Waters and Jimenez focus mainly on the influx of immigration towards the Southern and Mid-Western states. One of the reasons proposed for this path that immigrants choose (to new gateways instead of established gateways) is that the different institutional arrangements will influence the immigrant assimilation. It’s interesting to see how having one high school, one YMCA, one college and so on, will force the immigrants and the native-borns to interact with each other. I wonder if there was any hostility or any attempt to drive the immigrants out of the town in Garden City, where Jimenez conducted the research.

It’s also true that with each generation, it becomes harder for immigrants to speak their native tongue. Even though my parents and siblings can speak Chinese, I can’t speak it; I can only understand. My parents had shown their frustration towards me by putting me in various Chinese tutoring schools when I was younger, but somehow I was never able to speak it. Both my parents and siblings, on the other hand, can speak and understand Mandarin and Cantonese fluently. It really is disheartening because I know that if I have kids, they won’t be able to speak Chinese as well because I won’t be able to teach them.