Having only relocated myself from one borough of New York to another in recent years, I could be considered a migrant but certainly not an immigrant. It was an older generation from my family who would immigrate into the United States and experience a change in lifestyles.
My mother’s side of the family originated in Trinidad and Tobago, specifically Port of Spain, Trinidad. On a map, Trinidad can be found off the coast of Venezuela, the southern-most island in the pair that makes up the nation Trinidad and Tobago. In fact, Trinidad is the most southern island in the entire chain of Caribbean islands that it is a part of. Speaking with my grandmother to get a better idea of what the country was like when she was there revealed the big picture and her motivations for leaving. Despite it being a beautiful country and having only recently graduated from high school there, an institution that she tells me is the equivalent to American college, she had to leave due to the scarcity of jobs. She decided to set out to escape her situation, and as in the classical immigration story, she came to the US to take advantage of opportunities. Thus, in 1968 she left the country that she had grown up in, utterly alone as she lacked the siblings that her future generations would have. She left behind family members such as her mother and aunt, but she was merely paving the way for others who would soon join her such as my grandfather as well as my mother and aunt who were still children at the time.
Too late to experience the joys of being processed at Ellis Island, she instead came over in the comfort of an airplane. Her destination was New Jersey where the sponsor family responsible for helping her immigrate awaited her. She spent her first year in the United States living with them before being able to move out on her own. The beginnings of a culture shift became evident during her first year here. First of all was experiencing winter as the east coast of the US knows it. Transitioning from the hot weather of a West Indies island to the colder climates of North America was a challenge that both my grandmother faced as well as her daughters when they finally came over. Another notable cultural difference for her while she was living with the sponsor family was difference in dining. In Trinidad, lunch was of greater importance with it being a large meal like dinner. Meanwhile over here, it became a much lighter meal with the sponsor family eating sandwiches for lunch. Little things like this may seem meaningless to a native born, but of course they are a world of difference to an immigrant who is experiencing things for the first time. Even after living in New York for so long, my grandmother will complain about the winters, though it is hard to fault her with the snowstorms being as vicious as they are recently.
Nonetheless, she slowly made the transition. She stayed with the sponsor family for the year she had to and finally moved to New York, specifically Brooklyn. She started to work at the phone company. Ultimately she spent twenty years working there and moving up in the ranks. A lot occurred five to six years after her arrival. She received her citizenship in five years. Her recollection of the process to get citizenship was of a process simpler than the one present today. There were questions of course such as “Who is the governor?”, but she affirms that it wasn’t to the extent of the numerous questions that are offered today. A year after this achievement, she would finally leave Brooklyn and reunite with the daughters who she had gone ahead of. Now six years older than when my grandmother last saw them, my mother and aunt had been left in the care of their own grandmother. With their coming over, a new generation had to be able to adapt to the New World. My grandmother and her daughters settled down in Staten Island. My grandfather had come over to the United States only two years after my grandmother. Thus with beginnings on a Caribbean island, my family came to be on Staten Island, the borough that I’ve lived most of my life. Overall, my grandmother found her immigration to America to be a positive experience. Having lived here for 47 years now, she’s accomplished much of what she had dreamed of doing. She has received her citizenship first and foremost. She worked hard to support two young daughters and a third one that would be born over here. She self educated herself and attended school to earn her Master’s degree. After years of hard work and seeking the opportunity that originally motivated her to leave Trinidad, she’s enjoying the quiet life in Staten Island, a mother to three and a grandmother of six. The nice two story house there with walls brimming with pictures of my brothers, my cousins, and myself do little of showcasing her Trinidadian heritage. Only, the foods and drinks that she prepares when her grandchildren come over will reveal that information with there being fried bake, roti skin, and sorrel drink among other things on the table when we arrive.
Although her two oldest daughters are first generation immigrants, they came over at such a young age that it was easy to adapt to their new situation of living on Staten Island. My mother specifically attended public school in Staten Island before going on to earning her Bachelor’s at St. John’s. Continuing to further her family by improving upon her mother’s accomplishments, she went on to attend law school. There she earned her J.D. (Juris Doctor) upon successful completion of the program. All three daughters went on to have successful careers with my mother continuing to inform me of the importance of hard work and dedication.
This whole report has mainly been about my mother’s side of the family. Mainly, this is due to my father’s family having lived in the city for generations. My father grew up in Red Hook, Brooklyn and never really experienced a dramatic shift, geographically or culturally, like my grandparents and their children on the other side of my family did. My parents met in Brooklyn and lived together in Staten Island leading to myself being born and living in the borough for most of my life. In a way, it can’t be said that my father has never experienced the difficulties of moving elsewhere to set up a new life. Even years after I was born, my father would get lost on Staten Island. While I was in the back of the car at a young age, his request for directions from a fellow driver would be accompanied with a “I’ve lived here for x years, and I still don’t know my way around,” Of course in time he too adjusted to new living situations.
As for myself, I’ve only moved around NYC as well as said earlier. Shortly before the start of 2012, my family moved to the Bronx. This was during the start of my sophomore year at high school, and one of the motivators for the move was to get me closer to my school in the Bronx. Compared to what amounted to a one hour car trip for me, the move that my grandparents, mother, and aunt undertook was of a much greater magnitude. They took a chance by leaving the country of their birth and their pursuits paid off as they made the most of their new lives.
