The Other World

The Other World

I heard from the old generation that America was a place that can let your dreams come true. In my opinion, The United States was just a flourishing country. When I came to Chicago, there was a terrible snowstorm, and that was my first impression of cruel winter. My dear family, my lovely friends or my desired life were not here. I have already been in Chicago for over three years, and I felt I have lost the time and happiness with the people and the life I love.

My parents are growing older, and I did not get a change to accompany them over these past three years. I miss the times spent with my parents even though we used to argue a lot. I even disliked how my parents pressured me in China. They are limited my time to get home at night. Nevertheless, I miss them and love them even more now that I have been living in Chicago. There is a saying in China, “On festive occasions more one than thinks of parents far away.” I really miss my dear parents and my little brother. Coincidently, this week was the Chinese Luna New Year. Luna New Year is the most important festival for Chinese people. Our family would have a reunion dinner in the last day of the year, and parents would give me a couple of red money envelope on New Year’s day. That meant parents gave the best wishes to their children. However in past three years, I haven’t even shared a meal with my parents. those time have gone.

In addition to that, I have lost the closeness of my friendships. Yan Mei, my best friend since my childhood whom I use to share many happy memories. We were in the same schools, and we would celebrate all the festivals in China together. However, my busy life has changed all that. I can not contact my best friend frequently. Now, we sometimes send messages to each other to keep in touch, and we talk or share our lives less. In addition, there was one thing that I still regret until right now. I can’t take part in and share my best friend’s wedding party. She got married a couple of months ago. I was so surprise when I heard the news. Because of time urgency and I was living in the US, I could not go back to China at that time.

I was once a cheerful girl. However, I have gained more sadness and less happiness since I came to Chicago. I have had a desired job in China where I worked at the graphic design studio. The job made my life colorful. However, I can’t have the same kind of job in Chicago because of the language barrier. As an immigrant, I have faced many hardships. I need to learn English in order to get a better future living in the US. I never thought I would work at a restaurant before I came to America, but that’s what I do. Right now, my life only consists of three parts: school, home, and work. The happiness I used to have got replaced with anguish and pressure

We lose many things when we immigrate to a new place, and some things we will not gain back. Family and friends are the most important parts of our lives, but I lost my happiness from family and friends when I moved to Chicago. Although coming to the United State was not an option, it is what was best for me. Within the three years in Chicago, I learned to face many difficult situations by myself. I wish I will soon be on the right way to my bright future where all my dreams will come true.

Ture Passions Never Die

Chris Iwanek

February 12, 2014

ESL 100                       

True Passions Never Die

            “Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites.” (Oprah Winfrey). Passion is what makes life truly exciting it determines parts of an individual, as well as it can reveal a person’s interests. People can feel passionate about all sorts of things, including activities, hobbies, or about another individual. One particular thing, quite in contrast to the United States, that most people in my home country of Germany are passionate about, is the sport of soccer. Soccer in Germany is by far the most followed sport, and some followers take it so far that they dedicate their whole life to the sport, and the particular club they are supporting. Most of my life I spent the same way, being a true supporter of my hometown team, Hamburger SV, but ever since I moved to the United States, my passion for my bellowed team slowly seemed to disappear.

            Soccer is the most popular sport not only in Germany, but also in most parts of the world. Most followers choose their team due to a variety of reasons. Since most of the people are loyal to only one club at the time they inherit their team of choice from their members of the family. In my case, I chose to support my hometown team, because of the city I was born into, and because my father has already been a strong supporter of the team ever since he moved to Germany. Therefore, like every strong supporter, I used to collect fan supplies, watch every single game of my team, and try to go to the local stadium as much as my pockets allowed. In my own thoughts there was no way on earth that that could change, even by moving into another country.

            Nevertheless, after my arrival to the U.S, my passion slowly began to fade. All of the sudden I was thrown into a completely new world with a completely different culture and, indeed, completely different passions. Growing up in a western culture, I did not expect the U.S to be too different from Germany, but my views rapidly changed upon my arrival. Thrown into this new world of change, I was overwhelmed with learning the new culture so much that I entirely forgot about practicing my own native culture. In the beginning, I was still trying to keep track of what was going on back home, especially in sports, but soon I had to realize that I was being confronted with a true issue, the loss of my passion.

