Stop by Nature’s Art Florist and owner and master florist Ferial Malaika will tell you all about her “prince charming.”
She’ll giggle like a school girl. And although she has quite the love story now, it was a long time coming.
Malaika is from Saudi Arabia where she married, but “not for love.”
Malaika and her ex-husband moved to Tucson, Arizona on student visas to attend the University of Arizona. They had two children, both later became Wildcats.
“I never knew what it was like,” she said about being in love.
After a divorce she began her struggle for citizenship. Frustrated with lawyers who “drain your money” she was told to wait until her son, a US citizen by birth, turned 21 so she could get her worker’s visa and then green card.
“When I would go to the immigration place, they would make me feel so low that I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me,” Malaika said.
For now she has her green card, and is working on her citizenship but is hesitant to deal with lawyers again. She’s a local florist who works on weddings and other events in the community and at the university.
She attended design school and later studied to become a master florist. But she’s now working on deciding what dress to wear and other details like “who will do the flowers,” she jokes.
She never banked on a happy ending, but her “prince charming” showed up after all.
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