A new dream

Noushin Darya Framke, chair for the Advocacy Committee for Racial Ethnic Concerns (ACREC), provides this reflection on her experience in Merida, Mexico. Noushin traveled there in the fall of 2007 with ACREC committee members for a joint meeting with the Advocacy Committee for Women’s Concerns (ACWC). Together they explored and learned about the driving forces behind immigration and the impact on those who immigrate, as well as on the communities they leave behind.

Noushin holds a little girl in one of the palapa homes in the village of Dzan, Mexico. Photo by Tiffany Gonzales.

My husband and I recently celebrated our 25th anniversary.  At a small and packed popular restaurant in New York City, they brought out our dessert with Prosecco on the house and a chocolate inscription around the plate that gave away our celebration to all the tables around us, opening the door for conversation. When the couple next to us said they came from Oklahoma, my husband felt compelled to tell them that I was from Iran, figuring they probably didn’t run into many Iranians in their circle. He was right. He apologized later in the cab, but I knew instantly why he did this.  It was because I have spent my 29 years in America playing the role of ambassador from Iran.

The couple from Oklahoma nodded their heads approvingly at my immigration story and the man declared very proudly that I was “living the American Dream.” All night, this did not sit well with me. Not that there aren’t other dreams in America, but THE American Dream is about “The Self” and what the self can achieve, usually proudly from nothing. More and more these days, it feels like the American Dream is a race to the top, trampling anyone in the way, and when getting there, the person at the next table can look at you and admire that you are “living the American Dream.” No — for me, I would like to be living God’s Dream. And for me as a Christian, I like to remember that God’s Dream has a cross in it. The American Dream and carrying the cross don’t really sit together well.

My answer always brings me back to that phrase “the American Dream.” My parents stay in Iran to stem the brain-drain; that’s how I see it.  They are very loyal to their country and proud of their identity.  To complicate matters, my mother is an Armenian Christian woman living in Iran with a very successful career, which surprises people even more. Her mother escaped the Turkish genocide in 1915 and walked into Iran as a refugee. So I have a Christian family and a very secular Shia Moslem family too.  People who look at me quizzically and ask, “Why don’t your parents leave?” are thinking in terms of the self. I have come to learn that the American Dream is about the self:  My dream house, my little piece of America, my car, my job, my title, my vacation, my diamond ring, my status watch, my status whatever; my status.

For a year now, I have served on the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s Advocacy Committee for Racial Ethnic Concerns.  I was elected Chair in July and I just returned from a week in the Yucatan with 30 Presbyterians from our two national advocacy committees — the other being the committee for Women’s Concerns. We went on a listening trip to see what happens to the women and children who are left behind by the men who come to America for work.

According to many American Christians, the poor people of Mexico must be living life NOT according to God’s will for if they were, they would be rewarded with God’s favor. Some call this thinking The Theology of the Prosperity Gospel: that is, if you are a good Christian, God will reward you with riches. Of course, we found this to be untrue. Our group spent time listening to students and faculty at San Pablo seminary, and another day listening to the indigenous Mayans of the village of Dzan far from the United States border. Everywhere we went, we saw and heard stories of the men having to leave and work far away in “El Norte.” This was not news to any of us. What was news was learning about the need for — and the ramifications of — such a decision. Families mortgage whatever they have to raise funds for this cataclysmic journey. If, God forbid, the traveler died crossing the border, the family would never recover from the debt of the mortgage as they would have no way to raise funds. We learned that coming to America commonly becomes living a nightmare, though it’s a better nightmare than the one in Mexico where corruption and poverty have consumed the country. According to the government’s own figures, 40 percent — about 40 million people — try to live on $2 a day, but some say the figure is as high as 75 million people.

In America we are fighting about ways of getting 40 million people healthcare coverage.  In Mexico, they are just trying to get enough to eat. Our American translator told us a story about going to a Mexican family’s home where he stayed for dinner. Being the guest, he received the first plate. He was surprised at how full and generous the plate was for such a poor family. They motioned for him to start and as he was eating, after a few mouthfuls, one of the youngest children grabbed the plate away from him and began eating from it.

The plate was for the entire household and was intended to be passed around. 

What bothers me about this story isn’t the obvious part. It’s that this level of poverty exists in the shadow of America, the richest country the world has ever seen. How can we be fighting here about whether this is a Christian country or not, and proclaiming that it was founded by Christians, when there are people so hungry at our doorstep?  They risk their lives to come here to pick our food in the fields, clean our hotels and our homes, cut our lawns, and even raise our children. We all know our economy depends on them now.

Our group came home from Mexico heavy-hearted and arrived back to news stories filled with the California fires and stories of wealthy neighborhoods destroyed by fire. Only on National Public Radio (NPR) was there coverage of the migrant workers running from the flames. NPR reported that charred bodies of migrants were found at the border. They also reported that at the stadium in San Diego, Mexicans taking refuge were accused of looting, summarily arrested and handed over to the Immigration and Naturalization Service for deportation.

What does this say about us as a nation?  And what does it say about that American Dream?  At what cost is this American Dream worth having? As long as we are willing to trample other people’s humanity to get what we want — not need — there will be people willing to come here illegally to help feed their families. In Dzan, we learned a surprising lesson:  leaving for “El Norte” is the last card a desperate people play; it is not the first card, as many Americans believe. They don’t want to leave their homes and families and most of them do so with great sacrifice and heartache. This is their last resort; they have no other card to play. 

Maybe it’s time to re-examine our dream. Until we as Americans look into the eyes of our neighbors and see our own reflection, we will be doomed to building walls and standing guard over our American Dream.  In Mexico, there are very few dreams. I learned that where hunger is the law, rebellion is justice.