My family came from India in the 1980s. My father is one of 13 children, and his sister was the first to go to the United States of America. My grandfather was a businessman who dealt with rubber, and he knew a lot about taking risks. He knew that America was the place where his family could grow and become financially stable. He sent his newlywed daughter off with her husband to New York, and she told all the siblings about how great it was and the many opportunities in New York City. She filed for all of their visas, and in groups of four, my dad’s family was able to settle down.

None of the thirteen children knew how to speak English or how to be accustomed to the American culture. They stayed together in their two apartments in Spanish Harlem and eventually developed an unbreakable family bond that still exists today. My uncles and aunts spent the little money they brought to America on these two small apartments in Washington Heights, Manhattan. There, they would all live together with their spouses until they worked and made enough money to move out. Slowly, each of the thirteen siblings were able to move out of the apartment and buy their own houses and settle down with their families in Floral Park, New York, a small town bordering Nassau County.

But how did my dad settle down? He was the eleventh child of the family. He came to America when he was twenty-one years old in 1985. He left his comfort zone of India and had to experience college in New York. The rest of his brothers and sisters already had either a nursing degree or some sort of computer electronics certificate, so getting a job was a lot harder for my dad. He decided to take baby steps, knowing that he would have to overcome the language barrier to communicate well with others, especially during interviews. He worked at Duane Reade full-time, slowly picking up English by talking to the customers. He once told me that when people asked him which brand of a product worked better, he would tell them the brand that had the least in stock.

He took computer classes in community college to try and obtain some sort of degree. However, he was unfortunately unable to get a degree after failing a class on the subject that he spent years trying to speak but not enough time to master completely: English. He spent about 6 years going to work in the morning and going to night classes in the evening. But not all hope was lost when in the 1990s, he went back to India and got married to my mom, who was a nurse in the military. But once he came back to America, he was not ready to move out and settle down. He had a younger brother and sister to take care of, and he needed to help pay for their education. He eventually got to work for an electronics company, and he later got a position as a Traffic Device Maintainer at the New York City Department of Transportation, where he would work all the way until January 2016. All of his brothers had similar jobs in the MTA fixing trains, so he knew that this opening was perfect for him because it did not involve much of a formal education. After a while of working, my mom was finally able to come to America because of her visa. They stayed a while in Washington Heights until the birth of my brother. They had finally been one of the last to move out of the apartment in Manhattan and settle down in Woodhaven, Queens. After I was born, I stayed in Woodhaven and finally moved to Floral Park, where we continue to live today.

I have always asked my dad what was the hardest time of his life. I had always thought that it was the time when he worked a full-time job and went to school. However, he says that he enjoyed that time of his life. There are three things that kept my dad relaxed while he was struggling to make end’s meet.  The first thing was the Catholic Church, which shapes my life today. My dad and his family learned to trust in the Lord, and luckily for them, a South Indian church had just opened up. They were able to pray in their native tongue around each other, reminding them of their homeland. All of my family still attend the same church today. The second thing was family. My dad knew that he was not the only person going through this situation. It was his family going through a change, and he had older brothers and sisters to talk to and ask for help. If he had ever needed help with anything such as babysitting, he had twelve other siblings lined up to take care of us. The last thing that helped him relieve stress and kept the family together was volleyball. In India, my dad and his brothers cleared some of the field and put up a net, playing with a leather ball. When they came to America, they would rent out a gym in a church and play with their church friends. They would play in church tournaments, and meet other South Indians who had also immigrated to the United States. All of these things play some sort of relevance to my life.

My family still retains most of the South Indian culture that they brought to America during the 1980s. They have found a balance between the American and Indian cultures to raise up me and my siblings. I have been able to identify myself as American and Indian, even though Americans in America and Indians in India tend to say otherwise. I remember times when I have tried to play basketball at the park, and strangers yell, “Shouldn’t you go back to India and attend medical school?” Even though these insults hurt at first, I had finally understood that everyone in America except the Native Americans had ancestors that are immigrants that are foreign. This common ground makes me no different from anyone else. My family as a whole has become more receptive to the American culture, especially now as we have grown up and some of our cousins have married non-Indians. They treat them just as equally as everybody else, immersing them in a whole new culture full of new foods, trying to get them to speak our South Indian language.

The three things that helped my dad and his brothers succeed in America – the Malankara Catholic religion, volleyball, and family – have been passed down to my generation. My dad, his twelve siblings, and all of my cousins still go to the same church that our parents had gone to when they first came to America. They had become active in the church, and that still holds true today. Now, my family gives money to the church, and my cousins have office positions in order to expand the church develop it. Even though the service is from 11AM to 1PM, my family goes to church from 9AM to 2:30PM to talk to each other and their friends. Volleyball also has a big influence on my family today. All of my cousins play volleyball, and it is essential that we play whenever we have picnics and barbecues. We spend every day in the summer playing volleyball at a park until it gets dark using a pole and net that my dad had made. My uncle is currently the manager of a travel team in New Jersey, and this team is made up of me, my brother, and my three cousins. My family was the first to introduce me to volleyball, and it is because of them that I played volleyball in high school and even in Brooklyn College. My family was very supportive after hearing that I was playing the family sport collegiately. With all that said, even though volleyball and church play a significant role in my life. I believe that the camaraderie of my family has had the strongest influence on my life today. After moving out of Manhattan and being able to settle down, my parents along with their brothers and sisters moved to Floral Park in Queens. We live blocks away from each other, and we hang out together, watch basketball games, and play cards together. We see each other three times a week during the school year, and every day in the week during the summer. We have been so close to each other for so long that we do not hang out with friends very often. And even though common households find it disrespectful, grabbing something to eat or drink out of the refrigerator is expected with my family.  Our camaraderie today reminds my parents, uncles, and aunts of the time when they all squeezed themselves in two little apartments in Manhattan.

This picture is of my grandfather’s obituary in the Indian newspaper. It gives information about the funeral service and his children. My grandfather came to America once, and he hated it so he tore up his passport. Without him and his willingness to let go of his children in hopes for a better future, our family would not be the way it is today. 

This photo is of a lot of my cousins playing cards with my deceased uncle two weeks before he passed away. The loser of the game (my cousin on the left) has to wear a card on his ear as a symbol of shame.