Final reflection!

Obama decides to try bypass congress

As I have already posted, the GOP and Obama are at a standstill, so Obama is really taking matters into his own hands by using his executive powers to do as much as possible without having to go through congress. One of the things he has been doing is giving visas to immigrants, especially the minors from Central America who are fleeing from violence. This is an important step in solving the immigration problem in North America; however I feel that this is a highly impermanent solution and more steps need to be taken.

The major connection I feel between this article and The Distance Between Us is a less direct one than other connections I have been reviewing. In this book, when Reyna, her siblings, and her dad went across the border and were stopped they were just thrown back, and allowed to pretty much try again. Now there are far more migrants, so they are not simply thrown back, and the border is far harder to cross. We need to fix the issue of undocumented immigration and lower the number of undocumented immigrants crossing the border, be it by making immigration easier, or making illegal immigration harder if not both.

Immigration has gone up and down in the United States. I had learned about the different periods and which people migrated when in history class, but I didn't get personal stories of migrants until this time. I believe that even after the Mexico / Central America migration ends, more migrants will come from new places. Immigrants will always be on the rise going from one place to another as the socioeconomics of the world changes. The United Sates needs long term solutions not only for the rising numbers of unaccompanied minors currently entering the US, but also for future migrants. Doing this will require both political parties to cooperate.

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Reflection #4

My families immigration

My great-grandmother came to America when she was around 20 years old. She left Latvia during the time of World War One. She was nearly killed multiple times, and she claimed it was a miracle that she saw her 90th birthday. Her uncle Isaac who had already made it to America, and had made quite a bit of money, helped her family make the journey to America. Even if she had survived World War One in Europe, she being Jewish, would almost certainly have died in World War Two. She was lucky to survive, and I wouldn't be alive if she hadn't made it to America.

Like my family, Reyna Grande came to America to escape something, in her case extreme poverty. When her dad came and got her, she was quite diseased, and could have died before adulthood if she didn't get proper care. Not only would she possibly be dead, but she would definitely not have been as successful as she is today. Her success is in part thanks to the education she was able to get in college in America. Her dad pushed her to graduate, and she is now a successful author. Her life would be so different if she had not immigrated, just as I would not have existed if my grandmother had not come to America.

I knew that my family immigrated to the United States, but doing this project made me do some research and I learned a lot about my family's history that I never even would have known. I even read my great-grandmother's book I Refuse to Die, which I used as this reflections artifact. I did not realize why or when my family left Latvia, and I am glad that I now know. Almost everyone in a the United States is a descendant of a immigrant, and people should try to learn about their family history.

Reflection #3

Nepalese immigrants risk everything for a better life.

Nepal's economy is in a very bad shape. It has been having many problems, mainly economic ones, ever since the 10 year Maoist insurgency. The war ended in 2006, but the after affects of the war are still being seen. The government still is unable to draft a functioning constitution. Nepal has many parts of its economy shrinking, but it's population is still growing. This is causing as many as one fourth of the people at any given time to be working out side of Nepal. Many people go to South Korea, Kuwait, Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. They perform backbreaking physical labor, and in Qatar, there was evidence of Nepalese people being used as slaves! Some return to their country with HIV, presumable from sex trafficking; others return home dead, as many as five a day will arrive in boxes, often covered in shrink-wrap. This is the sad reality of how far people will go to escape poverty.

In The Distance Between Us, Reyna Grande's family went to "el otro lado" which means the other side. The other side is a term people in the small town of Iguala, Guerrero use for the United States. Reyna's dad and Reyna's mom both left for el otro lado when she was 2 and 4 respectively. The United States of America is a far nicer place then say Malaysia, and the leaving of their family didn't kill anyone; however, it did completely destroy the family. The parents got a divorce, the children had a hard childhood and had to be very self-reliant while being abused. Mago, the oldest daughter went slightly crazy, even feeding innocent children poop simply because they had a mother. In both Mexico and Nepal, people will go to great lengths to fight poverty.

I did not know that immigration was a problem in other countries. I knew that eastern Europeans were migrating into North Western Europe and other immigration existed, but besides that I was not very educated about immigration problems outside of North America. This book showed me that immigration is a bigger issue than I previously thought, and this article showed me how wide-spread this is. I honestly think that America has a low immigration problem compared to other countries. These issues need to be solved in more than just one country.

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