It's time again for Utah StoryCorps: Everyday people sharing their stories at the StoryCorps recording booth in southern Utah.
Dima Khalifa
My name is Dima Khalifa. My father is Syrian. My mother, she's from California. So my dad started playing music when he was about 11.
He graduated from music school and joined the National Syrian orchestra at a very young age.
He traveled around Europe playing with this orchestra, and eventually to America, playing music at Arabic nightclubs, the type of place that has belly dancers. And my mom was one of the belly dancers, and that's how they met.
They got married at a grocery store. So an imam is needed for an Islamic marriage. And my father knew an imam who owned an Arabic grocery store, so he married them there, and you need to have two male witnesses. So they just picked two of the male customers that were there.
So my dad was Muslim, my mom was Jehovah's Witness.
Amy Nadel
Were you raised with religion?
Dima Khalifa
Oh yeah. Big time. My dad sent me to private Arabic Islamic school from kindergarten through eighth grade. So we would have religious classes, wear a hijab, I was taught Arabic. I would come home, and my mom would teach me the Bible. There was definitely confusion.
My school was really small. My class was four people. Seventh grade was one boy, and you would pass 5-year-olds in the hallway. And then after middle school, I went to just like public Las Vegas High School, which was a culture shock for sure.
Like my dad had some really strict rules. I wasn't allowed to go out of the house without my mom till I was about 14. It was, like, awkward. It wasn't just me going to friend's house, it was me and my mom, and that kept me from making a lot of close friends at younger ages.
My mom has always been a really big outdoorsy person, and I guess instead of hanging out with friends all the time, me and my mom would go outside a lot.
I was just so excited, because it felt like there was way more people to get to know, and like I could kind of like, branch out ....
Amy Nadel
From, like a puddle to the ocean.
Dima Khalifa
Yeah, and so I was in the all girl metal band when I was 14, and my mom took me on a trip out here, and I realized I really like spending time out in Springdale, out in Zion, like, this place is amazing.
And I met Sam, we started dating, and then he mentioned to me that he knew somebody who worked at the lodge up in the park. Like, oh, that sounds really cool. Like, I'd love to go work up there, plus they have employee housing dorms, literally right in the middle of the park. It was amazing.
And I found out that you can do work trading, work at other national parks. And after the season was over, we went to Hawaii, and after Hawaii, we were going to New Orleans. We had applied to work at a hostel out there.
And when we were at the airport during our layover in Seattle, we got a message from the hostel saying we did not get the job there.
And we were just like, "Okay, what are we about to do now"? And we're like, "We've always wanted to go to Portland!" And we saw a hatchback car that was for sale, and we could afford it, so we canceled the second flight.
Amy Nadel
So now you had a vehicle, a place to live, but you didn't have a job. So then what happened?
Dima Khalifa
We were homeless in Portland for a while and going to food banks. We ended up going to Lake Tahoe because he had a cousin that worked out there.
We did a season in Tahoe. I've done two seasons in Glacier National Park, and I did spend about four months in New Zealand.
Amy Nadel
And then you stopped traveling.
Dima Khalifa
The whole time I was traveling, I would have dreams about Zion. I would be in Hawaii, asleep on the beach, and I would wake up having dreams about Zion, and I finally was like, I have to go back there. And so this place has always felt like home.
