Carolina, a 48-year-old immigrant from Romania, had a shocking awakening when she arrived to what she earlier in the interview had referred to as a “wonderland.” Here, she describes her first disappointing experiences in the United States:
And when [my husband] came here in May, I think and we came during the summer vacation, I think in July and he found the rent in the basement and I was so scared, because I never saw people live in the basement underground (laughing). […] I saw the lights just day and night, because they don’t have a window, just a small window and in the outside they have the backyard and uhm… garbage. It was put in front of the window and it was a rain in that summer, heavy rain, and all the garbage come outside and during the night all the cockroaches came and run on your bed, and I was so scared and now upset… and I told him if this is America that you’re dreaming, I take my kid and I go home. And in one week we left back for Romania and I left my husband here.”
