Yes, father really does know best. And apparently, it's universal.

Growing up in far-away Bethlehem, Abdalla Bandak dreamed of a career in engineering. His dad wanted a doctor in the family.

Bowing eventually to parental wisdom, he enrolled in medical school in Jordan and discovered the affinity for medicine his father sensed all along. He particularly loved surgery.

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This overview photo of Bethlehem, where Abdalla Bandak grew up, looks like a souvenir postcard.

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Thanks, Dad.

"I grew up in Bethlehem, about five miles south of Jerusalem, that part of the world where there is unrest, to say the least. I was 7 during the war of 1967. I remember the rockets, the fires, the shooting. My dad was in Kuwait, working. It took three or four years before he could come home. I was with my grandparents in Bethlehem.

"He was doing good in Kuwait, making more money. When permission came for him to come back, he sold to his partner and said, 'I just want to come home.' It was very emotional.

 "I had a very nice childhood. When my dad came home, he started his own business. We had a supermarket and a chicken farm. I worked on the chicken farm every day.

"We had excellent schools in Bethlehem. You get raised up from first grade to learn English, Arabic and French, three languages. It was old culture. Listen to your parents and do what they ask you to do.

"There were a lot of tourists coming to Bethlehem and Jerusalem. Everyone caters to the tourists. Bethlehem is well known for olive wood carving, so you see a lot of nativity scenes and statues of Jesus and Mary carved in wood. That was a good business at that time, as well as mother-of-pearl for rosaries.

"At Christmas, we would have choirs coming from the United States, Sweden, France and Australia. Christmastime is very touching. We would celebrate according to the western Christians on the 25th of December. Christmas for the Eastern Orthodox is on January 7, so the whole thing gets repeated. Those are good times to be in Bethlehem.

"When I was growing up, it was almost perfect. Now, it's hard for anyone to visit there. Things started to change drastically after '87, when I left to come here. People became more like prisoners and lost their freedom to move.

"When I was a boy, I was really good in math and physics, and I wanted to be an engineer. I loved that stuff. My father influenced my decisions. He kept encouraging me to go to medical school. I wasn't convinced until after I finished high school. We don't have medical school in Bethlehem and Jerusalem. I had to cross the Jordan River to Jordan for my medical training, a six-year program and a year of internship.

"I wanted to do surgery. I thought I was good with my hands. I wanted to come to the U.S., but it was almost impossible to come in here for training, especially for surgery. I worked in a surgery department in Jerusalem for about three years until I got permission to come here.

"In Jerusalem, I met Charlie Horton from Norfolk, Virginia, a pioneer in plastic surgery, a good teacher and mentor. He was visiting areas of unrest. He would come into Jerusalem and meet Palestinians and Israelis and go to Turkey and meet the Greeks and Turks and to Iraq and meet Iraqis and Iranians.

"He started a charitable organization, Physicians for Peace. His idea was to make friendships one physician and one patient at a time. We don't need to hold guns. We can hold knives and do surgery and not fight.

Yes, father really does know best. And apparently, it's universal.

Growing up in far-away Bethlehem, Abdalla Bandak dreamed of a career in engineering. His dad wanted a doctor in the family.

Bowing eventually to parental wisdom, he enrolled in medical school in Jordan and discovered the affinity for medicine his father sensed all along. He particularly loved surgery.

The founder of Physicians for Peace lured him to Norfolk, Va., for plastic surgery training, a field he'd never considered. All these years later, settled into a thriving plastic surgery practice in Kanawha City, the one-time wannabe engineer can't imagine doing anything else.

Thanks, Dad.

"I grew up in Bethlehem, about five miles south of Jerusalem, that part of the world where there is unrest, to say the least. I was 7 during the war of 1967. I remember the rockets, the fires, the shooting. My dad was in Kuwait, working. It took three or four years before he could come home. I was with my grandparents in Bethlehem.

"He was doing good in Kuwait, making more money. When permission came for him to come back, he sold to his partner and said, 'I just want to come home.' It was very emotional.

 "I had a very nice childhood. When my dad came home, he started his own business. We had a supermarket and a chicken farm. I worked on the chicken farm every day.

"We had excellent schools in Bethlehem. You get raised up from first grade to learn English, Arabic and French, three languages. It was old culture. Listen to your parents and do what they ask you to do.

"There were a lot of tourists coming to Bethlehem and Jerusalem. Everyone caters to the tourists. Bethlehem is well known for olive wood carving, so you see a lot of nativity scenes and statues of Jesus and Mary carved in wood. That was a good business at that time, as well as mother-of-pearl for rosaries.

"At Christmas, we would have choirs coming from the United States, Sweden, France and Australia. Christmastime is very touching. We would celebrate according to the western Christians on the 25th of December. Christmas for the Eastern Orthodox is on January 7, so the whole thing gets repeated. Those are good times to be in Bethlehem.

