Post Mortem #3

In the novel “My Father, the Panda Killer.” by (Jamie Jo Hoang) it splits the story between Jane and her father, Phuc. Jane lives with her little brother Paul, and her father Phuc who is an escaped immigrant. Jane is 17 and wants to go to college but is terrified to ask her father for permission to go. She is afraid of being beaten for wanting to leave and not work at the store like her father. She is also afraid of her brother hating her for leaving like their mother.    When Phuc was young he had to try to escape his hometown to get to America; but fails the first time and lands up getting an older man killed because of his  arrogance. The second time he succeeds and gets out of his home town.       Jane finally spills about being accepted to college at dinner when her fathers company was visiting.  The lady was questioning her if she would like to go to college or if she's undecided; when this happened she couldn't take the pressure and just yelled out that she'd been accepted. Her father to her surprise just said okay and nothing more.         The second time Phuc attempts to escape he is on another boat. And it makes it further than last time, being stopped a few times to be checked and paying off the people to continue the trip, then the ship broke down and they were stranded, being passed up multiple times by other boats. At last Phuc thinks of fishing, dives for the fish and when he comes back up the boat is gone and there is a shark playing with him. When he finds and swims back to the boat he keeps passing out and then there is a lot of commotion, when he gains consciousness he realizes everyones dead except 1 person. Later just one other gains consciousness and now it's Phuc and two others.  Phuc has but together it was pirates that killed, tortured, and robbed the people on the ship.      Jane went to Disneyland. When she gets back work is even more boring than it has been because there is no excitement except for her friend showing up and giving her coffee. The next day she was late picking up her brother and they had already called her father and she knew she was in for a world of hurt. When she was in the car she got hit multiple times and when she got home she got beat more with a stick till she physically couldn't move. Later her brother brought her soup and her stuffed panda her father won at a carnival game for her, creating the one good memory she has of him and one she cherishes most.        Phuc finally gets saved by a cargo ship and two or so nights after he gets on he finds a panda and over a couple nights he starts playing and feeding her. He does this until he gets locked in by the caretakers and they want him to fight with her and he lands up killing her and he is transmitted by this. When he finally gets off the cargo ship he is shuffled around for a bit till he finds a job building a skyscraper with other immigrants. Phuc then learns about alcohol and gets drunk after work everyday with his coworkers. When he is drunk he gets horrible nightmares about being on the boat with all the dead bodies and killing pandas. After a month or so working on the building he is put back on a boat to go to Guam, well he is on this boat he unknowingly met his future wife and mother of his kids.     Jane has an incident with her best friend and they are no longer friends, that same day her father takes Jane and Paul to a Funeral for her father's friend. One of Phuc's (Jane's father) friends tells him that he should go see his parents because they might not be around much longer. Later on Phuc takes Jane and Paul to vitamins to see their grandparents, well there they meet Long who is Phuc's brother. Later on when they are in America again Jane runs into trouble with the car and has to call her dad. When he gets to her he seems to be in a really good mood and doesn't get mad with Jane but instead seems happy to teach and show her how to fix it. A couple days go by and Jane is cleaning and when Paul doesn't listen to her she gets mad and slammed his fingers in the back door of their house. The day before Jane has to go to college, Paul and her make up and Paul asks her if she will come back and not run away like their mom did and Jane explains she'll be back in the summer and call when she can.       

In the ted talk “What Marrying an Immigrant Taught Me About Cultural Bias” – by Kyle Quinn, he talks about how us as American citizens mistreated immigrants just because we are socially biased. Him and his wife went to the dmv to get their license switched to a new state and when the woman who was helping them she completely dismissed and ignored them as soon as she saw that his wife had a green card. “The BMV rep saw that green card the reaction we got was shocking. She got up out of her chair began to raise her voice and in a very quick and accusatory way started demanding additional documents including mine which we hadn’t yet presented. She looks at me and says “where’s you green card?” And I said “I don’t have one.” And she said “Then you can’t get a driver’s license” and she pushed back our documents, she leaned over the counter, pushed us out of the way and waved on the next people to become attended to.”(quinn) 

In my book I don't really see that Americans are the ones who are creating a bad environment for Jane's family. But what I do see is that Jane's father seems to be stuck in his own cultural bounds. He treats his kids the same as what is stereotyped for Vietnamese people. ““In the bathroom stalls at school there are yellow stickers that read “abuse? call 1-800-799 safe.” I've heard stories about abused kids being in denial. And now I have to wonder if I am one. maybe I'm worse. Maybe Jackie is right and I'm a straight up coward. you go home and get the clothes, I imagine saying. I test it out knowing I wouldn't ever dare to actually speak it.”(hoang 227)

  In the ted talk though I see it because the women they were seeking help from refused to acknowledge them once she realized that she was an immigrant. What we can do to help this kind of behavior is to not even act but actually acknowledge that we are all humans doesn't matter where your from or what your background is.

