The Penguin Book of Migration Literature

by Dohra Ahmad

  Some of us on the boat were brooders by nature, and preferred to stay to ourselves, and spent most of the voyage lying facedown in our berths, thinking of all the men we had left behind. The fruit seller’s son, who always pretended not to notice us, but gave us an extra tangerine whenever his mother was not minding the store. Or the married man for whom we had once waited, on a bridge, in the rain, late at night, for two hours. And for what? A kiss and a promise. “I’ll come again tomorrow,” he had said. And even though we never saw him again we knew we would do it all over in an instant, because being with him was like being alive for the very first time, only better. And often, as we were falling asleep, we found ourselves thinking of the peasant boy we had talked to every afternoon on our way home from school—the beautiful young boy in the next village whose hands could coax up even the most stubborn of seedlings from the soil—and how our mother, who knew everything, and could often read our mind, had looked at us as though we were crazy. Do you want to spend the rest of your life crouched over a field? (We had hesitated and almost said yes, for hadn’t we always dreamed of becoming our mother? Wasn’t that all we had ever once wanted to be?)

  On the boat we each had to make choices. Where to sleep and who to trust and who to befriend and how to befriend her. Whether or not to say something to the neighbor who snored, or talked in her sleep, or to the neighbor whose feet smelled even worse than our own, and whose dirty clothes were strewn all over the floor. And if somebody asked us if she looked good when she wore her hair in a certain way—in the “eaves” style, say, which seemed to be taking the boat by storm—and she did not, it made her head look too big, did we tell her the truth, or did we tell her she had never looked better? And was it all right to complain about the cook, who came from China, and only knew how to make one dish—rice curry—which he served to us day after day? But if we said something and he was sent back to China, where on many days you might not get any kind of rice at all, would it then be our fault? And was anybody listening to us anyway? Did anybody care?

  Somewhere on the boat there was a captain, from whose cabin a beautiful young girl was said to emerge every morning at dawn. And of course we were all dying to know: Was she one of us, or one of the girls from first class?

  On the boat we sometimes crept into each other’s berths late at night and lay quietly side by side, talking about all the things we remembered from home: the smell of roasted sweet potatoes in early autumn, picnics in the bamboo grove, playing shadows and demons in the crumbling temple courtyard, the day our father went out to fetch a bucket of water from the well and did not return, and how our mother never mentioned him even once after that. It was as though he never even existed. I stared down into that well for years. We discussed favorite face creams, the benefits of leaden powder, the first time we saw our husband’s photograph. He looked like an earnest person, so I figured he was good enough for me. Sometimes we found ourselves saying things we had never said to anyone, and once we got started it was impossible to stop, and sometimes we grew suddenly silent and lay tangled in each other’s arms until dawn, when one of us would pull away from the other and ask, “But will it last?” And that was another choice we had to make. If we said yes, it would last, and went back to her—if not that night, then the next, or the night after that—then we told ourselves that whatever we did would be forgotten the minute we got off the boat. And it was all good practice for our husbands anyway.

  A few of us on the boat never did get used to being with a man, and if there had been a way of going to America without marrying one, we would have figured it out.

  On the boat we could not have known that when we first saw our husbands we would have no idea who they were. That the crowd of men in knit caps and shabby black coats waiting for us down below on the dock would bear no resemblance to the handsome young men in the photographs. That the photographs we had been sent were twenty years old. That the letters we had been written had been written to us by people other than our husbands, professional people with beautiful handwriting whose job it was to tell lies and win hearts. That when we first heard our names being called out across the water one of us would cover her eyes and turn away—I want to go home—but the rest of us would lift our heads and smooth down the skirts of our kimonos and walk down the gangplank and step out into the still warm day. This is America, we would say to ourselves, there is no need to worry. And we would be wrong.

