve it because it's there for everybody. And I'm not the last one. I'm not the first one, I'm not the last one in this America. America is a nation of immigrants. You know, there's people come from all over Europe, Italy, you know, anywhere in the world, China. People come from the Middle East. There's a lot of some of them, they're going to be bad elements. Yeah, I understand. But not every immigrant. And there's educated people who brought this country to where we are now. And now our kids, or generation who are born and raised here and educated. So they're gonna make this country better in the future for my next generation, which is my grandchildren. So I don't want to stop saying, Well, I did my share. I educated my kids, and that's it. No, we have a further you know, this is the message. You're going to move on and transform this into the grandchildren, which, you know, you want them to have a better future as an Americans in the United States.
-Looking Back
Ame Sanders 13:34
If we take a minute, we look back, because you talked about your roots and where you came from and the journey to where you are now, you've come a long way. What is something that you had to let go of in order to find yourself where you are now?
Ziad Namouz 13:50
There’s not a whole a lot. It's just like the little things that matter to me. Sometimes I have to think like, this is part of the American Dream Tax. Like, you know, the language, for example. For myself, I'm not speaking because I'm fine because I went to school or learn the language. My kids, I teach them, and I taught them well, that they can speak and understand, but when it comes to write and read, they cannot because there's no school for that. So this is, I feel like this part of it, like they start to lose in the roots of learning the language. The culture they learn by daily life we teach them at home. But in writing and reading. And if you give them a book or letter, they cannot read it in Arabic, or they cannot write it. But nowadays, technology is not an obstacle, because nowadays there's so much in their hands that they can have, you know, they can write a letter in English and put it on the computer, and then they can translate it to be translated to Arabic. But it's still our need to learn, like I do when I have a customers who come in here. I can interact with them better than my kids, because if they have something in writing in Arabic, I could read it. I could, you know, have my background, you know, of knowledge of things when I came I was young, but still, I learned a lot before I came to United States. So this is implement into our next era, which is like new generation who came from overseas, that sometimes they come here, they want somebody, somebody can read Arabic, because they have a note in Arabic. My kids, they would love to, but they don't know how to read it. So they come to me, say that somebody has gave him a note in Arabic. Can you read it for me? I say, yeah. So this is an advantage.
And there's, there's little things like and it's not a lot that you regret, that you lose, because this is part of the American Dream Tax. Which is like, you know, you live here, after a while, you start thinking, you know, I missed a lot of little things back home, like the way family married first, and all that things. But also the world is changing. You know, when I go back, I feel it's not the same, like when I left it 45 years ago. And it's changing. It's changing to the better. Some things to the better. There's a lot of to the worst. What it is is just people, you know, following the western style of life, and they forget the roots, like back then, if there's a family wedding, the whole family will be there all the time. Here, if your time allow you and I see that. You know, in my in my daily life, like Allah, have sacrificed a lot for me to be able to afford for my kids to have what they have. And then I couldn't be there on their activities, 24/7, but my wife did. So she did a lot for them, and the same time, I was financing that things for them. Now I think if I wish I had the time to scale back on my working hours, to be there with the children when they were in high school, in the middle school, and their activities, but I was trying my best to balance between what they need and I need to provide to them and what I could afford to do. As far as time, time frame, as far as finance, that was my responsibility. My wife was busy. She was the mother and the father in the same time, and I was doing the finance for her to be able to keep them straight and keep them busy in their life, so they would not drift into into bad things, you know. But thank God, so far, I'm very happy.
Ame Sanders 17:30
And that's not an immigrant story. That's a common family story.
Ziad Namouz 17:33
Yeah, but after also, as an immigrant, you're worried, because as an immigrant, you don't want the kids to end up in trouble. And then, you know, gets the kids, then the word back to your family that he went to United States, and he didn't know how to manage his family and take care of his kids, and he didn't manage to keep him out of trouble. He ended up having kids and drugs, or kids in in criminals that all of what he worked hard for is it didn't do nothing. He's just burned him his life for nothing.
Ame Sanders 18:03
So you have some extra expectations on you, yeah?
Ziad Namouz 18:06
Because in no failing, no, no, no setbacks, we have stayed the course and always move forward. Move forward to the better and more and more promising for the generation to come, which is the grandchildren.
Ame Sanders 18:19
Is there something unexpected that along the way you found or discovered in this transplanting yourself and starting a different life?