In infinite country by Patricia Engel The Revere family Case a lot of challenging experiences while immigrating into the country they are originally from Columbia while immigrating they get separated Talia is being held at a correctional facility for adolescent girls she was taken while they were immigrating into the United States she has a plan to try to escape “It was her Idea to tie up the nun”(Engel 1) and get back with her family because her dad has a plane ticket waiting for her into the United States. For me what I think needs to change for people to feel more accepted is making sure that we're not separating families while immigrating and also making sure that we are holding the correct people back. If they wanted to hold Talia back they should have held the whole family back instead of letting some through and others not. The Ted talk I will be talking about is Three questions to ask about your US citizenship. This Ted talk talks about somebody who came into the United States to live with other family to get out of their home country. people say that their ancestors came in the right way but “America's definition of "the right way" has been changing ever since the first ship of settlers dropped anchor.” (Vargas)America really doesn't have a correct way everybody does it differently and everybody thinks that their way is the correct way.

In my book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz Oscar struggles to fit in, find himself, and do well here. He has a hard time fighting between doing what he wants, following the Dominican stereotype, and fitting in as an immigrant. Oscar does not follow the typical Dominican man role, he is a nerdy, to himself kind of guy. In the ted talk Subjunctive by Phuc Tran it goes over how immigrants are challenged by language barrier. Also how Americans and others view it, “I hate it when grammar is used to belittle other people”(Tran 1). It talks about people struggling to fit in and In my book it doesn't really deal with Americans making it hard to fit in, it's more of his family that doesn't let him be himself. It’s his own family that doesn't really accept him and help him be successful. If his family was supportive of him he might have been confident, been who he wanted to be, and not wanted certain things so bad. “Oscar, Lola warned you repeatedly, you're going to die a virgin unless you start changing…Cut the hair, lose the glasses, exercise. And get rid of the porn magazines…”(Diaz 25). They were the ones that could've changed to help him be successful. 

In my book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz Oscar struggles to fit in, find himself, and do well here. He has a hard time fighting between doing what he wants, following the Dominican stereotype, and fitting in as an immigrant. Oscar does not follow the typical Dominican man role, he is a nerdy, to himself kind of guy. In the end of the book he finds a girl that he really likes but she has a boyfriend. That doesn't stop him from kissing her. Her boyfriend finds out, and sends people to kill him. In my book it doesn't really deal with Americans making it hard to fit in, it's more of his family that doesn't let him be himself. It’s his own family that doesn't really accept him and help him be successful. If his family was supportive of him he might have been confident, been who he wanted to be, and not wanted certain things so bad. He was trying to find a lover like the whole book. He was never able to find someone until after college, “But he also got his first kiss ever. So you could say that day changed his life.”(Diaz 293). He never had support or acceptance which led him to trying himself with such a desire for love. When he had the chance he went for it, and he ended up getting killed over it. In the ted talk Subjunctive by Phuc Tran it goes over how immigrants are challenged by language barrier. He made this to help bring knowledge to this situation. He goes through on how Americans and others view it, “I hate it when grammar is used to belittle other people”(Tran 1). He refers to this as people making other people feel like they aren't worthy or don't fit in because of language. This connects as they make Oscar feel like he doesn't fit into the family because he is different then most Dominican men.

In Steph Cha’s book, Your House Will Pay, It follows the Park and Matthews families and they both get involved with crimes. They are both immigrants and they face cultural biases against themselves. In Kyle Quinn’s Ted Talk, What Marrying an Immigrant Taught Me About Cultural Bias. Kyle talks about how being married to an immigrant, you can definitely experience cultural bias. “Despite the legal protection that is granted toward documented immigrants in our country, this legal system does nothing to protect them from the hate, discrimination, or dehumanization they experience on a daily basis in the U.S.” (Kyle Quinn). In my book Your House Will Pay, Ava Matthews got shot in the back of the head at a local store because she was wearing crip colors and the cashier, Jung-Ja Han, thought she was up to no good. "Ava wasn't a Crip," said Shawn. "But Jung-Ja Han thought she was. She died wearing Crip colors." (Steph Cha). They both similarly relate to the same topic. They both experience cultural biases.

