Personal Narrative

I was born in America, but when I'm in Serbia, I hardly feel American. My parents were born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. My mom loves telling me her story of how she came here, and now I want to share it. My parents went to college in Serbia, but my dad wanted to go to post doctoral studies here. So the two (who were engaged) moved to America. They got student Visa's to come here for school and for my mom to be a house mother. It was hard to get a visa at the time but since my father was accepted in the school it was easier for him and my mother. My mother said they couldn't carry much and they both had only one suitcase. Most people now, carry 2 or 3 for themselves. Just imagine all your possession's, everything you have to start a new life and house...all lie in one suitcase.


They didn't have much to begin with. In fact at first they lived in a crappy neighbor hood, but as soon as my dad got better jobs, we started moving up. Fortunate enough for them, they wont a green card in the lottery, so it let them work and live a normal life style in America. My mom would tell me how there were many hard times in Serbia. The government was unstable with riots breaking loose, it was no place to raise a family.That's one reason i believe in immigration, we let people have a better life for themselves and their family. Even if they do come here and their life isn't perfect, think of how much worse it could have been in a corrupt country.


At first,my parents moved everywhere, exploring America. In fact my three siblings and I were born in South bend, Indiana.We lived in Chicago for awhile and then ended up here, in New Jersey. Which i still have no idea why someone would pick to raise there children in Jersey, but that's beyond me. I loved how, no matter where we went, we still kept our culture with us. The one main thing in our culture(like many other cultures) is food. My mom would cook us many traditional Serbian dishes like stuffed peppers and grape leaves. I also love how my mom would not let her language die. She insisted me knew how to speak Serbian and taught us both English and Serbian as a adolescent.



Another neat thing my parents kept that was in our culture is the orthodox Christmas(Jan 7th). We celebrate all holidays on our orthodox days, not on regular ones. Many people who come here just go along with what society does and forget about what they did. I believe that culture is a very good and important thing in my life but also having American culture is important. My parents didn't come here and expect people to learn Serbian to understand them, they came here and learned the language and culture of America.


I just thought it was really interesting how my parents made their life here. They came here with nothing but a suitcase, but look at what they have now. A nice ranch, in a good neighborhood, with very good schooling. As children, we pretty much get what we want. My parents must be living their version of the American Dream. Everyone in America is originally an immigrant, it would be hypocritical to say that we don't want any immigrants in our nation. Many great immigrants have helped our society and saved lives. If given people opportunities they can make great things for themselves, their families, and society.