In Sentenced Home, 1996 immigration law served as an agent for reducing the number of immigrants in United States: when a U.S. resident, either legal or illegal, is convicted to a crime, it doesn’t matter if the person served his/her sentence, he/she has to face the possible deportation. Deportation for these Cambodian Americans is a very harsh punishment by taking away one’s life completely with as little as a week forehand notice.

Most of the Cambodians are either refugee from the Cambodian Genocide from 1975~1979 or the descendants of the refugee. The society or the environment the immigrant kids were exposed to did not create a peaceful and studious atmosphere around these kids. Unfortunately, most of them have had little knowledge about the situation they were in and due to the environment they were exposed to, a large portion of them have criminal history.

I have to admit that I had teary eyes when I watched the video for the second time. In my point of view, deportation seems very unjust to me: for example, Many Uch has been checking in constantly with INS and haunted by the possible deportation for years because of his criminal history from his teenage hood; likewise, Leoun Lun, convicted a crime for about 8 years ago, even though he did his sentence, he was told to be deported back to Cambodia.
A better application for the immigration law needs to be fixed or rewritten because the deportation does not re-evaluate a person. The government just blindly pushes immigrants with criminal history away. The threat of deportation makes the possible deportees nervous and insecure. Imaging one day you are forced to leave your friends, your family, your work, and everything you have behind, you would feel the harshness these people are experiencing everyday.

The Golden Venture talks about the smuggling of Chinese immigrants to America. The people smugglers, known as the snakeheads, were exploiting these Chinese immigrants and taking advantages of them. Upon the unforeseen arrival of the ship, the New York police force had little time to react to the situation, and the crewmembers irresponsibly ran the ship onto Rockaway Beach. The immigrants were seeking for opportunities and freedom that were propagandized to many not-so-advanced places.

Sometimes, the government actions seem irrational when it is dealing with immigration issues. These Chinese immigrants came here for the “Land of Opportunities and Freedom.” I wonder why it always seems to be an idle process. To many people who aren’t entirely understood the politic, the reactions and the proposed resolutions for the problems are usually extreme but needed no time consuming or time stalling actions.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service changed the policy when they had to face these illegal immigrants. Instead of releasing these unfortunate immigrants, INS gave them two choices: asylum or deportation. In my point of view, choosing asylum does give these immigrants some hopes of staying, but giving them jail time seems to be a very wasteful solution. Much money and time that were spent dealing with the immigrants. I think even putting them to work in exchanging for decent detainment places is better than keeping them inside jail cells. Deportation might seem to be the choice what the people in America want them to pick but the Americans did not know what dangers were waiting for these immigrants once they entered their homeland.

This documentary makes us rethink about the difficult situations for these illegal immigrants, about the causes for their attempts, and about how poorly the government dealt with the issue.

On June 6, 1993, two hundred and eighty-six Chinese immigrants from Fujian Province, China landed on the coast of New York City. These illegal immigrants had sailed across the Pacific Ocean on a freighter named The Golden Venture for three years. The survivors of the voyage, after years of suffering, were immediately arrested and detained. The documentary, The Golden Venture, accurately depicts the persecution and financial hardships illegal immigrants had to go through in their home country and in the United States. The documentary, in many ways, also depicts the sufferings of many illegal immigrants (those not on The Golden Venture) in the United States about twenty years after the landing of the Golden Venture on the coast of New York City.

Like many of today’s immigrants, the Chinese immigrants on the Golden Venture had to take dangerous and unpredictable routes to get to the United States. The Snakeheads, the smugglers that operated and organized the Golden Venture, led the Chinese immigrants through mountains, opium fields in the Golden Triangle, and several countries before arriving in the United States. The journey took three years and many people were beaten, raped, and died along the way. According to a man who was on the Golden Venture, “[the conditions] were a living hell.” The sufferings the Chinese immigrants had to endure shown on The Golden Venture are similar to the sufferings many of today’s immigrants to have go through.

The Golden Venture also showed the lives of four of the survivors, Guilin Chen, Yan Li, Arming He, and Kaiqu Zheng. All these men had decided to board the freighter to avoid persecution, to make better money, or to find freedom. Guilin Chen and Kaiqu Zheng, for example, boarded the freighter because they were not able to earn enough money in China, whereas Arming He and Yan Li boarded the freighter to avoid persecution and find freedom. Out of these four men, three are still in the United States and happier here than they were in China. Still, they work difficult jobs and fear deportation everyday as immigration laws get stricter every years. Unlike some of these men, most people on The Golden Venture decided to return to China because they were detained for years in the United States even after they had survived the long voyage.

The Golden Venture accurately depicts the lives of Guilin Chen, Yan Li, Arming He, and Kaiqu Zheng, showing the persecution and sufferings they had to endure even 20 years after the landing of the freighter here in the United States. The men work endless hours and still fear deportation even after they have paid the price in jail. The Golden Venture, which depicts the lives of Chinese immigrants from years ago, also depicts the lives of illegal immigrants today. Like many of the Chinese immigrants from The Golden Venture, today’s immigrants work endless hours, fear deportation, and are persecuted. The Golden Venture is not only a depiction of the lives of immigrants a decade or so ago but also a depiction of the lives of immigrants today.