            After a short period of time, I began to realize that my interest for soccer and its weekly results began to decrease. In the beginning, I still tried in vain to keep on following at least my hometown team’s results, but only to realize that I was losing interest. In the States, people have so many things to choose their interest from, that I was entirely overwhelmed by the variety of sports people pay attention to. I could not keep up with my own interest. Moreover, I began watching sports that I have also been passionate about, but never had the accessibility of watching like basketball. After realizing what happened to my passion after all, I was not upset over the loss of one sport because I had the chance to learn so much more about life and culture in Chicago.

            Every country has its own definition of what passion is to them, but one thing is universal, the loss of a passion can truly be an eye opening but also an alerting loss. Once people are passionate about something, they hold on to it so strongly that they blank out everything other than their passion and might miss the chance of finding other own interests. I experienced an identical situation that caused that change of passion. However, overall my well-being remained satisfied because despite the change I went through, I might have lost one passion but have won many more.

               

Not the same as before

My mother always told me that everything will not be the same forever. Actually, I always believed that nothing in my life would change, even if the world is changing. However now, I think I was wrong. After I moved to Chicago, I knew it more and more clearly. Many things are not the same anymore. This year is the second year of my living in Chicago and it is also second year I have celebrated the most important festival, Chinese New Year, in Chicago. However, the celebrations in Chicago do not resemble this great holding in China.

In China, the Chinese New Year is the most important festival and the happiest festival at the year. Family members who are working in other cities or provinces will go home and enjoy meals and spend time to welcome the New Year. I remember two years ago, my father and my mother cooked a lot of delicious dishes and bought some beverages for my sister, brother and me just like she did every year. Sometimes my brother and sister and I would help my parents to wash the vegetables and prepare them for my mother because my mother is the great chef in my family. We always had a very happy dinner party together. Those days were so wonderful, but they have been changed now. Yesterday was the Chinese New Year’s Eve, but my mother still had to work, and the three children in my family still needed to go to class. Therefore, we could not prepare the delicious dinner or have a series of activities for celebrating the New Year’s Eve together as before. These changes made me felt so helpless and disappointed.

Today is the first day of Chinese New Year, but I still cannot feel any of the holiday atmosphere. Before I came to Chicago, I had a lot of fun at the first day of Chinese New Year. For instance, my family would get up more earlier than other days because we had to meet our parents and family and say “happy new year and have a health body in a new year” which is a common greeting in my country. After that, we would get red-packets from my parents and my family. These convey best wishes for us, and are for children only. In general, my mom would make some of sweet Chinese rice dumplings in the morning for breakfast for all of us. The sweet rice dumplings signify a good beginning in a new year. Eating sweet rice dumpling is common in my family. After we ate the sweet rice dumpling together, we would choose activities to have fun. I liked to hang out with my friends and shop or see some funny show together, such as the dragon and lion dance which is the traditional activity at Chinese New Year in China. I was so happy to hang out and enjoy the day with my friends together. However, Chicago is not the same, and the holiday has changed. This year, I did not gone out or enjoy the New Year with my friends. My mother did not made the Chinese rice dumpling for us in the morning as well, because she has to work and has no vacation for the Chinese New Year. Even though the Chinese New Year is still very important for us, my parents have no time to make the rice dumpling or do the celebrations as we did before. However, they still give me red-packets and wish me a good new year. I realized that I miss the feeling and atmosphere of Chinese New Year in China it just cannot be replicated.

The Chinese New Year is one of the most important festivals in China, and it is one of my favorite festivals. This year, I got many New Year’s congratulations messages from my friends and I felt so delighted. When I talked with my friend who lives in New York, and I asked her what she was going to do for celebrations of Chinese New Year. she said “I have no time to celebrate it, because I still need to work in this week.” In fact, Chicago is a city with a significant Chinese population,but it still does not have any atmosphere because most Chinese people have no vacations or time to celebrate it with their family. In fact, they are missing all the feelings and activities of the Chinese New Year in China just like me.

