Lotfi: Just to give some context about how I feel about Wyoming and Laramie more specifically. I come from Algeria, as I said. I come from the capital, Algiers.

It is a highly populous city. Very big. About 5 million people live there. My whole life I have lived in Algiers. I was mostly around a lot of people, family, friends, and struggling with city life or enjoying city life. There are a lot of things to do and, as you would expect, a lot of traffic and pollution, both in noise and in the air.

There are good things and there are bad things. When I left Algiers for Grand Forks, North Dakota, I was shocked at how small this town was compared to Algiers. I did not have a culture shock in the way you might expect from a foreigner coming to the US. I was kind of familiar with the culture.

But I did not realize how small towns could be, even with their universities. The program there was good, but it was very cold. There were not a lot of people to hang out with outside of school. Not a lot of things to do. After a year and a half I was offered an opportunity to transfer here to UW, and then I googled Laramie.

I was even more shocked to see that it was smaller than the town I was currently living in. I told myself, “okay, I can do this. This is for the betterment of my PhD candidacy here. I have to make some sacrifices.” So I came to Laramie. It was as small as I expected.

But then something interesting happened that did not happen in Grand Forks. Grand Forks was very cold. I did have a lot of friends there, but I did not have true connections. Laramie gave me an opportunity to meet more people. The campus was very welcoming, and that gave me some confidence. I thought, “let us give Laramie a chance. Let us see what there is. Let us see what it is all about.”

I started hanging out more, going downtown, figuring out what this city was about, and learning about the history of Wyoming here and there. Slowly but surely I started to realize this: even though it is a small town, it has so much personality, and it is so convenient to have everything within a five-minute drive.

If you need anything, you are there within five minutes. When I was in Algiers, it was a 40-minute ride everywhere, and it was actually maybe 10 miles away or less than that. So that is the first thing. I got used to the calm life in Laramie. I see that a lot of families are happy bringing their families here and letting their children grow in this calm, welcoming environment.

Another thing that is absolutely great to me is getting exposed to nature more. Growing up in the city, I was not exposed to hiking or fishing. The only animals I really saw were stray dogs and cats. That is it. But coming here you see wildlife everywhere, from the tiniest rabbit all the way to a big moose here in the Rocky Mountains. 

I had my first fishing experience in Wyoming. I was super interested. I had a really fun day with family and friends. I see you smiling because you were there. So, for me, Wyoming is about rediscovering yourself, rediscovering a part of yourself that you did not know you could enjoy.

Being outside. Being more outdoorsy. Doing new activities that you did not do before, including skiing. I had my first ski session here in Wyoming. It was in the Snowy Range. We did not have a lot of snow back in Algeria, so you get to learn how to deal with snow as well. 

I think it changed me as a person, even though it is only three years of my life and I am almost 29 now. I feel like I am a different person than I was three years ago, ever since I came to Laramie. I have been to other states. I have been to New York, Texas, New Mexico for a short while, North Dakota as I said, and Minnesota, here and there. I felt most at home here in Wyoming.

I enjoy having the choice of being near nature and near cities as well. Here in the Front Range, you are pretty close to Fort Collins and Denver. On this side, if you are a bit tired of small-town life, you can just go for a weekend, have some fun there, and then I say, I have had enough of the traffic jams, I have had enough of the loud cities, I am going back home now.

So for me, Wyoming is calmness, serenity, peace of mind, and a slower pace of life. A slower pace of life in a good way, not in a bad way.

Abdalrahim: From what you have said, you mostly talked about the good things about Wyoming. So I want to hear about the challenges, the difficulties that you faced and overcame in Wyoming. You mentioned some of the challenges, like the weather, the snow, the cold. These are some challenges, but I need to hear more from you about some of the challenges that you had in Wyoming.

Lotfi: That is only fair. We can start with the weather. That is a big one for a lot of people. Algiers has Mediterranean weather, so it barely gets cold in the winter. It gets quite warm in the summer, not desert heat and not mountain cold. So it is just temperate, very good weather.

When I came to the US I first came to North Dakota, which was an absolute shock in temperature. Going from breezy 50 degrees in Algiers, Fahrenheit, to minus 30 Fahrenheit was definitely rough. When I came here to Wyoming, I had gotten used to the cold somewhat, but definitely not the wind.

People warn you about the wind, and it is everything they say. It is very strong. You have to hold onto everything, hold onto your hat or beanie and your books if you have them in your hand, otherwise they will fly away.

Every time I take out pizza boxes during the winter, they keep flying away, and I curse my luck for having to struggle with this every time. So the wind is definitely a tough experience here, but you get used to it. It is not a big deal, especially since you are at home, you have shelter and whatnot.

In terms of Laramie being a small town, I would say it was a bit hard for me to make connections at first. I was engaged to my current wife at the beginning, so I spent about four months here on my own. I had recently moved here, so I did not have any connections except for some individuals who also transferred universities with me.

It was just maybe four or five individuals, fellow Algerians, but it was definitely lonely the first few months. It is tough to make meaningful connections. You do not know where to start. You do not know who to reach out to socially, outside of a professional setting. So it can get very lonely unless you have someone to drag you out and say, “hey, let us do this and do that.” It might be a bit difficult for my introverts to take that step on their own the first time.

Things started changing when my wife arrived and I started attending more MENA Club events, the Middle Eastern and North Africa Cultural Club here at UW. I met some friends there, and that vastly expanded my network of people that I know here.

So it did turn out well. I understand how people can feel lonely here. The other thing is that I had to learn how to drive in high winds and blizzards, which is not something I needed to do back in Algeria for sure. It can get very dangerous, with you getting stranded. One time we did get stranded.

I was with some friends and we were going to a work conference at 4:00 AM. It was a complete blizzard. You could not see past 10 feet in front of you. We had to go off the road and we got stuck in the snow for about an hour and a half until there was a tow truck there. It can get dangerous.

For now, that is what comes to mind. I do not see any other big challenges that I had to deal with except the weather and the lack of a social network.

Abdalrahim: My final question: Do you see a future for yourself and your wife in Wyoming? Is it something that you think about, or are you just here for a PhD and then you will look for something else?

Lotfi: I think that is an important question to ask yourself. If I had everything that I needed, if I had the choice, I would stay in Laramie. I think I have gotten a nice, comfortable nest here with my wife, although she may disagree. She would maybe want a bigger city. So it is going to be a matter of who wins the debate.

If I find an opportunity to stay here, I definitely would. Of course, Laramie does not have a lot of opportunities for what I do in my field, doing research in petroleum engineering, maybe still with the university. But if I did find a job here, I would certainly like to stay.

It has everything that I need. You have all the necessities of life, and if you want to do some activities that are not available here, you can drive to Cheyenne, or you can drive down to Colorado to some of the bigger cities. You also have outdoor activities just 20 minutes away in Happy Jack or one hour away in Medicine Bow. It has a mix of everything.

I would certainly miss the ocean, the sea, and living close to the coast. That is a big thing for me. I grew up next to the coast. I grew up 15 minutes from the Mediterranean, and I used to go swim every summer, almost weekly, just like that. So that is definitely something I would miss, but I would trade that for everything else here in Wyoming.

Note: The transcript above has been condensed from its original audio recording to improve the flow and readability of the story.