Update, wut.
So I went on the immigrant rights march yesterday.
It was INCREDIBLE. I felt really out of place, partly because I was walking around with my purse and just wearing my school clothes, and partly because I'm such a white girl. So whenever people asked me where I was from (as in heritage), I just responded, "UKRAINE!" Which is true, but I just didn't mention that I've never been there and I think it was my great-great-grandparents who emigrated to the US from Ukraine. Yep.
I made a couple friends and we marched all the way down to Foley Square (the march actually started going over the Brooklyn Bridge, at which point I said, "Ehhhhhhhh I'mgonnagohomenowbye.").
It was fun talking to my mother about immigrant's rights on my way back home from Foley Square- she's SO passionate about it, it's crazy. She said she was talking to some woman at home in VT recently about immigrants rights, and said woman doesn't believe in them. That is, she believes that America should be kept for AMERICANS.
...?
I distinctly remember being slumped over my desk in my sixth grade, New Jersey public school classroom, watching a tape on a roll-in television about how America is a "giant melting pot" of different people from all over the world. I remember going to Ellis Island on field trips and trying to find relatives. Since when are people "from" America?
Blah. I'm looking forward to seeing what's going to happen after all these protests (though NYC has had its fair share of protests lately, with the anti-war protest this past Saturday).
It was INCREDIBLE. I felt really out of place, partly because I was walking around with my purse and just wearing my school clothes, and partly because I'm such a white girl. So whenever people asked me where I was from (as in heritage), I just responded, "UKRAINE!" Which is true, but I just didn't mention that I've never been there and I think it was my great-great-grandparents who emigrated to the US from Ukraine. Yep.
I made a couple friends and we marched all the way down to Foley Square (the march actually started going over the Brooklyn Bridge, at which point I said, "Ehhhhhhhh I'mgonnagohomenowbye.").
It was fun talking to my mother about immigrant's rights on my way back home from Foley Square- she's SO passionate about it, it's crazy. She said she was talking to some woman at home in VT recently about immigrants rights, and said woman doesn't believe in them. That is, she believes that America should be kept for AMERICANS.
...?
I distinctly remember being slumped over my desk in my sixth grade, New Jersey public school classroom, watching a tape on a roll-in television about how America is a "giant melting pot" of different people from all over the world. I remember going to Ellis Island on field trips and trying to find relatives. Since when are people "from" America?
Blah. I'm looking forward to seeing what's going to happen after all these protests (though NYC has had its fair share of protests lately, with the anti-war protest this past Saturday).