  FRANCISCO JIMÉNEZ

  UNDER THE WIRE

  “La frontera” is a word I often heard when I was a child living in El Rancho Blanco, a small village nestled on barren, dry hills several miles north of Guadalajara, Mexico. I heard it for the first time back in the late 1940s when Papá and Mamá told me and Roberto, my older brother, that someday we would take a long trip north, cross la frontera, enter California, and leave our poverty behind.

  I did not know exactly what California was either, but Papá’s eyes sparkled whenever he talked about it with Mamá and his friends. “Once we cross la frontera, we’ll make a good living in California,” he would say, standing up straight and sticking out his chest.

  Roberto, who is four years older than I, became excited every time Papá talked about the trip to California. He didn’t like living in El Rancho Blanco, especially after visiting our older cousin, Fito, in Guadalajara.

  Fito had left El Rancho Blanco. He was working in a tequila factory and living in a two-bedroom house that had electricity and a water well. He told Roberto that he, Fito, didn’t have to get up at four in the morning anymore, like my brother, to milk the five cows by hand and carry the milk in a large aluminum can on horse for several miles to the nearest road, where a truck would transport it to town to sell. He didn’t have to go to the river for water, sleep on dirt floors, or use candles for light.

  From then on, about the only thing Roberto liked about living in El Rancho Blanco was hunting for chicken eggs and attending church on Sundays.

  I liked looking for eggs and going to Mass too. But what I enjoyed most was listening to stories. In the evenings, after supper, Papá’s brother, tío Mauricio, and his family came over to visit. We sat around a fire built with dry cow chips and told stories while shaking out grain from ears of corn.

  On one such evening Papá made the announcement: We were going to make the long-awaited trip across la frontera to California. Days later we packed our belongings in a suitcase and took the bus to Guadalajara to catch the train. Papá bought tickets on a second-class train, Ferrocarriles Nacionales de México. I had never seen a train before. It looked like metal huts on wheels strung together. We climbed in and took our seats. I stood to look out the window. As the train started to move, it jerked and made a loud clattering sound, like hundreds of milk cans crashing. I got scared and lost my balance. Papá caught me and told me to sit. I swung my legs, following the rhythm of the train. Roberto sat across from me, next to Mamá. He had a big grin on his face.

  We traveled for two days and nights. During the night, we didn’t get much sleep. The wooden seats were hard, and the train made loud noises, blowing its whistle and grinding its brakes. At the first train stop I asked Papá, “Is this California?”

  “No mi’jo, we’re not there yet,” he answered patiently. “We have many more hours to go.”

  Noting that Papá had closed his eyes, I turned to Roberto and asked, “What’s California like?”

  “I don’t know,” he answered, “but Fito told me that people there sweep money off the streets.”

  “Where did Fito get that idea?” Papá said, opening his eyes and laughing.

  “From Cantinflas,” Roberto said assuredly. “He said Cantinflas said it in a movie.”

  “Cantinflas was joking,” Papá responded, chuckling. “But it’s true that life is better there.”

  “I hope so,” Mamá said. Then, putting her arm around Roberto, she added softly, “Dios lo quiera.”

  The train slowed
down. I looked out the window and saw we were entering another town. “Is this it?” I asked.

  “¡Otra vez la burra al trigo!” Papá said, frowning and rolling his eyes. “I’ll tell you when we get there!”

  “Be patient, Panchito,” Mamá said, smiling. “We’ll get there soon.”

  When the train stopped in Mexicali, Papá told us to get off. “We’re almost there,” he said, looking at me. We left the station. Papá carried our dark brown suitcase. We followed behind him until we reached a barbed wire fence. According to Papá, this was la frontera. He pointed out that across the gray wire barricade was California, that famous place I had heard so much about. On both sides of the fence were armed guards dressed in green uniforms. Papá called them la migra, and explained that we had to cross the fence to the other side without being seen by them.

  Late that night, we walked for several miles away from town. Papá, who led the way, paused, looked all around to make sure no one could see us, and headed toward the fence. We walked along the wire wall until Papá spotted a small hole underneath the fence. Papá got on his knees and, with his hands, made the opening larger. We all crawled through like snakes. A few minutes later, we were picked up by a woman whom Papá had contacted in Mexicali. She had promised to pick us up in her car and drive us, for a fee, to a place where we would find work.

