I was recently talking to a cousin of mine about our struggles of being children of immigrants. Arij and I were lightheartedly discussing being taught English words with the wrong pronunciation by our parents and making fools of ourselves in public. If you ask any first generation child of immigrants, they'll tell you similar stories. It is a part of growing pains.
The truth is, first generation children of immigrants have a different style of thinking. We have the modern American way of thinking that we are taught in school but with the old school style of reasoning, we are taught at home. Our brains run with two different functions.
Both of my parents are college educated Palestinians. My father came to America after graduating college and my mother came later on after marrying him in 1987. My dad owned a Key Food store and my mom chose to be a stay at home mother. I never thought anything of it as a child. For people who could look past our race, and the "broken English," this was a very American style home. My father worked hard, was his own boss at work, and my mother kept together our home. Later I recognized my mother's spoke English with an accent and identified Arabic being the primary language being spoken at our home. I don't remember even being taught Arabic, Asalam Alikum was unconsciously embedded within me. I grew up translating letters that were sent to the house as she translated conversations to me from other family members.
It wasn't until my father's death when I was 10 that I recognized the struggle. My mother had to slip into a role very quickly that she never. She had to become the provider and take every responsibility my father had and master it. She had to get a job, she had to secure and pay the bills. She had to drive us to school, she had to figure out which bill was for what, all while maintaining her caretaker role as well. I watched her sit in the living room shuffling through bills, and watched her cook and do laundry. I've witnessed her jump between those roles like she was destined for it. I remember the same woman, who's first language wasn't English, being able keep afloat our family without a single complaint or sign of struggle.
Children of immigrants know our family has struggled. We know our parents struggled to get where they are, but they never once let us see it. I've never seen my mother crumble or fall to her knees under pressure, but she has been there to pick me up when I do.
It's moments like that, engrained in my mind that makes my way of thinking different from those around me. It's the stories of our homeland torn apart by war that makes children of immigrants recognize our parent's sacrifices for our luxury. When we are younger and we visit that land during the summer, we take it for granted. We look down upon it and think our easy American lives are better. But when we're older we distinguish that this is the place that taught us everything, because it taught our parents everything.
The biggest lesson my immigrant parents taught me was the power of education. My father always taught me that knowledge was the most important possession you can have in life. He always said that "They can take everything away from you, but they can never take away your knowledge." He wasn't alive to tell me this personally, but as I got older and repeated how much I hated school every chance I got, my mother made sure to pass this on to me. She never told me what career to pick or tried to get me to change it, she is just happy I'm chasing it. And as I'm soon to be the third college graduate in my family, I've treasured that lesson. I never enjoyed school, but I believed that when you're a first generation American, we have this unspoken pressure and drive to make sure our parent's sacrifices weren't done in vain. We are always afraid to fail, even though our parents tell us all the time they are proud. We have this overwhelming desire to show them that all the suffering they've endured in making those sacrifices was valid and worth it. And as someone who dreads graduations, I have no other choice but to make sure I attend mine because my mother deserves that moment. It isn't about me, it's about what she's done for me.
There are moments where I think I know more than my mother. There are moments my siblings call my mother's style of thinking backward, but the lessons from our mother has gotten us farther than anyone I know. Whenever I used to joke about my mom being an immigrant, she's quick to remind me that she knows the entire New York City transit system like the back of her hand. While I, Brooklyn born and raised, get lost every single time. Her style of thinking has single handily kept this family together and has impacted me without me even knowing. It was embedded in me as easily as Arabic was. The motivation to make my mother and father proud and be the added legacy to their brave journey to the United States is what has gotten me here. My parents have taught me power, knowledge, sacrifice and humility.
At every small milestone in my life, I hope it's an added legacy to theirs. I hope their voyage to this foreign land is worth something.
Whenever I think about my future, I think about Hiam and Ali. Thank you.
