My name is Nina Gazanfari and I am a former student and deep admirer of your father, Dr Meisami. I wish to offer my condolences to you and your family for your father’s passing and share some of the wonderful memories he graced my life with.
I first met your father as a college student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in his physiology course. On the first day of the course, I felt his contagious passion for human physiology and I knew that his course would be one of my favorites all semester. He taught so uniquely from other professors. He would walk up and down the aisles of the 200 person lecture hall, making every corner of the room feel welcome and engaged. He called on us to answer questions, referring to each of us as “my friend.” He taught difficult physiological topics in a comprehensible manner through his fan-favorite Physiology Coloring Book, a fun way to learn. I cherish my copy.
I will always have a special place in my heart for your father because he made U of I feel like a home to me, and he made me feel that somebody believed in me and thought I was important when I was at the most infantile stage of my career journey. There is a quote that goes something like this: “You can tell a lot about a man’s character by the way he treats those who can do nothing for him.” That quote reminds me a lot of your father, because he had a way of seeing through people, seeing what we could become and seeing what we could add to the world instead of what we were at that moment. He was transcendent.
I often felt like a “fish in the sea” in many of my 300+ student biology classes at U of I, but not with Dr Meisami. He had a special way of finding something worthwhile in every person he met, and he was great at bringing the best out in people. He wrote me a letter of recommendation for medical school which I could not have gotten into medical school without, and I am forever grateful for his support and belief in me.
I will honor your father’s support of my lifelong dream by aiming to emanate my favorite qualities of his: his kindness, his ability to see the good in people, his zest for life and discovery, his love for science, and his compassion.
I am sending warm thoughts of comfort and consolation to you and your family and hoping that you are feeling some peace. I am blessed to have known your father and will forever respect and regard him as one of my biggest inspirations and role models in this life. May his kind soul rest in peace.
Sincerely,
Nina
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