Good Things and Immigration

When one of my former students was new to the US, having just arrived in Philadelphia from Vietnam, she boarded the wrong Septa bus one night, trying to make her way home after work. She watched out the window for landmarks she could recognize, but at the end of the route, she was the only one remaining and saw nothing but unfamiliar streets. She burst into tears, knowing she didn't have any money to pay for a taxi.  

The bus driver tried to help, but at that time my student didn't have many English words. Eventually he was able to understand a street name. Rather than hang up his hat at the end of his shift, he contacted a friend whose route was also finishing and who drove in the area where the woman needed to go. The first driver took her to an intermediary meeting point to connect with the second bus driver, who then drove her to the correct stop in her neighborhood—altruistic actions that saved a new immigrant from a night that could have ended quite badly.

Despite its moniker as the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia often takes a bad rap when it comes to hospitality. Still, I would like to think that this little story truly represents what we are capable of not only as a city, but as a country. We just need to find our way.

Originally, I had wanted to highlight the actions of individual immigrants that have strengthened our communities and our nation, but I've become concerned for their safety. While I would like to share people's experiences in their own words, I don't unwittingly want to put the spotlight on anyone. I know naturalized citizens who are afraid that they could get swept up in an immigration raid, and based on what I've read in the news, this is not a baseless concern.

When I was younger, I worked exercising horses on a racetrack in Maryland, and most of our grooms had immigrated from Michoacan, Mexico. These grooms became my first Spanish teachers and my friends. At that time, in the late 80's, the US-Mexico border was not so difficult to navigate.

So each year in December, there were often a couple of grooms who would go home to spend the month celebrating Christmas with their families, and then they returned to work in January. We found out back then that it generally took two people to adequately complete the work that the one vacationing groom had done. And generally, when that person returned in January, the trainers were only too happy to hire them back.

Today most immigrants who are in the process of gaining their residency permits cannot leave until the legal work is complete—that’s why these days so many want to settle here with their families. Our system is overwhelmed and often it takes years to navigate even for those with strong claims. Most are willing to suffer through it because they are struggling to provide something better for their families.

Like our horse trainers in December, if immigrants leave, I am sure as a nation we will suffer not only from the loss of cultural enrichment, but we will also discover the staggering amount of work that's been left untended.

As an ESL teacher, some of my favorite classes were with the parents in my after-school English class. Today, I'm still in touch with some of these students, and it's gratifying to see that most did succeed in building a life here. The woman who boarded the wrong bus has children studying in selective universities. These former students have bought houses, started businesses, and contributed to our communities in immeasurable ways.

The fight we should be having today should not be about finding the best way to throw immigrants out, but instead about finding the best way to create a more efficient and humane system of immigration for our country and its newcomers.