Fuat Jan was born in the city of Ta’if in the mountains southeast of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. His parents were Turkish “guest workers”, as were many different nationals employed in the Kingdom. Even though he was born there, Fuat was not a citizen of Saudi Arabia. Fuat eventually immigrated to the U.S., and Americanized his name to John Can. He found work with an uncle who had an Italian restaurant, and learned the pizza business. In time John found his way to South Florida and opened his own restaurant near Boca Raton.

It was only a short distance from a new marine fish wholesale business that I was helping to build. We would go to John’s place for lunch frequently. John is very outgoing and liked to talk with his customers, and we told him about the fish business. As he learned from us about the aquarium fish industry he became quite enamored by the subject. He began to wonder about the fish of the Red Sea, how valuable they were, and how he might go back to Saudi someday to start a fish collection station there.
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