Everything a desk needs, and nothing it cannot verify.

Atta Arghandiwal is an Afghan American author, speaker, humanitarian, and mentor whose work connects memory, dignity, self-sufficiency, and responsible use of new tools.

Atta Arghandiwal is an Afghan American author, speaker, humanitarian, and mentor. After leaving Afghanistan and living as a refugee in Germany, he arrived in the United States in December 1981 with basic English and $10. He began as a bank teller and built a 29-year career in banking. His books and talks explore memory, dignity, responsibility, and the practical work of starting again.

Atta Arghandiwal is an Afghan American author, speaker, humanitarian, and mentor whose work is rooted in a life rebuilt across countries, languages, and institutions.

Born in Kabul, Atta served in the Afghan Air Force and worked in public relations and sales at the Hotel Inter-Continental in Kabul. He left Afghanistan in August 1980 after the political rupture that followed the 1978 coup and the Soviet invasion. After living as a refugee in Germany, he arrived in the United States in December 1981 with basic English and $10.

Atta began his American working life as a bank teller. Over the next 29 years, he built a career in banking and rose to Senior Vice President and Regional Manager. That experience—beginning again, learning unfamiliar systems, earning trust, supporting a family, and accepting responsibility—became part of the foundation for his writing and community work.

His books include Lost Decency: The Gilded Cages and the Search for Home and The Self-Sufficient Immigrant in the Age of AI: A Field Manual for the Work of Standing Again, co-authored with Sohrab Rasouli. Across memoir, public conversation, and practical guidance, Atta examines Afghanistan, exile, moral memory, work, family stability, self-sufficiency, and the dignity of rebuilding a life.

Today, Atta writes and speaks for readers, universities, libraries, cultural institutions, immigrant-serving organizations, and communities seeking a serious conversation about memory, responsibility, and human judgment in a changing world.

Sohrab Rasouli is an Afghan immigrant, educator, and co-author of The Self-Sufficient Immigrant in the Age of AI, and the founder of Noura, an artificial-intelligence project for employment-support teams.

Sohrab Rasouli is an Afghan immigrant, educator, and co-author of The Self-Sufficient Immigrant in the Age of AI. He left home young, crossed borders alone, and rebuilt more than once in more than one country. Before working with artificial intelligence he took the jobs that teach the body what restarting costs, then served newcomers directly as an employment specialist. He is the founder of Noura, an artificial-intelligence project for employment-support teams.

Sohrab Rasouli is an Afghan immigrant, educator, and co-author of The Self-Sufficient Immigrant in the Age of AI: A Field Manual for the Work of Standing Again.

He belongs to a later wave of Afghan displacement than his co-author. He left home young, crossed borders alone, and rebuilt his life more than once, in more than one country. Before working with artificial intelligence he took the jobs that teach the body what restarting costs.

He went on to serve newcomers directly as an employment specialist, helping people prepare for work, understand unfamiliar systems, and move through the early pressure of starting again. Two things he learned in that work run through the book: there is a distance between ability and access, and proof usually has to be rebuilt before a door will open.

Sohrab is the founder of Noura, an artificial-intelligence project for employment-support teams serving newcomers, built on one discipline: technology should help deeply, but it must never replace human judgment. He co-leads the AI Self-Sufficiency Lab with Atta Arghandiwal.