Who I Aspire To Become An Immigrant

Through interviewing my roommate Linda Wang, I have gotten the opportunity of hearing a first-hand account of what it is like being a young immigrant living in the United States. At the age of eight, Linda, along with her father, mother, and aunt, emigrated to America. Linda’s family currently resides in Bayside, Queens and she is a student-athlete on the St. John’s women’s golf team. Linda was kind enough to share her immigration story with me so that I may use it as a manifestation of what life as an immigrant, and the immigration process itself, entails.

My maternal grandfather was an immigrant from Sicily, Italy, who came over on a boat to Ellis Island, with his mother and two older siblings to pursue a better life with opportunity. He became a “scholarship boy” (Rodriguez 49) and through determination and hard work, he became a civil engineer, designed infrastructures and developed inventions for the government, and was extremely successful. My maternal grandmother on the other hand, was born and raised in the United States, with her family lineage tracing back to the Donner party and distant relative, William Wallace. My grandparents met in Southern California, married, and settled in Santa Barbara. Being of Catholic faith, my grandmother became a stay at home mother, and conceived nine children. When my mother was in middle school, her parents divorced, and they were left to be raised by my grandmother, with the financial support of my grandfather. Being a newly divorced woman, my grandmother began to partake in the lifestyle of the 70’s/ early 80’s. My mother being

Growing up with parents who are immigrants can present many obstacles for the children of those immigrants. There are many problems people face that we do not even realize. Things happen behind closed doors that we might not even be aware of. Writers Sandra Cisneros and Amy Tan help us become aware of these problems. Both of these authors express those hardships in their stories about growing up with foreign parents. Although their most apparent hardships are about different struggles, both of their stories have a similar underlying theme.

The first day in the United States is one of the best day and most thrilling days in my life. My father and my older sister move to Malaysia to get a job and support our family due to financial difficulty and lack of job opportunity in Burma. After a few years, my father and my sister were able to enter as immigrant and they were sent to the United States as immigrants through United Nation. After being apart with my father and my sister for more than a decade, my parents decide to move completely to America where more opportunities are available for a brighter future. My family faces many obstacles during the process of migrating to America. Despite all the struggle that are on our way, my family finally arrives in the United States and face major changes in life.

As a nation founded and built by immigrants, regardless of the treatment the different immigrant groups have received from the U.S., the very notion of immigration is an essential componant in understanding our nation’s identity. I believe it’s important to recognize and know one’s personal culture and background in their family line. If we are called to remember that somewhere down our family’s history there are immigrants who decided to migrate then I believe that can have a humbling effect, and, as a result, decrease the likelihood of xenophobic behavior to spread across our political system and the social and economic discourse that surrounds immigration. Thus, preserving one’s own culture is important, because it allows us to realize that

When a citizen from another country wants to enter the United States, they have to obtain a U. S. visa. A person from a foreign country can request to enter the country for business, pleasure or visiting or a combination of both categories.

“Mom, will I ever be treated as a regular person? When will I be like the others without people look at me in a strange way and make fun of me, when mom? When?” Those were the questions I did to my mom almost every day after getting home from school. Fourteen years ago that my parents brought me to this country offering a better life with better opportunities than where I was born. I was seven years old when came to the United States, but I still remember the happiness I felt when I first step in this country. Throughout the years, I have realize that not everything is easy and simple as I imagined. My parents worked in the fields because of the lack of a social security and not knowing how to speak English. Many Americans do not know how hard it is the life of an immigrant, they should have a consideration for us and not just blame us for the deviance of the United States.

As a youth, my acceptance of my Haitian roots was something that needed to find. As of now, it has been found as I begin to embrace my roots, culture, and traditions. However, this would have been a hard path to achieve without the support of those around me and their constant encouragement. They gave me the ability to progress and overcome the past negativity that had latched itself to me. Including those like me, students with Haitian roots that were trying to embrace their culture as

I am a veteran, I served the United States Air Force for 14 great and honorable years. I was a combat medic and I loved my job to the fullest. Now, the only thing people see after an interview that I am qualified for, is that I have a felony conviction. I take responsibility for what I did and I regret hurting anyone. For 14 years I helped heal people, not hurt them. I want to tell you a brief overview about my life because I want to ask for a Governors pardon or an exoneration.

I never apprehended how fortunate I was until my life changed on December twelfth two thousand thirteen. I was only a freshman still trying to adjust to new people and a new school. I would have never thought I had to become a responsible adult much earlier in life. It all began with one phone call from my mother saying she just been struck by a car.

I am a Chinese immigrant, and I have been New York six years already. In here, I spend lots of time to learn English and adapt the cultures. Even my language is not as good as a native speaker, but I still want to be an American here. Therefore, I am planning to become a US citizen within two years, before I graduate college. In this six years, I started from learning alphabetical in high school. Because of my language problem, I didn’t have a good GPA in high school. It made me upset. After I graduate high school, I didn’t go to college, because I thought, even I went to college at that time, I won’t have good score and achievement. I won’t spend too much time and concentrated on study. Therefore, in the year after I graduated, I went to

Men yelling, sirens sounding, the sound of burning tire, and there I sat in a truck meant for six people, but instead packed with five more than that. I could feel myself trembling with fear hoping for it to all be a dream, but I knew I had to be brave for my siblings and my mother so I was. I remember sitting next to my mother who was holding my one-year-old baby brother. Next to her was my younger sister, holding my little cousin. I sat still, staring out the fogged-up window and could see nothing except blue and red lights from the immigration trucks lighting the dark night. A life changing experience occurred that late September night when my dad was taken by immigration. Thus, being born and raised as a daughter of immigrant parents has led me to see things from different perspectives and has made me who I am today. I am me because of my parents, Fidel and Amelia Martinez. I am me because I believe I can create a different identity for my parents and I. My parents came to the land of opportunities to have an opportunity for themselves, but for their future family as well. My father’s hard work and persistence and my mother’s bravery have had a great impact on me. For this reason, my biggest influences are my father and my mother.

My dad was born in Switzerland and grew up in France, when he came to San Francisco he decided to open a restaurant. My mom is from New York and came to San Francisco to further her college education. one of the most inspiring things about my family for me is the fact that both my grandfathers at one point in time were millionaires; however, how they achieved their success is very contrasting. My father's father was born in Dusseldorf, Germany where he grew up quite wealthy due to his family owning a large machine manufacturing company. He inherited the company and lived a wealthy life, he married 3 times; the 3rd time being my grandmother who was a young, poor Slovenian laborer who had snuck in to west Europe from the communist east. Unfortunately my father's father died before I could meet him, but the stories I hear about him from my dad and my grandmother are inspiring. My mother’s father whom I live with to this day however did not have the opportunities my other grandfather did. He is an African American who was born in Mississippi 1919, at this time the Jim Crow laws were in full effect and the great depression was about to hit America. Growing up he experienced legal

It wasn’t until high school until I understood what I represented – what I symbolized to other immigrant

As first-generation immigrant, I was expected to become successful as well as being fluent in a second language without challenge. I had put an incredible pressure on myself to live up to my family’s expectation, however, thankfully unlike many other first-generation immigrants that I know, my parents do not pressure what I should be studying in college, what career I should partake and if I should be married at a certain age. Instead they encourage me to peruse my interest and to construct my own future.