Coney Island is the westernmost barrier island of Long Island, stretching for approximately four miles. It is an artificial peninsula, connected to Brooklyn by a landfill. The neighborhood of Coney Island started off as a Dutch settlement known for its abundance of rabbits from which the name “coney” is derived from.  In the 1800’s, it was a popular natural park until several structures began to be built at the turn of the century. These structures were ultimately demolished in order to make room for a boardwalk and easy beach access. In the 1940’s, Robert Moses opposed plans for making the area one of entertainment and proposed building residential housing; a proposal that ultimately resulted in a fusion of both ideas – 18 to 24 story housing project were constructed while the amusement park the area is known for was continuously expanded. The construction of Ocean Parkway and the completion of the Stillwell Avenue subway station ushered in a diverse settlement of commuting workers. Today, the neighborhood is home to several beaches including Sea Gate, which is one of two of New York’s only gated communities – the other one being Breezy Point located in the Rockaway neighborhood of Queens. They are very similar socially; the average family and household size for both the Rockaways and Coney Island is about three people. About forty percent of people in the households are the owners and about fifteen to twenty percent are spouses of the household owners. With regards to demographics, the Rockaways have a nearly 1:1 ratio of white to black people, while Coney Island has a ratio of 4:1. Although the Rockaways have a majority Irish population and Coney Island has a majority Russian population, both share a strong population of Italian people, close to six or seven percent. Most people living in either “beach community” are within the ages of 25 and 54, and over seventy percent of the entire population is over the age of 18.

The Rockaway area of Queens is located in the Rockaway Peninsula, which connects to the South Shore of Long Island.  It began in the 1800’s as two separate villages know as Holland an Hammels, which were incorporated into the borough of Queens at the turn of the century. In the early 1900’s, much like Coney Island, Rockaway was home to an amusement park. A subway line was extended into the neighborhood and, coupled with the building of the Marine Parkway Bridge and the Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge, executed by Robert Moses in the 1930’s, attracted a permanent commuter resident population to the area. In the 1950’s, the 13 story Hammel Houses were constructed, ushering in a diverse population of commuting workers similar to those settling in Coney Island at the time. Today, the commuting population remains in the two neighborhoods and many of those workers have similar jobs. Approximately thirty percent of the populations of these two communities work in the education service, health care, and social assistance fields. Since that time Rockaway and Coney Island have seen similar statistical trends in the economic, housing and demographic categories and are two parallel beach communities today. Most of the income falls within the range of $35,000-$99,000. The majority of family income lies between $35,000-$75,000 (two “census” brackets of income data). The Rockaways do have a higher percentage of people attaining income within the higher bracket of the overall range ($50,000-$75,000), while Coney Island has a higher percentage in the lower bracket ($35,000-$49,999). Much of both populations live in homes that are worth from either $300,000-$499,999, or $500,000-$999,999; the majority of these homes were built between 1960-1969. Both neighborhoods are pleasant beach communities and are a unique taste of New York City.

Flushing

Bayside and Flushing, two neighborhoods that are fairly close to each other but differ in a lot of categories. Flushing is an area dominated by people from Asia. As you can see from the table below, 54.6% of the total population is foreign born. Since most of the people are foreign born, they might have trouble finding high paying jobs because of language barriers, cultural assimilation etc. The median household income is rough $52,000. Also about 50% of the people living in this area have gone to some sort of college, and 38% have at least one degree. Overall, Flushing is a very diverse neighborhood that is still developing into one of the major areas in the city.

PLACE OF BIRTH
Total population 251,278 +/-7,484 251,278 (X)
Foreign born 137,133 +/-5,499 54.6% +/-1.2

WORLD REGION OF BIRTH OF FOREIGN BORN
Foreign-born population, excluding population born at sea 137,117 +/-5,495 137,117 (X)
Europe 13,629 +/-1,449 9.9% +/-1.0
Asia 97,093 +/-4,709 70.8% +/-2.0
Africa 1,064 +/-419 0.8% +/-0.3
Oceania 28 +/-33 0.0% +/-0.1
Latin America 24,985 +/-2,627 18.2% +/-1.7
Northern America 318 +/-154 0.2% +/-0.1

Bayside

Bayside, a neighborhood to the east of Flushing, is dominated by whites unlike the majority of the population in Flushing. Approximately, 56% of the people in this region are whites and 35% are Asians. Unlike Flushing, only 40% of the population is foreign born and out of those, 85% came after the turn of the century. This means that the people in this area have assimilated with the American culture and hold high paying jobs. The median income of Bayside is roughly $72,000, about $20,000 higher than flushing. As a result, people in this area can take advantage of many resources that are not available in the Flushing area. 65% of the people have gone to college, and 48% of those have at least one degree. Bayside is one of the most prosperous neighborhoods in New York City.

PLACE OF BIRTH
Total population 118,499 +/-4,128 118,499 (X)
Foreign born 48,540 +/-2,707 41.0% +/-1.7

Screen Recording