the world I imagine now

When Margi asked us to imagine a “better” world for one of our last delegation activities, many things came to my mind; and I soon realized those things now I imagine to be in a better world are fairly different from what I would have imagined a few months ago. The experience of two month here definitely affected my point of view in many substantial ways.

I now imagine a better world to be where people are treated according to their talents not there nationalities. DREAM Act students who have grown up in the US for the most part of their lives and have some kinds of valuable abilities, not only limited to SAT scores, should have the same chance to be educated as any other “American” students. They deserve way more than what they get right now.

I now imagine a better world to be where people in Latin American countries, or any other countries in the world, live in economically, socially, and politically better societies. Before coming here, I knew almost nothing about economic, social, and political push and pull factors all organically working to force people migrate without documents. I assume the US government would have known that better than I; but they are still working on treating the symptoms rather than the causes. I want the government and other people who have the substantial power to change the situation to work on solving the root problems such as economic disparities.

I now imagine a better world to be where immigration process is more accessible and difficult and expensive “naturalization” process is not required when one only wants to work in another country for a relatively short period of time of his life. If one wants to live his entire life in the US, for example, going through the naturalization process makes sense. However, when one only wants to work for a couple of years to earn some money and go back to his family after that, I personally do not see the point of going through it. This may be a biased opinion, since I myself want to work in the US in the future and feel burdened about the possibility of going through green card process if I want to get a really good and influential job which is not very accessible to aliens without green card.

I now imagine a better world to be where people listen to the other sides’ opinions without looking down on it. I have met many people here who were deeply enthusiastic about their works. Sometimes, however, I saw some people who seemed too emotional or blindly and extremely devoted to their positions, which made them unable to listen to the other side. I believe lack of communication only worsens the conflict. As I wrote in the last blog posting, I want people to try to listen what the people on the opposite side say without any prejudice; because if you don’t do it, the other side will not do it either. Mutual respect between two opposite sides seems to be needed in the current situation.

This is my last posting in Tucson. However, I don’t want this to be the real last one – things I have been experienced here which have changed me in many ways will keep me thinking and writing more and more even after I leave here.