Ziad Namouz 18:29
A lot, you know. Like when I was raising my children, I was thinking, Yeah, you know what? They're gonna get them to marry people from my culture. And then my daughter went to college, and she met her college sweetheart. He's an American, and he's very nice and good to her. They've been married for nine years, and when she came to me, and she knew how our mentality and our thinking of culturally like they expecting us, that we expecting them to pick somebody from the same culture. She said, Dad, I'm in love with this guy. So good, good, you know. And you know, you never say no to your kids. You know you want to have a better future. And she said, Dad, but I don't know. Am I disappointing you? I said, why? She said, Because he's not an Arab I said, Well, I was hoping and praying and, you know, expecting, but now you found somebody. You found your life, your love, and your love of your life, and this is your life. You're born and raised here. So I expected that part to go back to say this is a tax of living in America, that my daughter is not gonna marry an Arab, Palestinian Christian, you know, 100% pure bread like we are. So I was lucky that my wife, I got to meet my wife from the same hometown while I was in the United States. So I made my my hard effort to go back and get married in the church over there in the Catholic Church, and brought her back with me and applied for her to stay here as a citizen. And then, after four years married, she became a citizen, and we have our first child, and all of our children born and raised here. So that was like, we are we are lucky, and we are blessed. Now, my daughter, you know, I marry an American Boy, oh, yeah, but you know what? She's born and raised here, I cannot go and find somebody that I'm happy with, and after five years, they're not together. So what's the point? So I start thinking of just not myself. It's just what's the best for the interest of our family. She's happy with him. She picked him. He picked her. They’re in love. He's treated her good. And so far so good. And the second one he married somebody he met from South America. So that was example of, you know, the children is not exactly how we are. So they're gonna move to another level of different immigrant. Immigrant who are married into another immigrant or Americans. So my third child, who knows who is marrying? Some of them from the same religion or different religion, but to us, we're married like they want him to have him from the same religion, but if it could happen they are not from the same religion, we couldn't be against it, because that's their happiness. So as an immigrant, we're going to start to accept those things. They're going to start to drift, you know, from the main core of being Palestinian, Christian, Catholic. No, it's going to be an American. Now, an American. They don't look at people, what religion he's from, what faith, what nationality, what background, he's in love, she's in love. That's fair. That's fine. They make their life together. It's not they're married for their culture. They're married for their future, their soulmate.
-Something You're Proudest Of
Ame Sanders 21:50
You've already alluded to a number of things that you are proud of, your children, your family, your business. Is there something that you think of when you think of having accomplished or realized a dream that you've had that we haven't talked about?
Ziad Namouz 22:08
Yeah, this is if it wasn't for this country, for America, I wouldn't have what I had and everything I have in my life. Would. My family, and even some of it with the family back home, who we still connected with. It has to do with the goodness of this country, with goodness of becoming an American. I'm proud to be an American. Give back to us. It's not like treat us as a second class citizen, no, and they're gonna find individuals here and there, but is, this is not my point. I'm not going to sit there and watch those people, because they need to be helped. I moved forward with my life and my kids. born and raised here, and we try to educate them and teach them that we are an American. We live in the American dream. We live in America. But don't forget where we came from.
So if you see an immigrant, don't forget we also were immigrants. One day we are not now, maybe we are citizens, but still we are citizen by naturalization. So America is Mother, is the like a duck has a babies, and now we are part of this family of America, you know, the dream and the people the country who gave us so much, so it's time for us to give them back. So I have a son who went to Med school when, when they asked him about why you want to stay in Greenville, why you didn't go somewhere else, he said, Well, I'm born and raised here, and now, the teaching of our family values and our family background gave him the input. He said, I want to give back to my community. It took a village. A lot of people contributed to where I am, where I'm going to be in the future. So I want to be here to pay them back. He's going to benefit, like here, like everywhere else, by practicing medicine, but he decided to stay here because be closer to the family, closer to our family, and his wife's family who he met. She's from Colombia, and then in the same time practicing and giving back to the community who gave him so much, all of his 32 years of his life. So this it means a lot that you think of yourself, but others too, because, you know, he didn't forget his roots, where he came from, how we are immigrants, we became citizens, and then he became citizen by birth, and then he grew up here, from kindergarten to scouting to church community activities, to high school to college and going to professional, you know, grad school and then now medical school. And he is emphasized, or he wants to stay here so he give back, and still, he would pursue a dream of being more successful and become a better person. In the future.