  The woman drove all night, and at dawn we reached a tent labor camp on the outskirts of Guadalupe, a small town on the coast. She stopped the car by the side of a narrow road, near the camp.

  “This is the place I told you about,” she said wearily. “Here you’ll find work picking strawberries.”

  Papá unloaded the suitcase from the trunk, took out his wallet, and paid the woman. “We have only seven dollars left,” he said, biting his lower lip. After the woman drove away, we walked to the camp, following a dirt path lined on both sides by eucalyptus trees. Mamá held me by the hand very tightly. At the camp, Mamá and Papá were told that the foreman had left for the day.

  We spent that night underneath the eucalyptus trees. We gathered leaves from the trees, which smelled like sweet gum, and piled them to lie on. Roberto and I slept between Papá and Mamá.

  The following morning, I woke to the sound of a train whistle. For a split second I thought we were still on the train on our way to California. Spewing black smoke, it passed behind the camp, traveling much faster than the train we had taken from Guadalajara. As I followed it with my eyes, I heard a stranger’s voice behind me. It was that of a woman who had stopped by to help. Her name was Lupe Gordillo; she was from the nearby camp. She brought us a few groceries and introduced us to the camp foreman, who spoke Spanish. He loaned us an army tent, which we pitched with his help. “You’re lucky,” he said. “This is the last tent we have.”

  “When can we start work?” Papá asked, rubbing his hands.

  “In two weeks,” the foreman answered.

  “That can’t be!” Papá exclaimed, shaking his head. “We were told we’d find work right away.”

  “I am sorry, the strawberries won’t be ready to pick until then,” the foreman responded, shrugging his shoulders and walking away.

  After a long silence, Mamá said, “We’ll manage, viejo. Once work starts, we’ll be fine.”

  Roberto was quiet. He had a sad look in his eyes.

  During the next two weeks, Mamá cooked outside on a makeshift stove using rocks and a comal Doña Lupe had given her. We ate wild verdolagas and rabbit and birds, which Papá hunted with a rifle he borrowed from a neighbor.

  To pass the time, Roberto and I watched the trains go by behind the labor camp. We crawled underneath a barbed wire fence to get a closer look at them as they passed by several times a day.

  Our favorite train came by every day at noon. It had a distinct whistle. We heard it coming from miles away. Roberto and I called it the Noon Train. Often, we would get there early and play on the railroad tracks while we waited for it. We ran straddling the rails or walked on them as fast as we could to see how far we could go without falling off. We also sat on the rails to feel them vibrate as the train approached. As days went by, we could recognize the conductor from afar. He slowed the train every time it went by and waved at us with his gray-and-white striped cap. We waved back.

  One Sunday, Roberto and I crossed the fence earlier than usual to wait for the Noon Train. Roberto didn’t feel like playing, so we sat on one of the rails, arms wrapped around our legs, foreheads on our knees. “I wonder where the train comes from,” I said. “Do you know, Roberto?”

  “I have been wondering too,” he answered, slowly lifting his head. “I think it comes from California.”

  “California!” I exclaimed. “This is California!”

  “I am not so sure,” he said. “Remember what—”

  The familiar Noon Train whistle interrupted him. We stepped off the rail and moved a few feet away from the tracks. The conductor slowed the train to a crawl, waved, and gently dropped a large brown bag in front of us as he went by. We picked it up and looked inside. It was full of oranges, apples, and candy.

  “See, it does come from California!” Roberto exclaimed. We ran alongside the train, waving at the conductor. The train sped up and soon left us behind. We followed the rear of the train with our eyes until it got smaller and smaller and disappeared.