The main character of the novel, A parrot in the oven, is Manuel Hernandez, a young boy often known as Manny. Manny is growing up in the projects with his parents, one brother, and two sisters. The title of the novel comes from Manny’s father, who compares Manny to a parrot in the oven: he sits around in the shade all day and complains about the heat. The saying is often used for people who are stupid, but Manny’s father uses it in a different way, to describe Manny as a trusting person. He says that Manny is naïve and often doesn’t see people’s true nature. This appears to be accurate, as Manny shows a deep level of empathy, but he himself is hurt by this ability to easily trust others.

In the ted talk, Don't feel sorry for refugees, Mufleh shares stories of hope and resilience, explaining how she's helping young people from war-torn countries navigate the difficult process of building new homes. Get inspired to make a personal difference in the lives of refugees.

In my book, Manny parents cant keep jobs, this prevents manny and his family from being successful in their town and makes it harder for Manny to fit in at school. In the Ted talk, the speaker who is the soccer coach to the boys has to worry about taking one of the kids to the hospital as they don't have access to healthcare. "Rooh, come on out. I need to talk to you. I need to see if you're OK or if we need to go to the hospital." (Mufleh 8:30)

Based on my novel The Good Braider by Terry Farish, it's a story about a teenage girl from Juba who flees with her family to the U.S. because of the ongoing war and she is anxious for the safety of her family. Once she's in America she has to adjust to the new way of life and culture around her, she has to work hard to earn money for her family while also trying to figure out who she wants to become independently in America. "Mrs. Meija wears makeup like stars in the Egyptian soaps. Mrs. Meija is from a country called Colombia. No one in America is from America" (Farish 111). This quote shows how Viola describes her surroundings as if no one is originally from the United States and makes it seem like she is living separated from Americans, which means there wouldn't be so much tension if they weren't so divided from each other. Another quote I found is, “‘Never has a child talked back to me as they do here’. My son said to me, ‘In Sudan, the parents beat us all the time. Here they cannot beat us’. ‘How can we raise our children here’” (Farish 133). This quote shows Sudan mothers asking one another how they can raise their kids to behave when American culture doesn’t allow them to punish them the way they feel is necessary. In the Ted Talk titled What Marrying An Immigrant Taught Me About Cultural Bias by speaker Kyle Quinn, he talks about him and his wife’s relationship in the U.S. after marrying a woman from outside the country. After years of staying in America with his wife, he notices the amount of discrimination that immigrants go through daily when they go anywhere around America. “Her tune changed entirely when she found out that I was American. She was nicer. She was more accommodating. She was more patient. When she thought that we were both foreigners she had little to no patience at all to deal with us” (Quinn 3). What this quote shows is an American man talking about his experience at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles with his wife trying to get a license, he notices that they didn’t want to help them because his wife wasn’t originally from the country. What needs to change for these people to experience more success and acceptance would be for Americans to treat everyone equally, no matter where they come from.

My chosen Ted Talk, Immigrants make Democracy Stronger, by Sahu Bhojwani is about her experiences in American politics, and how immigrants who come to The US matter and should have their voice heard as they get jobs, help the economy,and become citizens. “And soon after I had taken that formal step to becoming an American, the attacks of September 11, 2001, changed the immigration landscape for decades to come. My city, New York City, was reeling and healing, and in the midst of it, we were in an election cycle.” (Bhojwani) This quote is about 9/11, which is a big turning point where the US became a lot less friendly to immigrants. My book Love hate and other filters by Samira Ahmed is about an Indian girl named Maya. She wants to go to film school but her parents want her to go to a different school and get married. She must balance the traditional Indian lifestyle her parents want with her own dreams. After a bombing by a muslim man who shares her last name, she and her family become the targets of hate crimes. “NYU is my dream school. I’m not going to the University of Chicago if I can help it. The mere fact that I’v pulled off this feat - under the radar, in spite of the ever - present gaze of my parents - represents a tiny victory.” (Ahmed 8) What is missing is a tolerance for other groups of people, a lot of America seems closed off to these new groups, like in my book and ted talk.