-What Gives You Hope For The Future?
Ame Sanders 25:01
You sound like a person who looks forward more than you look back, but what today gives you hope?
Ziad Namouz 25:11
You're always gonna keep the positivity, because if you think positive, things become positive. If you're gonna sit and start to think, you know, I will never, I cannot. It's hard. It's impossible. Then it becomes impossible. You know, I'm saying, if you can dream it, you can do it. That's what Disney was all about. He said, Well, if you dream it, you can make it. And if we, as an American sit there, or as an immigrant, we say, well, it's kind of the system. It's kind of hard because we are, we're not an American citizens. We are not the original native of the of the land. No, there's opportunities, if, if that gonna be an obstacle for me, I will never get nowhere. But it's always keep positive and move forward. Today, what I have I'm grateful for. Look backward and think that you better off person than today, and then look forward to achieve and be better person for the future, not for just myself, for the next generation.
-What Do You Hope Or Dream?
Ame Sanders 26:09
And that leads me to my next question, what do you hope or dream for the future and for those next generations?
Ziad Namouz 26:17
I hope, you know, we become more Americanized in like, more the real America was, was founded on, like, sit back a little bit and scale back our involvement in the world, that we have military involvement everywhere we go, that becomes a burden on us. You know, American is like an empire. You know, now we become so tangled and so involved with so much in the world that to keep peace with those people and keep them on our side, it's costing us a lot. I mean, we should, we should care about us first America first, and then leave these people to live their life the way they want, not by us, putting our policies, foreign policies, to impose it on them. You know, like China, India, Middle East, very, very hard issue. But. And then, because I came from there, and then we have also, like European like, between Ukraine and Russia, we need to get involved to help for them. You know, scale back of the tension and make up the differences and live in peace. But sometimes you think about, you know, making peace, it's harder than making war, and it doesn't help economy. Wars will create, you know, production of arms and bombs and weapon and peace is everybody lives in peace. There's no economy. The economy is money making and is, I mean, there's going to be wars in the world. It's not going to be by us, maybe by some other people, but not us. We need to worry about our own borders, our own soil, territory, our own economy, our own people. Very, very important, and then worrying about other people, what they do to help them to get better with us being also as good, not to help others when we need to be helped.
-Final Thoughts
Ame Sanders 28:25
Is there anything that we haven't talked about, that you wanted to talk about, or that you'd like to share?
Ziad Namouz 28:32
But in the immigration issue that people, as an immigrant, they come in hoping and praying and trying to do their best to become better people in this country, give them a chance. I'm not saying, take the criminals of South America or Middle East or far east or anywhere in the world and bring them to this country and give them a chance. No, I'm saying as an immigrant, if they come respectfully seeking to become an American citizen or to become a good American, you know, people give them a chance to prove themselves, to give them a chance to work, build up and see if they can sink into the immigrant country of United States. That's why we are a nation of immigrants. And if it wasn't for the immigrants, we wouldn't be where we are now at. So the future is just judging by their actions, not by their background. They have too much trouble in their country, and they are leaving because they're being pushed out of the country, hardship of economics, of the crime. They want to run away from it. They were, some of them, they go for two, three weeks, you know, by foot and transportation from one country to another country to get to the border and sneak in. I wasn't I didn't have to do that myself. I was lucky. Mine was flying a civilian, like a human being, into airports and coming to United States and then apply for my stay legally in the country. Back in the days, the laws were easier and cheaper. Now it's so expensive. You know, I remember back then when my citizenship to apply for citizenship was like $500 the whole the whole process. Now it's not $5,000 and you have to have lawyers to defend you for anything, any little things. So give him a chance. And if they do anything wrong, fine. I'm for that. Take him, take him out. Either you make him pay the price, put him in jail, or you take him and put him on the plane, take him back to their country. But not everybody come there's 10% going to be bad element, but there's 90% they will do better for this country as an immigrant.
-What Do You Wish People Knew About Immigrants?
Ame Sanders 30:52
So this question follows on with what you were just talking about. I want to ask you, what do you wish people knew about immigrants and immigration?
