The book relates eleven stories of successful immigrants in Italy, including three Moroccans. For the presentation, she hosted Halima Hadir, an Italian-Moroccan textile and fashion designer, and Yassine El Aouak, the founder of the Italian company “ParkingMyCar”. The round-table was moderated by Abdallah Redouane, General Secretary of the Islamic Cultural Center of Italy and CCME member.
The encounter was also the opportunity to get to know two successful young Moroccan businesspeople in Italy.
Halima Hader, a fashion and clothing entrepreneur who has been able to marry her artistic fiber, inspired by her Moroccan roots, with the sophistication of Italian fashion. Her brand of prêt-à-porter is “a transcultural journey, where Italian couture and the highest quality fabrics meet Moroccan craftsmen's hand-embroidered details”.
“‘Cultural duality’ for me and my identity, which combines two different cultures, has allowed me to benefit from all of the good things about both, and I've become a stronger person as a result,” confessed Halima Hadir, adding that living between two worlds “‘strengthens us and gives us greater opportunities, and not the other way around’”.
A view echoed by young entrepreneur Yassine Al Aouak, who considers that the dual nature of culture and knowledge makes young immigrants more likely to innovate than people who have lived in a single culture, pointing to the foreign roots of the founders of the world's leading technology companies.
With his “ParkingMyCar” application, Yassine El Aouak offers a unique service similar to Airbnb, where customers can rent out their private space to other customers who may need it to park their cars. His rapidly-growing business is set to expand into other markets in Europe in the near future.
Explaining how second-generation Moroccans in Italy cherish their origins, Yassine or “Mattia”, the Italian name he's used since childhood to avoid social exclusion because of his name and culture, described ways in which they face up to any form of exclusion due to their origins and names, with successful careers in various domains.
CCME
