Essay #1 First Draft

This is a time when immigration is a vital option for people to deal with struggles in life. As most countries fail to improve their economies, some people only hope to survive by moving to richer countries like the United States of America. However, some would reply to this statement with contradictions. People has different views of the U.S. when it comes to immigration. Why is that so? What really affects people's judgment of the U.S.? Jamaica Kincaid utters her opinion about the U.S. through a novel she wrote entitled "Lucy".

Lucy is a young woman who came to the U.S. to work as a nanny for a family in exchange for support in her education. She had always imagine the tall buildings, bridges, and parks that she thought would make her happy. When she arrived in the U.S., she notice everything that is new around her, from the elevator to the weather. She left her home thinking this would make her feel excited, but rather, she felt uncomfortable. She felt homesickness. Lucy likes the family she is working for. While having dinner, she noticed how they are very pleasant to each other. They called Lucy the Visitor, for they said she seemed like she isn't living in their house at all. Mariah, one of Lucy's boss, waited impatiently for spring and for the arrival of daffodils. Lucy then remembered a poem that she was forced to memorize and recite when she was ten years old. She never appreciated the poem's meaning and had forgotten all about it until Mariah mentioned daffodils. Mariah told Lucy about their plans for spring. In the mean time, Lucy receives letters from her family and friends and put it in her brassiere and carry it everywhere she went. She did it not because she was longing for them but because of hatred. She wrote her mother a letter about her first ride in a subway train. Her mother replied with horrible stories she had read and heard about the dangers of the subway. Lucy thought of two possible dangers in her life, and she wondered, "In this great big world, why should my life be reduced to these two possibilities?"

As a newcomer, Lucy represents all the immigrants of the U.S. Her story is not far from most immigrant's experiences. People would come here with beliefs that they got from foreign channels, magazines, or other people that promotes the country. Then, they would either be disappointed or happy to what they'll see. They would encounter people who would either like them, hate them, or wouldn't care at all. Whether a person from a city is moving to a suburb of the U.S. or vice versa, it would definitely take some time for him to adapt to his new place. Once these people adapts to the new environment, they would change the way they live. These changes would then be shared to the people they knew back home. And this would contribute to a person's impression about the U.S. And it all comes back to new people coming here with expectations turned into disappointment or happiness. It's a long process of searching for a place that would suit us best. We do our research by listening to other people's experiences or reading critics' reviews about a place. And once we come here, we realize that we have a different life from the stories that we heard. But by looking at a different direction, due to this extreme recession, conceptions about whether the U.S. is a nice place to live or not, to some people, might not matter anymore. Some people from the Third World countries would take any opportunity of migrating here without considering the low possibilities of getting a job right away. Some would just depend on luck just to escape their sufferings. Some think that starting a new life in a new place is the best solution. Whatever people's reason is for coming here, change is something that we should expect and I'm pretty sure no one would be disappointed.