Niaz's Alter

I made an alter for my cousin Tariq who passed away in a car crash July 13th 2005 along with his two best friends. He was 19. I'm going to be 19 this month.
It's funny because today, December 2nd, is his birthday. He would be turning 25 today.


He was my favorite cousin :)
He got me a little pink elephant toy it was the first thing he bought with his own money.
Who does that?! Seriously, he was the best ever, he was like the brother i never had.

All my really good memories of family are from when i was really young and he was still around. In our Evanston house (where i lived until i was 9), family used to come and visit a lot and I have many memories of Tariq there.

This is a picture of me and my cousins, over the summer it used to be all of us living together. I'm an only child so it was always lots of fun to have other kids around even if i was the youngest.
I don't see them all at once anymore.


In my alter I made the black gait because one time when we were really young Tariq and I were playing catch and the ball went into the neighbors yard so he jumped the fence and broke his arm. It was a joke between us that he was too good to use gaits.


He loved cars.
I had a toy car, one of those ones that you sit in and move around by walking, when i was really little he used to push me around in it. He loved indycars so we would pretend it was an indycar.

When he was 14 or something he got this 1968 Blue Camaro and he fixed it up real nice. He loved that thing. He used to drive me around in it when i came to visit him in Georgia :)












After he died, i wrote him a letter.
I was 13 when i wrote it and that's how old i was when he died. He took me out for my 13th birthday, we had spaghetti (my favorite) and we went ice skating.

His favorite pie was key lime pie, and it's my favorite too.

I miss him so much. I don't remember him that well anymore and it kills me.
Sometimes i forget he's dead because I wouldn't see him super often even when he was alive. It's when I go to Georgia or pick up the phone to call him that i remember.

I really wish i had more time with him. But isn't that what we all say when we lose someone ?
He was so intelligent, so sweet, so funny. 2pac's song "The Good Die Young" comes to mind whenever i think about his death. He makes me want to do good in this world. He helped me grow up.
I chose to make my alter for Tariq because his death has had a huge influence on me and i wanted to compile all the memories i still have of him.