One common denominator that you can gather from all grad students is that they are all hard on themselves. That of course, does not exclude me.
There are many moments in which I look back at undergrad, I look at my GPA and I wonder, what the hell happend. What the heck could have possibly happend that would prevent me from having a better GPA. I go thru my list of excuses, I explain to people what happend and they just look at me with disbelieve. They hardly can believe all the things that happend during highschool and my undergrad. I myself in the mean time feel like I am just going thru a list of excuses that don't measure up. But just this past week something happend that reminded me how it feels to be in a huge family full of extraterrestrial problems.
My stepfather is a legal immigrant. He has been in the United States for over 20 years. He was actually trying to apply for citizenship just last year and he passed everything except the English reading part of the test. He knew about the structure of our government. He knew the history of the United States. He tried testing me on how many members there are in congress, in the house of representative how many years do they last in office....All that stuff. I failed so miserably cause the last time I ever thought about those things was in Junior High Government class. But he knew all the numbers...
He knows how to speak English but he has never really seen the need to learn how to fully read it. He used to work in construction. He was so good at it that he almost started building his own company, but my stepfather is a farmer. He is a simple person. He is not interested in becoming a CEO. All he wants is for the world to leave him alone. All he wants is to get home, see his children, have some drinks with his brothers, and fall asleep to the sound of some Bachata.
My entire family is constantly filled with problems that he runs away from by driving trucks across the country. Thats right, in order to escape my mom's (and other family member's) thirst for conflicts he drives trucks for a living. He goes for days at a time driving back and forth.
Only this time he drove someone else's route into New Mexico. He hit an immigration check point and they asked him for his papers. When he didn't have the papers he told the officer "but I am not going anywhere international"... The officers didn't care they arrested him.
The most ironic thing is that
his prisoner number is his residency number (National resident of the United States), so they knew he was legal!
It makes my blood boil.
Now they have had him in Jail for a week. There is no bail. My mom is going to have to scrounge up $20,000 DOLLARS out of NO where because the glorious United States Government has my stepfather arrested without charges, without cause, and with proof of his innocence, proof of his legal residence. I don't know about you but this sounds like a GRAND scam to me.
When my mom contacted a lawyer the lawyer adviced her: He should get a better job. He should get a job that keeps him closer to his family. Which is another thing that makes my blood boil. What the
FUCK does his job have to do with this? My stepfather is a LEGAL resident you stupid FUCK! Which
SHOULD mean that he has the same rights as a LEGAL citizen of the United States. Which
SHOULD mean that he can have any job he wants in the WORLD!
I've encounter a lot of people who, when you mention some mistake in the system here in the United States they crucify you. They tell you basically that there is nothing NOTHING wrong with the United States. You tell them, this immigration thing is just not right....the idea of wanting to just throw everyone out, of just arresting everyone who looks a little "
Off White".. And they just yell at you, "THEY are all criminals! They are all stupid! They are all evil"....
It is so sad. The United States used to be something really special to me. It used to be the land that saved my family's life (my family ran away from persecution in Dominican Republic during Trujillo's time). One more ironic thing is that the first thing our past (Trujillo) dictator did, is put checkpoints of citizenship all over the country.
In reality it makes my hair stand to see how many new laws in the last 8 years seem very similar to the laws that the Dominican Republic had while under dictatorship. I mean I may not remember how many years is the term of a senator or a representative but the one thing I know is that there were no random immigration check points within the United States (not placed on the border) in the 1970's and I am preaty sure there were none in the 1980's. The US is turning into something ruined, something scary. What most Americans don't understand is that by writing the country off as "PERFECT" and not wanting to rethink, recognize, or even discuss the things that may need changes or correction, they themselves are slowly walking into a path that leads a country into not being FREE, into being just like the land that my family (a generation ago) had to run away from.
Democracy is hard people. You have to know what is going on, you have to look at your opponents point of view. You have to consider consequences years ahead, and alternatives. We are not doing that anymore. Everyone is just considering their own point of view, and in the mean time even LEGAL immigrants are getting hurt, really badly. How badly?
Well here is a simple (almost middle class) family trying to make it and yet my mom is going to have to come up with 20,000 dollars, my stepfather has not worked (so far) in a week.
So what? What does it matter you ask? These are just uneducated simple stupid immigrants you say? Well, you are so wrong... My sister got an offer from Harvard and Yale for her undergrad and here I am.....at UC Berkeley.
What people don't understand is that brilliant people come from simple families too. Simple families are just as valuable as RICH OLD money folks.
So this is just one of the many example of the kinds of things that I have to endure while I am in school.
My sister called me last Friday, hysterical because her father was in jail. She'd never known anyone in jail because all the other drama happend years ago when she was too little to remember. These kinds of things, legal, emotional, physical, international problems are very common in my family. I had to calm her down....
I saw a quote the other day:
They came for the Jews
But I am not Jew so I didn't do anything about it
They came for the Homosexuals
But I am not gay so I didn't do anything about it
Then they came for the Black people
But I am not Black so I didn't do anything about it
Then they came for ME
But there was no one to defend me cause everyone else was already GONE!
Also there was a quote I saw one day in a New York restaurant bathroom which I think also applies to the state of our democracy right now.....
Jazz is not dead
It just smells funny...
Replace the word Jazz with American democracy please. This is definitely smelling funny to me....
SO, What do you think? Do you think that if all the sudden you found out your parents were in jail that would affect your grade on a test the next week? I think so.
