(This post is continuation from Chapter 3)
I have known Jane from the day she was admitted in the hospital. Shagird came and informed me about her and I addressed her ankle. However, post that I had no contacts between us till Shagird invited me to dinner at his place and she was there too. She was once again thankful, warm and welcoming and I felt an instant liking for her.
It was when I stopped in front of Shagird’s bookshelf; I got talking to her about her love for books and eventually about other things in life. We have been good friends since then. At times she would invite us to her place, at times I would just accompany Shagird.
I guess I am the only American in this group. Shagird, Jane, Claire and others who kept on shuffling were usually the immigrants from various nations, looking for a life and career in my country. Watching them struggle, seek happiness, battling continuously; caught between dream and reality, ideologies of their world and this world I often saluted them to be a real fighter.
Living in this small town, which is known to have highest number of immigrants in the nation I have forgotten how is an American different. I see each of them more patriotic, more passionate, more hardworking, more contributing in growth of this country than I am. They are as much American as I am.
In my last job, we often discussed this and never welcomed immigrants to be at par. However, here in this small town, things are different. Even after nine eleven, this town lived in peace. We all had someone dying out there but something kept us together. Never in my office did we blame an Asian nor were we accused back. When recession hit, this small magical town kept floating like nothing happened.
The strength of this town is the immigrants and their mix culture. Jane, Shagird, each of them plays an important role in keeping the sanity of this town intact.
However, I can sense a shift. I can see more and more of them going back to their countries or moving to other cities. Shift has been inevitable; however there have always been new faces from new part of world replacing the old. But this time it is different. This time I can sense the number of people reducing, the jobs cutting down. They say recession has hit smaller towns late and probably that is affecting us.
To be continued...
To be continued...
Well this is true... the 9/11 has affected immigrants and their relationship with people. But then are we the only one affected? Americans have also been a different set post that. So finally we have a part 4! hoping to see a 5 soon :)
ReplyDeleteRicha