Everyday I turn on the television and I hear a story about people, who have tried, to varying degrees of success, to come to the US. Some of these people’s stories have happy endings, most do not. I see how creatively people try to sneak into the United States. Some in refrigerator trucks, others in huge cargo contains, others in inner tubes, in the cargo hold others seek a better future, even better known to Floridians are the people that try to arrive here in boats whether those boats are speedboats or makeshift car-boats, or cargo boats, even on rafts. Every day, we hear of somebody dying trying to reach the United States. People in refrigerator trucks are made to endure the horrors of no AC, no air circulating, having to endure the oppressive heat in essentially metal boxes stuffed to the gills with people. Some people try to sneak into the United States by means of cargo containers. These cargo containers, also huge metal boxes, are used for days, weeks, even months at a time to house these potential immigrants in miserable conditions, with possibly little or no food, enduring the constant heeling of the ship, perhaps having to endure the horrors of a monsoon or hurricanes while locked in these huge metal boxes like sardines in a can with many others, even possibly a dead body. These immigrants, regardless of their method of arriving here, risk drowning, starving, dehydrating, even their very life and limbs to seek a better life. These people are from all walks of life. Every social class. Some pay their way upfront, others arrive in a pseudo-indentured servant state, even more pay to come here only to be told that they owe even more money, that the money they initially paid is now, not enough. These people include, babies, toddlers, children, teenagers, adults, even the elderly and the pregnant. These people are all seeking just a better life. Some, if they arrive, are forced to work in sweat shops, in the sex industry, as slaves, even as cheep laborers in communities of migrant workers. These people, as you know, are generally termed “illegal immigrants.” My qualm with using this term is it tends to make them appear in my mind as unwanted, disgusting wards that should be disposed of. I think that these people are indeed people and should not be treated inferiorly.

It always moves me to hear about how hard people are trying to arrive into this nation. The nation, I had the luxury of being born in. This may not have been the case. My own father immigrated to the United States. Fortunately, his path to the United States was not like others. He arrived legally, in a plane, with a visa. He was poor, but had arrived here in order to find a way to help his family and also to escape the civil war going on in his homeland. The US to him seemed like a better place to go to get an education, and to earn a living from which he could send remittances back home. He also wanted to have his children born in this country, with its seemingly endless opportunities. My mom, though she was born here, was also poor. My dad and her worked hard and achieved the “American dream.” I know that he is the apparent anomaly. I know that what he achieved, he achieved because of his education and his personality and desire for success and refusal to fail. He instilled the believe about the power of education into me. Knowing how much his education did for him, I know for a fact that it is one of the most important things in the world. His old university and high school believed that it should prepare him so that if they dropped him in the middle of anywhere, he would be able to not only strive but succeed.

My best friend’s parents, when they arrived here from Vietnam, lost her sister on the way. I was thinking about that when I just started to write this paper. She hadn’t told me this before and so I was just really surprised when she told me. Her parents fled from Vietnam like many others, and her mom had her sister on the boat. When they arrived in Singapore, her sister, less than a week old, died just when she touched the ground. I was thinking about my friend. I was just thinking about how her mom must have felt. Having to flee, while expecting a child at any moment, and then loosing her daughter, her firstborn child, right when they reach a place that would result in their safety, they loose perhaps the most important thing in the world to them.

My uncle, also one of the “boat people” fled Vietnam around the same time as my friend. His story is also echoed by many others. He was separated from his family on the boats and ended up in the United States. From the time of his arrival he has actively searched for his family. He has looked through countless records and the sort. A couple of years ago he did indeed find his family. His sisters, his brothers, and his parents he found in Germany only two years ago. I remember the day he found out, it was like he had hit the Florida Lottery Jackpot, only even better. He was glowing. As soon as he could, he took the first plane to Germany bringing his own family in tow. His wife and three children (two toddlers and a baby) accompanying him. I remember looking through the pictures of his trip, there were so many pictures of just him and his family embracing. I really was touched by seeing just how hard it was for him just to get to the United States. He lost his family in the search of a better future. All risked in the search of a better life.

At my parents shop I meet people every day from various nations. I translate for the local Hispanic population and try to help out with the Brazilians around the neighborhood. I realize how lucky I am every day when I hear about their stories. Some of these people I have gotten to know pretty well...others not so much. These people just help fuel my desire to go and study law. Though I have never asked them, I am pretty sure that some of them are illegally here. Most of the others are legally in the US. I hear about their struggles and attempts to obtain “papers.” I help out them as much as I can.

My entire life has been spent around people of diverse backgrounds. All these people are on the quest for a better future. They are all upwardly mobile. I have personally helped some people on their quest for a better future by typing their papers for them, serving as a translator for others, and by providing a shoulder to cry on and talk to for even more. I have talked to people who have had to leave their children in various nations with their mothers while they work for 6 months in the US. I talk to this one lady who is so happy whenever she arrives or leaves but also a little bit sad. Whenever she arrives she is sad that she has to leave her daughter with her mother and happy that she is now able to better provide for her family. Whenever she leaves she is sad that she cannot provide well for her family but overjoyed that she can be with her daughter. At the shop we sell phone cards. These phone cards are sometimes the only connection some have to their family. I am one of these people who is dependent on phone cards. My grandfather does not speak English. I do not speak Arabic. Yet every time we talk I can here the pure glee in his voice. Speaking in our pigeon tongue we say very little, yet I know the feeling that it gives. If I don't call in for 3 days, when I call him the next time he complains, he doesn't like having our connection broken.

I know that this is the same for a lot of the other people in this country and around the world that are seperated by some barrier from their loved ones. I know the power of a piece of paper with some numbers on them and some wire. I know the power of a voice. I know how difficult it is to leave for another country and leave all that you love behind. Fortunately for me, I know also what I want to do. I have seen what a good lawyer can do for these people. I know what they can do to help ease the situation and also to help them obtain the one thing that they have fought for. Fortunately for me, I know what I want to do for the rest of my life. I want to help people out with the immigration process. I want to see the smiles on their faces when they arrive here from a third world or less developed nation. I want to see the tears of joy rolling down their cheeks when they are naturalized. I want to know that, by me doing my job, this person did not have to resort to being taken advantage of, being stuck in a hot metal box or in the hull of a ship or any other means of arrival into the US, just to get a better life for themselves and their families. I know what I want to do, and I know that Stetson has a really good International Law Concentration. I know that with a degree from Stetson, and a concentration in International Law, I can finally do my life's dream and help out these people who are just like you and me, all seeking a better life free from persecution and war, something that we sometimes take for granted, and something that I am very grateful that my family has done so that I can have this dream. If they hadn't had tried as much as they could to give me this better life, I wouldn't have been able to dream such a dream. For all that my family and others like them have done, I am eternally grateful. I want to repay this debt, and help out many others achieve the same sort of things.