Finding Face and Faith in America

Book excerpt: In 1994, Ahror Rahmedov, a young medical student in Toshkent, Uzbekistan, was hit by rocket flare fired by a drunk at a wedding feast, andsuffered massive injuries to his face. He survived, only to find himself inside the very medical system that had been training him, where he was forced to bribe officials to get the proper medicines. In 1996, after living for two years with his destroyed face, still unable to speak, he came to the United States with the help of good samaritans in Seattle to begin a long and difficult round of reconstructive surgeries. Here he found his lost face and regained his faith. Today, he is an Engineering graduate student at UCLA.