My Essey

 

                                             Hardship in Adapting The new life

                                                      Xingyun Huang/Kelvin

Immigrant’s lives in America are always considered to be affluent and comfortable, so a lot of people in China love to emigrate to the US. Several months ago, I came to the US because I had decided to study here. I had lived here for 3 months. However, the reality here seemed to be the opposite to what other people described. The new life in the US is actually painful and suffering, which had brought me the hardship in adapting it. The hardship included money, language and loneliness. In this transition form China to the US. I have been very hard and get lost in this blank new land.

    Money is the biggest issue that perplexed me. In the past, I used to live in an affluent surrounding in my homeland. But now, I have to be worried about living expenses like my rent, energy charges and tuition. To make ends meet, I found a job as a source of income. No matter where people work, if they don’t know English well, those kinds of jobs, in most case are extremely hard to finish. I had worked in a restaurant for several days, in my aunt’s restaurant in Indiana, being the person who do odds and ends, such as packing takeout and cut the beef. Standing for 12 hours a day, I was approaching the limit of mental breakdown and could only earn several dollars per hour. In the US, those who live here have to face with what is called “Reality”. The hardship reminded me of the comfortable life in the past .In China, although my family is not wealthy at least we could live a good surroundings without anxiety about food, tuition or housing. Inevitably, I can’t help missing my past in China and I actually want to cry some time.

     The language is another disturbing issue, that makes me dumb and very difficult to deal with. In many occasions, I often heard so little from what the English speakers said that I encounter a lot of trouble in life. For instance, once a clerk of the AT&T firm called me, and then I pick up the phone but understood nothing about what he said at first. I just said: “No, no”. And then the clerk was very confused and responded: “No, no? No for what! ”. I was jus so shy and nervous that hung up the phone immediately. After that, I realized that the intention of the call is to remind me to pay for the installation fees, AT&T then just cut out my service, that deprived my house of network and WiFi for long time. Since then, I lost my confidence. One another occasion, there was a once a time when I hid myself in the room due to the application for college, because, for me who doesn’t speak English, this process is so painful and painstaking that I was afraid that the embarrassment like the “AT&T” joke would happened one more time.

    Compared with the former two, the hardship of loneliness has tortured me most. In China, when I came across difficulties or failures, my family always comes by my side and encourages me. Now they are on another continent. In the past, I loved to eat morning tea with them in China, enjoying the family warmth. After I came to the US, I found restaurants in Chinatown, but no one can accompany me to eat anymore. I miss my grandpa and grandma in Hong Kong. I miss my cousins and aunt in Guangzhou. I miss my parents who come home form work while I was already asleep in midnight. I am now an independent grown-up, who might not need their help anymore but I am always the child who desires the affection from my family members most. No matter how tall a bird can fly, it cannot conceal the tears in its eyes because it’s impossible for him to forget its nest and fellows forever.

                                           

 Every person who comes to the blank new continent, has to go through the triple baptism of hardship: money, language and loneliness. Because once people are here, they will be compelled to face the difficult reality, with no exceptions. For the new immigrant, he US is not a place full of joy, but a place for struggling, changing and missing the past. In the translation, people may lose a lot, but I believe, in the meantime they will also learn a lot either. For me, hardship is like a teacher, who instructs me to be independent, diligent and persistent. Anyway I will hold to the end because I came here with a dream as well as the expectations from my families.