  EVA HOFFMAN

  From

  LOST IN TRANSLATION

  It is April 1959, I’m standing at the railing of the Batory’s upper deck, and I feel that my life is ending. I’m looking out at the crowd that has gathered on the shore to see the ship’s departure from Gdynia—a crowd that, all of a sudden, is irrevocably on the other side—and I want to break out, run back, run toward the familiar excitement, the waving hands, the exclamations. We can’t be leaving all this behind—but we are. I am thirteen years old, and we are emigrating. It’s a notion of such crushing, definitive finality that to me it might as well mean the end of the world.

  My sister, four years younger than I, is clutching my hand wordlessly; she hardly understands where we are, or what is happening to us. My parents are highly agitated; they had just been put through a body search by the customs police, probably as the farewell gesture of anti-Jewish harassment. Still, the officials weren’t clever enough, or suspicious enough, to check my sister and me—lucky for us, since we are both carrying some silverware we were not allowed to take out of Poland in large pockets sewn onto our skirts especially for this purpose, and hidden under capacious sweaters.

  When the brass band on the shore strikes up the jaunty mazurka rhythms of the Polish anthem, I am pierced by a youthful sorrow so powerful that I suddenly stop crying and try to hold still against the pain. I desperately want time to stop, to hold the ship still with the force of my will. I am suffering my first, severe attack of nostalgia, or tęsknota—a word that adds to nostalgia the tonalities of sadness and longing. It is a feeling whose shades and degrees I’m destined to know intimately, but at this hovering moment, it comes upon me like a visitation from a whole new geography of emotions, an annunciation of how much an absence can hurt. Or a premonition of absence, because at this divide, I’m filled to the brim with what I’m about to lose—images of Cracow, which I loved as one loves a person, of the sun-baked villages where we had taken summer vacations, of the hours I spent poring over passages of music with my piano teacher, of conversations and escapades with friends. Looking ahead, I come across an enormous, cold blankness—a darkening, an erasure, of the imagination, as if a camera eye has snapped shut, or as if a heavy curtain has been pulled over the future. Of the place where we’re going—Canada—I know nothing. There are vague outlines of half a continent, a sense of vast spaces and little habitation. When my parents were hiding in a branch-covered forest bunker during the war, my father had a book with him called Canada Fragrant with Resin which, in his horrible confinement, spoke to him of majestic wildernes
s, of animals roaming without being pursued, of freedom. That is partly why we are going there, rather than to Israel, where most of our Jewish friends have gone. But to me, the word “Canada” has ominous echoes of the “Sahara.” No, my mind rejects the idea of being taken there, I don’t want to be pried out of my childhood, my pleasures, my safety, my hopes for becoming a pianist. The Batory pulls away, the foghorn emits its lowing, shofar sound, but my being is engaged in a stubborn refusal to move. My parents put their hands on my shoulders consolingly; for a moment, they allow themselves to acknowledge that there’s pain in this departure, much as they wanted it.

  Many years later, at a stylish party in New York, I met a woman who told me that she had had an enchanted childhood. Her father was a highly positioned diplomat in an Asian country, and she had lived surrounded by sumptuous elegance, the courtesy of servants, and the delicate advances of older men. No wonder, she said, that when this part of her life came to an end, at age thirteen, she felt she had been exiled from paradise, and had been searching for it ever since.

  No wonder. But the wonder is what you can make a paradise out of. I told her that I grew up in a lumpen apartment in Cracow, squeezed into three rudimentary rooms with four other people, surrounded by squabbles, dark political rumblings, memories of wartime suffering, and daily struggle for existence. And yet, when it came time to leave, I, too, felt I was being pushed out of the happy, safe enclosures of Eden.

  MOHSIN HAMID

  From

  HOW TO GET FILTHY RICH IN RISING ASIA

  One cold, dewy morning, you are huddled, shivering, on the packed earth under your mother’s cot. Your anguish is the anguish of a boy whose chocolate has been thrown away, whose remote controls are out of batteries, whose scooter is busted, whose new sneakers have been stolen. This is all the more remarkable since you’ve never in your life seen any of these things.