At the end of my book “Butterfly Yellow” by Thanhhà Lai, we see the culmination of everything Hằng has been working for. She gets to reconnect with her brother Linh, who’s name is now David with his adoptive family in Texas. But when she gets to him, Linh doesn’t remember who she is which frustrates and hurts Hằng. Even though she is hurt by this, she is still determined to stay close to her brother and build a connection with him. Hằng and Linh start to become closer and we get to see Linh have memories come back up of him and his sister when he was younger before they were separated. It ends with Hằng being hopeful for what is to come in her life and that she has a home in both Vietnam and America. To create a better environment for people coming into our country is to have a better understanding/empathy of what they went through and experienced. What needs to change for these people to experience more success and acceptance is to have better policy reform in America to allow immigrants in the country so they are more supportive and inclusive to all of them.

In “Immigrant voices make democracy stronger” from Sayu Bhojwani, she speaks about the challenges she faced and her journey through finding her dreams in America. She talks about the barriers she faced while coming and adjusting to life in the US like, immigration status, race, and religion. Later on in her life she became an activist for immigrant rights and for them to be properly represented in our government. It overall shows the importance of immigrants in American democracy and what they face when trying to become citizens of the US.To create a better environment for immigrants we need to be more inclusive and to represent them in better ways. If the government was more representative of immigrants in the US, the American landscape would be far more inclusive of everyone. What needs to change for these people to experience more success and acceptance is to not push negative images of immigrants just due to stuff that only a small part of a group did.

In the Ted Talk What's missing from the American immigrant narrative by Elizabeth Camarillo Gutierrez, the author mentions how American society loves to idolize stories of success, specifically immigrant success stories. Gutierrez tells how the stories of success helps inspire and fuels the dreams of many, but also puts down those who don’t reach the same level of success. “The problem with this narrative is that it also seems to cast a shadow on those that don't succeed or that don't make it in that way, as less than.” (3:08 Gutierrez). In the novel A Tyrant’s Daughter by J.C. Carleson the character Laila does feel as she fits in within America. Through stories of others success and pressure forced upon her due to societal standards she is pushed even further out of her element. "I was out of my element in America, just as I had been out of my element in Saudi Arabia, but now I was out of my element in an entirely different way." (Carleson 117). Within American society the pressure applied on the general immigrant population due to “super” success stories place unneeded pressure on immigrants that can backfire and cause halted progress within bettering their own lives.

In Luma Muflehs Ted talk she talks about the struggle of being separated from her family and how not only that but also the harsh and unwelcoming treatment she received when she got to the United states simply because she is an immigrant, She also talks about how people often feel bad for immigrants instead of believing in them. “Don't feel sorry for them believe in them”Mufleh says. She also explains the feeling of not feeling like she is welcome anywhere “hard to believe you belong when you don't have a home”(Mufleh). My novel Heartbreak symphony follows two immigrant teens in San Antonio, Texas, who are navigating loss and self-doubt. Aarón’s mother died eight months ago and now he has an imaginary robot following him around. But not just any imaginary robot, but one that represents La Maquina, the public persona of Xavier López, a musician Aarón is strongly attached to and someone missing for nearly a year who he can’t accept is possibly dead. Mia has grown up with domestic violence at the center of her world. She and her brothers create family bonds through invented rituals so they won’t focus on the parents who are gone: first, their mother who abandoned them, and soon after, their father, who was consumed by alcoholism until he passed away. Aarón and Mia come together with a pact to not give up on auditioning for scholarships to a prestigious music school. In the quote I provided it is Aarón talking about how if he improves his mental health he could also help the people around him improve theirs and help them feel less alone "So...if I got better...maybe I could help the people around me get better too?"I ask"(Kemp 269). what is missing from the American mindset and culture to create a better environment for people coming into our country? What needs to change for these people to experience more success and acceptance? I feel like the lack of basic knowledge is a key thing missing in the American mindset and culture as well as the close minded behavior of many. What needs to change is starting with the system, The entire process of becoming a legal immigrant is pretty harsh and can take 30+ years which doesn't even sound fair or realistic. The second thing that needs change is the false narrative immigrants are painted with and have been painted with for generations, it's like a generational curse. They get treated poorly and unfairly for quite literally being themselves. I believe these people would experience more success and acceptance if the American people treated them as an equal and not an enemy trying to intrude.