"When I was growing up, it was almost perfect. Now, it's hard for anyone to visit there. Things started to change drastically after '87, when I left to come here. People became more like prisoners and lost their freedom to move.

"When I was a boy, I was really good in math and physics, and I wanted to be an engineer. I loved that stuff. My father influenced my decisions. He kept encouraging me to go to medical school. I wasn't convinced until after I finished high school. We don't have medical school in Bethlehem and Jerusalem. I had to cross the Jordan River to Jordan for my medical training, a six-year program and a year of internship.

"I wanted to do surgery. I thought I was good with my hands. I wanted to come to the U.S., but it was almost impossible to come in here for training, especially for surgery. I worked in a surgery department in Jerusalem for about three years until I got permission to come here.

"In Jerusalem, I met Charlie Horton from Norfolk, Virginia, a pioneer in plastic surgery, a good teacher and mentor. He was visiting areas of unrest. He would come into Jerusalem and meet Palestinians and Israelis and go to Turkey and meet the Greeks and Turks and to Iraq and meet Iraqis and Iranians.

"He started a charitable organization, Physicians for Peace. His idea was to make friendships one physician and one patient at a time. We don't need to hold guns. We can hold knives and do surgery and not fight.

"They were looking for people to come into their program for training. He offered me plastic surgery. I wanted to do general surgery, but in the beginning of 1988, I went into the plastic surgery program in Norfolk.

"I changed my mind almost completely about plastic surgery. What appealed to me was the challenge. The challenge in general surgery most of the time is the diagnosis. Once you diagnose it, there are certain steps you follow to do the surgery. There are one or two ways to do gallbladder surgery or take out an appendix. I thought it would become repetitive.

"In plastic surgery, it was like, wow, every patient is different. Say two patients come in who have cut the tip of their finger, one a violinist, one a farmer. The farmer's goal is to go back to work the next day. The violinist says, 'Do everything you can so I can play the violin.' I found it very interesting.

"Plus, in plastic surgery, you get to address multiple parts of the body - the head and neck, the mandibles, facial bones, the breast, abdomen, the lower extremities. A wider range.

"I finished my American boards in general surgery and went back to do two years of plastic surgery in Richmond at the Medical College of Virginia. Then I joined the faculty for about 11 years.

"It was hard to change a big medical institution, frustrating. So I decided to leave. We came here about three years ago with CAMC. We were so taken by the people at St. George Orthodox Church that we decided to stay. In June of last year, I started my practice here. My wife runs my office.

"Plastic surgery involves the aesthetic part and the reconstructive part. It's very rewarding on both sides. We're involved in breast reconstructions after mastectomies, skin cancers, accidents, facial fractures, patients with pressure ulcers, wound healing.

"You don't hear plastic surgeons fighting for doing pressure ulcers or breast reconstructions. They want the cosmetic part. My practice is about 50-50. I'm involved heavily with body contouring, mainly for patients after gastric bypass or if they lose weight on their own.

"You can't really separate cosmetic and reconstructive. There's a lot of overlap. The AMA definition of cosmetic is to improve on the normal, and reconstructive is to bring to normal. So if someone doesn't have a breast and you reconstruct it, that is bringing it to normal. But you can't take the cosmetic part out of it, because you have to give them a shape as close as possible to a normal breast.

"Generally, it's wise to look old. Gracious. But the younger generation doesn't look at it that way. Twenty years ago, the age group that had cosmetic surgery was late 50s and 60s. Now you are looking at 40s and early 50s.

"Twenty years ago, if a patient came in and said, 'I have wrinkles in my face,' your choice was a chemical peel or a facelift. Now we're doing more injections, fillers. People are addressing the issue earlier to keep it a maintenance thing before they would require invasive surgery.

"I have a best friend who is an engineer. He says, 'You need to write your dad a thank-you note every day, because look what you are making and look what I'm making.' I tell him that's not all. One of the philosophers said, 'If you love what you do, you don't have to work anymore.' I love to see my patients. I love to go to the operating room. I love to see the results. I admire my dad for his vision.

"Last time we went home was last July. Things are very different. It's sad. You can't move alone much between Bethlehem and Jerusalem. There are big walls separating Palestinians and Israelis. If you are Palestinian, you look at the Israelis as those people who are limiting our freedom. If you are Israeli, you say, 'Look at those Palestinians, trying to kill us.' We need to get beyond all that. The regular person, most Israelis and Palestinians, want peace. They just want to take care of their families.

"The people think U.S. citizens are wonderful people, but when it comes to government, things get messed up. For example, we send weapons and money to Hussein, who we know is not a good guy, but we want him to help us against Iran. We really need to support what's good for humanity, not what serves our interests at that time. Once we reach that level, the world will be more peaceful.

"I grew up in a very nice family and had a chance to get a good education. When I look at the people in my home country now, unemployment is almost 80 percent and education is really terrible. I feel lucky to be able to live in the best country in the world."

To contact staff writer Sandy Wells, call 348-5173 or e-mail san...@wvgazette.com.