On the Chinese New Year’s Eve, I was reminded of a conversation with my best friend who lives in China . She asked me“Does the Chinese New Year have any atmosphere in Chicago? What are you going to do for celebration?” At that moment, I felt very bad, helpless, and disappointed. I had nothing to say. Before I came to Chicago, I always thought maybe I could have a foreign Chinese New Year celebration in Chicago. I was so looking forward to it and it was one of the best ways to make me feel happy when I left my friends and family. I remembered my mother’s words “Everything will not be the same forever; it will change over time.” Despite these changes, I am still willing to do my best to keep this most important festival no matter where I live or how difficult it will be because I love Chinese New Year. 

Amazing Delivery System

 

 There are so many different service systems in the world. Each country has their own style of service system. I lived in South Korea for twenty-one years, and through my short life experience, I learned that Korean restaurant delivery service is very nice. I didn’t think about this idea when I was in Korea, but when I first visited in U.S at last few years ago, I realized that I lived very comfortable and fine to order some delivery food. I miss so many good things about Korean restaurant services. Thus, now I’m trying to adjust the American food style here in Chicago, but I can’t stop miss my country’s food custom.

 All kinds of food are available to order by delivery. There are many kinds of variety food in Korea. Whatever they want to eat, they can eat in their comfortable home and escape the noise sound and smells of the restaurant. When I was in Korea living with my family, I usually used delivery service to eat whatever I wanted. My mother couldn’t cook all kind of food, and sometimes when she didn’t want to cook, she asked to me to order anything I wanted. It was really nice because I could choose anything I wanted to eat. Thankfully, food menu books are delivered once a month in front of our house, so we could look at food pictures on the menu book and choose something easily. However, sometimes, the pictures of delicious looking food cheated me, so after that time, I wasn’t adventuous to try new restaurants. I used to order food from the same restaurant.

 In addition, time is no matter to Korean restaurants because they deliver food anytime even at twelve o’clock at night. Imagine that you could eat a hamburger, pizza, or chicken at midnight. When you were watching television at night and suddenly you were so starving, but there had no food in your refrigerator, you could just call the restaurant and order something you want to eat. No matter what time it is, in Korea, you could order the food. Now, that I’m living in Chicago, and I miss this kind of service. When I was in Korea, I used to order chicken very late at night. One of my favorite things to do was when I came back to my house, I ordered the chicken at night and watched drama and drinking beer with chicken. It removed my all stress of that day.

 Finally, Korean restaurant delivery service is very fast. There are so many restaurant in Korea ,so they can’t avoid competition, this competition has created more fast delivery service. Most restaurant deliver man deliver the food within thirty minutes. Some restaurants advertise their restaurant can deliver within fifteen minutes. It is really fast, so people should prepare their money in the pocket as soon as possible. In Korea, we don’t need to pay a tip or delivery service fee. It is all free. This delivery service can deliver anywhere. If you are on a boat on the sea, they would come to your boat to deliver your food. For example when I was in high school, our high school went to on a trip to famous Korean mountain and my friends and I didn’t prepare food, so we called to order food and they climbed to mountain to deliver our food. I was so impressed that day, and I really thanked them for accept my difficult order.

 Hence, Korea has a great delivery service system, and I’m proud of this. I have missed this so much. I think Korea is not big as America, so this kind of service works well. When I first visited America a last few years ago, my first impression of American restaurant was that the staff were very kind and the food was very clean. If the Korean restaurant system and American restaurant system could combine together, the service will be best in the whole world.

Lost Myself

    I feel that I am nothing in the US. Before I came here, I heard from many people that United States is a place where the money will drop from the sky without my doing anything. I also heard that people who lived here are rich and have better lives. Is it right? No! When I came to America, it was totally different from what I heard. People who live here work very hard to create their good lives. Because I am homesick, I have poor English skills, and I am confused about my future. I felt that I had lost myself in the United States.

