Personal Narrative: My Life As An Unocumented Immigrant

Welcome. A single word on the carpet by the door greets me whenever I come home. There had been times where that one word made my heart beat and cry with joy. But not now, for many things changed through the years. Now when I look at this carpet, I instead question back: ‘Do you really mean that?’

My story would have never begun if my parents had not made a huge decision in my life, almost 15 years ago. When they decided to move our family across the border, my future would be become unknown. The fate I had been destined to have was completely altered, now, I had the opportunity to change my life for the better, to strive for something bigger. My parents pushed me to be the best I could be, and to work as hard as possible to get what I wanted. As the daughter of two Mexican immigrants I grew up in a very cultural household, and being surrounded by Spanish at all times. The only negative being I had to learn English on my own, and which led to me having some difficulty when I first started school. Yet, growing up in a Spanish speaking

Getting through high school, getting a license, getting into college, and getting a job are all extremely intimidating parts of every young adult’s life, but it is hard to imagine doing all these things illegally with the fear that at any moment everything could come crashing down. In Jose Antonio Vargas’s article, “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant”, Vargas explains his take on the struggles of being a gay, illegal immigrant trying to achieve the American Dream. Throughout the article, Vargas tells his story and really makes the reader feel sympathy for his fight and his strength. He does a very good job keeping the readers drawn in as well as appealing to pathos and ethos.

I came to US during my 8th grade and that was a life changing moment in my life. It was first time traveling aboard and that also not for a trip but for to permanent settlement. I was nervous my whole time been in the plane that how I will cope up with new environment and with bunch of English speakers. I got more. When it came pilot call for, that it's time to land on the Detroit Airport, tighten your seatbelts and be relax. As soon as the plane landed on American soil, I knew that this was the place where I’d to start a new life. Even though I knew America is the “Land of Opportunity”, everything here seemed so strange to me, the streets, the language and the people that was my first time traveling abroad.

Jose Vargas tells the story of his life; from coming to America, finding out that he is residing here illegally, learning how to live with that, and finally to sharing with everyone that he is an undocumented immigrant. Jose has a difficult task in front of him, though. He must win his audience over to his side so that he can further his agenda of developing an easier path for undocumented immigrants to receive citizenship. There are many ways he could go about this, trying to skirt the topic of his illegal activities, but Jose is an intelligent man and knows how to influence his audience. He uses the story of his life to connect with others, and in connecting with them wins them over, even if only indeterminably so. In My Life as an

Jose Antonio Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize winning author, shares his life-long journey as an undocumented immigrant in his text, “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant.” As the title suggests, Vargas attempts to convey to his audience, who likely never has and never will experience anything similar to what he has, what it is like to live as an immigrant in the United States of America. Skillfully, Vargas details the perfect number of personal stories to reach the emotional side of his audience, which is anyone who is not an immigrant. Through the use of his personal accounts Vargas is able to effectively communicate that immigrants are humans too while simultaneously proving his credibility, as he has experience and a vast amount of knowledge

It is not uncommon to hear one recount their latest family reunion or trip with their cousins, but being a first generation immigrant, I sacrificed the luxury of taking my relatives for granted for the security of building a life in America. My parents, my brother, and I are the only ones in my family who live in the United States, thus a trip to India to visit my extended family after 4 years was an exciting yet overwhelming experience. Throughout the trip, I felt like a stranger in the country where I was born as so many things were unfamiliar, but there were a few places that reminded me of my childhood.

“Outlaw: My Life In America As An Undocumented Immigrant” by Jose Antonio Vargas from the New York Times, is a narrative essay that focuses on telling a story of past events. Vargas proposes that since he grew up in America that this is considered his home. Vargas believed he would be granted citizenship if he worked harder and achieved more. His motivation of sharing his childhood journey would be the relief of him coming forward about his legal status to those who were not aware and to those who he truly cares about but could not risk sharing his story with. Vargas tone and stance attracts people who are or have already been through the same path and for those that come to America to live the “American Dream” like Vargas intended to. Vargas concludes he is trapped in duplicity and being dishonest about his legal status is destroying his character. Even though, Vargas convinces me about his difficult journey as an undocumented immigrant, his belief that coming forward with the truth of his legal status will allow him to regain his values or the trust of those who he has already lied to is unconvincing because after all those years it has become a part of his selfhood.

