Emeer Guesmi, also known by his b-boy (breakdancing) name Zulu Rema, is a dancer from a small town in northern Africa, Tunisia called Hammam Zriba. At two years old, he lost his legs from a rare blood condition. Unfortunately, in Tunisia prosthetic care is not widely available so Emeer never was able to receive the care he needed. Now seventeen, Emeer received the chance of a lifetime thanks to fellow b-boy Chris Wright to come to the United States for state-of-the-art prosthetics.
Chris is a hip-hop ambassador and founder of Freestyle Session who found Emeer’s inspiring story on a popular news site. Chris was intrigued by Emeer as he saw video clips of him dancing legless at the Red Bull BC One Tunisia competition and wanted to help him achieve his life’s dream of breakdancing with legs. Chris had never seen anyone dance like that before and he instantly started a GoFundMe page to raise money for Emeer to travel to NY to make his dream come true.
A few months later, Emeer came to A Step Ahead Prosthetics with six pairs of socks packed into two prosthetic shells. The type of prosthetic he had was hurting his spine and knees, essentially deforming his knee caps due to tight circulation. The poorly constructed prosthetics were several inches too short for his height and came with no liners. Head prosthetist and owner Erik Schaffer said, “His prosthetics were completely inadequate for someone of his size and stature.” Once Emeer received his new prosthetics, he was infatuated with them. The sky is the limit now for him, and he told the team how he wishes to compete in the Buenos Aires Breakdancing Youth Olympics in Argentina next year. We hope young kids aspire to be like Emeer and never give up on their goals and always live life without limitations.
“What I want to say to people like me is to be stronger than your disability and overcome it. The real disability is in the mind, not in the body.” – Emeer Guesmi
