Michael Marfil
Prof. Chris Bonastia
The Peopling Of New York City
How My Parents Came Here
One can walk through the city and discover that there are many who have a story of how they or their parents came to the city. Each one would be unique, with their own set of challenges and hardships. My parents, like many others in New York City, sought America for greener pastures and a life substantially better than the one they lived in the Philippines. Both my parents lived in poverty, although one lived in the Iloilo countryside and lived somewhat better off than my father, who lived in the city. However, they both managed to at least go to college, and my mother graduated with a bachelor’s. Their story may not be exactly the same as others, and it gives rise to the uniqueness of each immigrant story.
After getting her bachelor’s, my mother saw an opening for nursing jobs in New York, specifically the Bronx. Seeing that most of her classmates worked there, she planned to follow them and work towards a better life. Literally a day or so before she embarked for New York, she married my father in civil court and had to leave him in the Philippines, because she couldn’t petition for him to come with her. Imagine leaving your newlywed in your native land before getting a chance to enjoy him and settle down! For my father, it was very hard not seeing her face for many years, but love survived this trial. At the same time, my mother struggled with bouts of depression, but as my mother was coming here and as she spent her first few weeks in New York, she focused on an encouraging verse in the Bible that told her not to be afraid and trust in God. She believed that God could see her through, and in hindsight, she believes He did.
My mother stayed with several of her classmates in a studio apartment in the Norwood section of the Bronx, on Knox Place. Boarding with classmates in a small apartment like that is tough, as it is hard to find places to sleep and things to eat. In addition, being away from her family, her husband, and her old way of life also took its toll on her. However, when all this started to rack her brain, she prayed. She prayed for a second family, a family that would take her in and nurture her even as she sought a better life here. Eventually, she found a church that was very intimate, where all the members were friendly and welcoming. To this day, Joy Fellowship Church remains our family outside of the one living in the Philippines, never losing its intimacy or its welcoming atmosphere.
Even after discovering Joy Fellowship, she went through some more hardships. In 1984, she failed the exams that were required to work here in the United States. Her working visa expired, and she had to return to the Philippines until she could renew her visa. After renewing her visa, she came back to the Bronx, where she finally passed her exams and followed a friend who worked at Bronx Municipal Hospital, known currently as Jacobi Medical Center. She then applied for her permanent residency. The process was painfully slow and nerve-racking, as she stayed in America for a while after her working visa had expired. Finally, however, she got her green card in October of 1989. Upon receiving her green card, she started the process of petitioning her husband, my father, to come here with her. This was probably the most difficult part of her story, as she bounced back and forth from the Bronx and the Philippines between 1989 and 1990, spending a lot of money on plane tickets and phone calls between the Philippines and America in order to follow up on my father’s papers. One can only imagine the difficulty of constantly taking long flights to and fro. However, a friend from church told her to send a letter to the Philippines asking about his papers, and only then were the issues resolved. My father finally arrived in 1992, and my parents were finally together and ready to settle down here. In 1995, one year after I was born, my mother took the oath to become a naturalized citizen of the United States.
Although my parents’ story may be unique, there are many who have experienced a lot of the difficulties that my mother did. However, they all come to a common end: a better life here in America and here in the city. New York has always been a first stop for many immigrants, and I am glad to say that my parents have gone through that “golden door,” to quote Emma Lazarus’s timeless poem inscribed at the base of the Statue of Liberty.
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