Biography (continued)
I had to learn it and I didn’t know anyone in Mali either, so that made it even harder. I remember at the airport in Kinshasa, before I went on the plane, an old man came to me and said, “Aly everything will be ok. You might have lost your parents, but God is your parent now.” What that man told me put my heart at peace and at that time all fear left me. I turned to say thank you to the man, but he was nowhere to be found.
It was hell! I was lost, lost, lost! Luckily my sister who lived in France came to Mali for our Father’s funeral. I had never seen her before. Her and her husband took me to France with them. There I lived in hell again. I went days without food and would sleep outside on the balcony of my Uncle’s apartment. My Uncle had three wives in a three-bedroom apartment with fifteen kids. That was so hard on me, but again God helped me get through it. We did not have any space at all and surely not enough food. My Uncle had an old-school attitude and everything had to be done his way. He had a crazy way of seeing life, but that is a different story.
Life in Paris was not all bad. There was where I discovered basketball at the age of fourteen. My favorite sport before that was soccer. My love for basketball is how I ended up in the United States. Out of all the high schools in the United States, I chose to go to St.Vincent-St Mary High School in Akron, Ohio. In Akron, is where I met an American family with a great heart. They were and still are a very big part of my life. Bob and Becky Kelly really took me in as their son and helped me through high school and college. They will always be my family; forever.
Again, I did not speak any French when I went to France. I had to learn it completely and even when I came to the United States, I did not speak any English, so I had to learn that as well. I’m still learning. My American Mom and Dad helped me to achieve that. They also helped me to prepare for all the major events in my life in the United States, such as my SATs. I remember the first time I landed at Cleveland’s airport, I was lost. This was my first time coming to America. I had one bag and everything in that bag was out of style, because I was broke from head to toe. I remember saying to myself and my friend one day, “I will breathe the same air Michael Jordan’s breathing.” He is the reason I started playing basketball. I watched his tapes a million times over. He is one of the persons who affected my life in a very positive way. Similarly, my American parents also changed my life. Bob and Becky took me in and really showed me that I could be loved. They really showed me that I could trust again. There are no words to describe what they did for me.