     The first reason that I lost myself in America was my homesickness. When I received the visa from U.S. Embassy, I realized that I would lose everything in China. I needed to quit my job and I had to stop my undergraduate studies in Human Resources. After I completed these activities, I suddenly felt that I had no relationship with China, except the Chinese person that I am. I remembered that I was very excited to get together with my family in the United States. However, the excitement of this moment disappeared quickly without a trace. I started to doubt my decision to immigrate to the United States. I had lived in China for twenty-three years and I never thought that one day I would leave my own country for another one. Even though I was afraid of moving to another country, I bravely got on the plane. I think I have enough courage to face a new life even though I never thought that I would take such a challenge.

     Another reason that I felt lost in America was my poor English. The first time I arrived at O-Hare Airport, I found that the English I studied in China for seven years was useless. I couldn’t understand what the airport employee said though he had repeated it three times. I looked around to ask for help, but only foreigners’ faces came into my eyes. If I were in China, I could ask someone else for help in my own language. Tears formed in my eyes as the airport employee looked at me confusedly. My fortitude fell apart in the first day in United States. I tried my best to stop my tears again and again. Nobody could understand my feeling of hopelessness. At that moment, I preferred that the airport police take me back to China. Until now, it is still difficult with my poor English to communicate with the foreigners. I told myself all the time “take it easy, in time it will get better.” Now I study hard and work hard in United States. With this positive life attitude, I have begun to join the American society.

     Finally, I felt lost in America because I was confused about my future. In order to build up a better future in the US, my family suggested that I go back to school to study English. There are many opportunities to earn money in the United States as long as you could work in a restaurant for almost thirteen hours per day. That was the way for most Chinese immigrants here. I was as baffled about that what I should do next. If I go to work, my future would be like most Chinese immigrants – waiting on tables and delivering food to my entire life. If I continue studying, I could choose whatever I want to be. My beloved grandfather told me, “Don’t worry about the household expenditure. No matter how hard working, families will support you forever.” Now, I study at school. I also plan to go to university to study social work.

      As a new immigrant in the US, I felt overwhelmed. I felt lost because of my homesickness, poor English, and my confused future. I felt that I was nothing here because I lost everything when I left China. Fortunately, I have family who loves me unconditionally. In this new country, strangers have assisted me, my family has provided selfless dedication, and I have experienced my own inner growth. Wherever you are, you need to have a dream, but don’t lost yourself dreaming. From now on, I am slowly discovering who I am.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

Transition

Hani Zeno

Just like a tornado comes without warning, people’s lives can be changed due to unexpected consequences. I lived in Syria all my life, and it was a wonderful stable life.  Then, the dark times of war came to take over my country, and turned the lives of many people upside down. As a result, everyone started to seek refuge to avoid this war because it had evolved and turned into a fire that eats anyone in its path. In fact, I was one of those fortunate people who had a chance to come to the United States, and when I arrived to Chicago, I didn’t care about anything expect that I had gotten rid of the war’s ghost. After a while, I started to notice big differences between my culture, and the one in the United States. Indeed, the United States, for me, was not only a place to seek refuge in. It has become a place that I have gradually adapted to a new culture and lifestyle.

 

A lack of free time was one of the first obstacles I have faced since moving to the United States.  My life in my country was relaxing, mostly because of the lack of responsibility, except the responsibility of focusing on my studies. I relied on my parents in every aspect of my life, and they supported me emotionally and financially. Honestly, I was living an ideal happy life. Months after arriving Chicago, I realized that my old life became something from the past, and I needed to be ready for the difficulties of this new life. As a result, my life became gradually more competitive, and all my concerns were how I could manage my time between going to school, working to cover my expenses, and doing other responsibilities, such as cleaning, cooking, and doing laundry. Therefore, I would have never known how complicated life could be if I had not come to the United States.

Besides the lack of free time, I also found difficulties in terms of making friends. I would have said that I had such wonderful, strong friendships in my country that would never be destroyed under any circumstances. Actually, we weren’t only friends, but also soul- mates. For example, if someone had a problem, the rest would hurry to offer their help. However, it is the opposite here. I have been in the United States for more than one year, and I still don’t have friends whom I could count on if anything bad happened to me. I would blame the lifestyle in America for that because life here tends to be more self-oriented rather than a collective society, due to fact that people here are from different ethnicities and backgrounds. Therefore, these reasons were strong enough to make not only me, but also other foreigners have difficulties in making friends.