Ziad Namouz 31:02
Immigrants are people who are running away from their trouble in their homeland. It wasn't particularly my issue, or my personal story, but I know a lot of immigrants, they have issue religion or color, or, you know, ethnicity that they learn away from, from their homeland, and they find a refuge in this country as to protect them and protect their rights. So if we give them the opportunity, and then they show goodwill, we might see what the problem is there to help them overcome that problem before they come to this country. But if we don't, and we just using the issue of immigrants when they come to this country as a bad thing, when it's not bad thing, because we have so much economy built on those people who, who stay here, send their kids to school, pay for the food, pay taxes and do the hard labor jobs. You know, I mean, I have a kitchen that people in my kitchen the 90% are immigrants, and if I don't, if I don't have them, I wouldn't be able to operate. My business wouldn't be running. And I mean, be hard to have find a good help. And they are hardworking people like me, like me 40 years ago, and then the next 40 years, I hope they'll be better than me. You know, if you give them that chance and they prove themselves, they're gonna build and do better. They're gonna become restaurants owners or business owners. Some of them started, started as, you know, labor, cheap labor, in the construction and then now they own companies, and they have employees working for and they're managing 40 or 50, people business, small businesses and this is what it's all about. You know, just given the opportunity, and some of them, they flourish and do good. And if they don't do good, they didn't do good for themselves, they become like just another citizen who pay taxes and live deliberate.
-Advice For Allies
Ame Sanders 33:10
What thoughts or advice do you have for folks like me who want to be more supportive and better allies for our immigrant neighbors that are in the community here?
Ziad Namouz 33:21
Keep, keep doing what you're doing, because this is very important. A lot of times when the immigrants, they find people who understand and they accepted them. They would not set back, and they would not scaled back, and they would not trying to turn around. They want to stay because this is, this is much better than the ultimate, which is the ultimatum, which is going back to the same roots where they came from, from their trouble, running around, run away from the trouble. They came here seeking better future, and they want to see people like you encouraging them, even if they are 10% of the time, but at least they give him like a push, like give him like encouragement. Oh, you doing good. Keep going. I have a lady I met 40 years, 45 years ago, 43 years ago, when she saw me working restaurant business, bussing tables, she would call me and try her best to encourage me, and she is like a mentor to me. I still see her up till today, she's like 85 years old, sweet lady. She always says, Ziad, I always looked at you, and I always saw that you're gonna do good for yourself and for your family. And we became so close, like a personal friend, even she was a restaurant, you know, business, you know, she comes to eat at a restaurant where I worked as a busboy, but now, as the owner of a restaurant, she's still coming to eat with me, and then she still have that sweet softness and encouragement and positivity. She gave me that energy, and she told me, you will do good. You will do better. And since the beginning and now, thank God, she said, I'm so happy to see you doing so good and prosper. And God became so successful, not just for you, for your generation to come, for your family, for as your brothers and the family who you worked hard with, and now you showed us like this is what is immigrants all about. And I'm so happy. I'm proud of you. And I told her nothing to be proud, because this is what we were taught from home, but we wouldn't have the opportunity, so we found it here and Greenville. Be it home sweet home. After 43 years, I would think I would not choose anywhere else to do it.
Ame Sanders 35:37
Ziad I thank you so much for talking to me today. I really appreciate it.
Ziad Namouz 35:39
Thank you.
-Conclusion
Ame Sanders 35:40
As you can tell, Ziad Namouz is a very successful entrepreneur and restaurateur. While his story is uniquely his, many immigrants follow an entrepreneurial path. In fact, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, immigrants start more than 1 out of every 5 new businesses. An MIT study found that, per capita, immigrants are about 80 percent more likely to found a firm, compared to U.S.-born citizens. And, as Ziad discussed, they hire workers. Firms, started by immigrants, also have about 1 percent more employees than those founded by U.S. natives, on average.
This entrepreneurial orientation extends to their children as well, who are also more likely to start business.
While the Pita House and many immigrant businesses are small businesses, this entrepreneurial orientation is seen across all business types and sizes. For example, more than 50% of $1B startups have at least one immigrant founder.
So we all need to heed Ziad’s advice and encourage our immigrant neighbors. They are a key part of building our community as well our local economy.
This has been the State of Inclusion podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, the best compliment for our work is your willingness to share the podcast or discuss these ideas with others. Also feel free to leave us a review or reach out. We’d love to hear from you.
Join us for the next episode in this very special series New Roots, New Voices: Listening to Our Immigrant Neighbors
CONTRIBUTORS
Guest: Ziad Namouz
Host: Ame Sanders
Social Media and Marketing Coordinator: Kayla Nelson
Podcast Coordinator: Emma Winiski
Sound: Uros Nikolic