A family Divided

Upon reading Schiller’s piece about Transnational Migration (in combination with the Basch), I realized just how loyal people are to their home countries. I always knew that people would come here and send money back to their home countries, but I never knew the ties that would be kept. There are literally people who spread themselves across two  countries, remaining affiliated with the political, family, and other affairs going on in their homeland.

I also did not realize how much these trans-national ties could actually help a family out. For instance, there was the one vignette about the phlippino family whose family became divided. The family at home was extremely poor and the parents had a difficult time giving them a proper education, the outlook was bleak. The family then had to make the decision to leave two of their children behind to come to the United States.

Imagine having to make that choice? Not many people have to do it, and I can only imagine how heartwrenching it must have been not only for the mother and father and siblings but for the children that were left behind. But the parents knew that they had to do it in order to keep their children in school. In order for those kids to be educated, the family had to move thousands of miles away from them.

But in order to do what was best for their children (to keep the younger ones in school and put the older ones in college) they had to move. In America, we never have to face these decisions, or at least rarely. I know that my parents didn’t have to leave me just to make enough money to put me through school.

It’s easy to overlook just what it is that these people are doing; but once I realized what is meant to be a transnational migrant I found it hard to forget.