Throughout life, every individual must face obstacles; some more difficult than others. In the story “The Trip” by Laila Lalami, poem “Exile” by Julia Alvarez, and article “Outlaw: My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” by Jose Antonio Vargas, there is a main character who has to face many challenges because of the fact that they’re immigrants. In all three texts, it is evident that being an immigrant has many affects on their lives. However, this label and the obstacles that come with it didn’t stop each character from pushing forward.

Being a culturally diverse person in American society implies that you have ancestors from different countries. I have two ethnically diverse Grandmothers who are legal immigrants turned citizens, and have studied the process for obtaining citizenship status in the United States, which means I can understand and relate somewhat to those who have faced the same struggles coming into the United States. In the article, My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant, by Jose Antonio Vargas, he tells his story of being an illegal immigrant and the struggles that are associated with his situation: his life as a child, struggling with integrating into western culture, his teen years, living a muted life because of his situation, and his adult life, jumping

In the article of “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” by Jose Antonio Vargas, he tells his story from the minute he arrived in America. Vargas first arrived in this country by a lie. He was told by his mother to get on and get on a play with his uncle, which he had never met before at the age 12. Over the course of his life, Vargas soon discovered he had come to America as an illegal immigrant. His grandfather Lolo and Lola took him as his own to care and provided the basics in life, to have a better life than in the Philippines. Vargas took it upon his mission to be successful in school and hope that the hard work would pay of and become the American he wanted to be.

Hi, I’m Anna Sophia Wager and I am from Germany. I immigrated to the United States in 1908. There was a big drought and my mother and father were very ill. I was helping my parents and my other family. One day, my father pulled me aside after school. I was a teacher at Berlin British School. He talked very softly. “Anna Sophia,” My father said, “Here is a ticket to Americana. Go and find Ben.” Ben was my older brother. My parents gave him a ticket to the United States. I looked at the ticket. It was a ticket that was golden brown. I gave my father a hug and ran to my room. I started packing, I didn’t know what was ahead of me. It was finally my third week on the crowded boat. When I look own the steerage door I see the dirty faces, hard lumpy beds, and chunky slimy soup.

When I arrived to the United States I faced a challenging situation in my life, I didn’t know English. This challenging as I didn’t know how to communicate with any of my teachers or classmates, and I wasn’t able to do any of my work. Not being able to participate in class upsetted me because in Mexico I was use to doing all my classwork and homework. Therefore, I decided that I was going to do everything in my power to learn English quickly. So, when the my ESL teacher announced to my parents that they were going to have to take to school during the summer, I didn’t mind at all. When I was in summer school I learned a lot of English due to my determination and my hard work. Looking back I wouldn’t do things differently because I know that

When I was living in Cleveland, Ohio I have a friend that is an illegal immigrant. She is Mexican. We lived in the same apartment building. The apartment was different. It stretched to sky and I thought i was going to fall. She is just a year older than me. Her dad is janitor during that time when I was new to America. She is really nice and friendly. We always hung out and sleep over each other house. A couple of years later, I asked her “how did you come here?” She said, “ well, I don’t really remember how I got here, but my dad told me that we came by ship. It was not easy. He faced a lot of struggle just to get us here.” She came here when she was 5 years old and her name is Jameil. Her dad worked really hard. Her dad was divorced with

I am a migrant worker, I don’t earn as much money, but the good thing is I can maintain my daughter and I. It is sometimes hard to raise her because of the low payment I earn but it is sufficient for our own survival, not to mention her father died quite years back, yes it is hard but to look at my daughter because it reminds me of him, but yet I manage to be happy because I know I have a part of him with me, our daughter. It does hurt me to raise her without a father because that was my childhood it shouldn’t be her’s, I want her to be happy. My husband died in the 1930’s, April 14, he was taken out by a Black Blizzard, after that i’ve never seen one. His body was never found, when I saw the Blizzard it was large,it wasn’t small it was