Finally, the religious and spiritual life was one of the challenging obstacles. When I was in my country, I didn’t have any problem practicing Islam, such as fasting during Ramadan, which is the holy month for Muslims. During this Month, one must abstain from food, drinks, and sex from dawn until sunset. It is more of a time for spiritual reflection, prayers, and charity. Usually during this month, there is no school and people don’t go to work. Instead of that, they try to be close to god by praying and asking for his graces. Today, I am unable to fast the whole month because my time is full with school, work and other responsibilities. As a result, I understand that I’m not the only one, but other Muslims as well are having a hard time practicing their religion and spiritual life.

I have to confess that the tornado of war which struck my country has changed the life of many people, including me. Literally, I have spent a tough days in Chicago with no free time to enjoy my life. As a result, my social life became really constrained and limited due to my daily schedules. Moreover, this has resulted in restriction on my ability to practice my religion .However, I realized that life will never stop offering me alternatives and solutions, and the adaptability to the culture where I live is inevitable in order to survive. This has become my motto, and I hope I will succeed in making this transition.

essay (Nathan Cho)

What does it mean to lose you?

         Many people are afraid to lose something, and losing can be a negative word. However, some people who succeed in their life do not see losing as a negative word. Instead they see the positive aspect that losing can be a chance to gain something else. For example, if a business man loses a lot of money and, when he looked around, there was nothing except family. So he realized value of his family. I also had similar many people. When I lost something, I was disappointed and I did not want to try to find something. However I changed my mind by losing my passive attitude since coming to America.

         When I was in Korea, I had a passive attitude about many things. It is important to show other people that one has a good job, attended a prestigious university, and lives in a good home In Korea. So the most Korean parents pressure their children to enter a good university and get a good job. My parents were like that. I did not have the right to make decisions over my life. They decided my university and my future. Korean education also follows Korean parents’ opinion, which pressures the students. Korean education forces students to become more competitive and students have memorize without understanding them. These customs made me develop a passive attitude. Additionally, when I was in the Korean army, I was used to having passive attitude. Armies are societies based on ranks, so I was ordered to do tasks like transporting food, clothes and information to the commanding office. In the end, these made me adapt a passive attitude in Korea.

 2012 year, my mother recommended me that I go to Chicago for my future because American education is better than Korean. I also wanted to gain individual freedom in my life, so I decided to go to Chicago. When I first arrived in this city, I was afraid and worried that I should have found my freedom than in Korea. Now I am not worried about that because I realized I had to do something to change my attitude such as finding a house, school and deciding my life by myself. When I was in Korea, my parents pressured me about everything. But, I had freedom in America without parents’ pressure. It meant that I had new responsibilities, also it let me think profoundly more about my living in my life. Of course sometimes my parents are worried my decision, but I make an effort to persuade them.

I realized that loss can also be a positive word and it had changed my life. I have developed an independent life by this experience. Additionally, I not changed only my life but also people who are around me. Sometimes people who are around me ask to me about my life in this city and me sometimes advice about American life. Recently, I got studio which cheap, nice and a good location. So my friends wanted to be helped by me. Finally, it made that they thank me and respect me. Of course sometimes I make mistakes or the wrong decision. For example, when I first came to America I did not know any phone plans, so I just used a $80 plan for 6 months, one day I wanted to get information about phone plan systems to save money, so I studied phone plan systems and I am using a $30 plan, It is more effective than before. Finally, I realized that I encountered some difficulties, but I solved them by myself, and I think it was a good experience not to make same mistake.

 My new life represents independent and responsible. Recently, I started to challenge creative life which recycling my garage or using used products. I often see people who are successful businessmen, CEOs and scientists. Most of them had experiences about losing money, family and life. But, they succeeded and they told me that their experiences helped them. I also think that losing can have a positive effect and I can use the losing again such as my experience since coming America. I have learned to do not be afraid, because facing your loss can help you be