My youngest daughter called me today to catch up. She was telling me that her friend was paying $3,000 for her daughter’s apartment. And her daughter was 21!!! Then she went on to say how glad she was that I never picked up after their mess, and they had to solve their own problems. This was after they left home to go to college.
After her student status expired and she became illegal, she had to work two shifts in a Japanese restaurant. She would do one shift, and when that was done, she would go to the Storage Area where they kept their huge sacks of rice, the gigantic soy sauce bottles, and everything that the restaurant used. She would sleep until her next shift, then she would work the second shift. It was very tiring for her, but at least she kept her financial independence.
Her eldest brother also became illegal when his long-time girlfriend found a rich husband and dumped him on the day of their interview at the Immigration. He carved tables and sold them. One table he sold to his former fiancee for $5,000. When he went to Ireland to wait for his fiancee to marry him, he worked as a welder. He stayed with his fiancee’s mother. One day, the machine he was handing went off from his hands and scraped his head and cut his left earlobe. Fortunately, the earlobe was sewn together and the scratch on his head was minor. His mother-in-law-to-be asked, “Aren’t you going to call your Mom to tell her about this accident?” She felt that this was a serious accident since the machine could have done a worse job. He answered, “No, it is not necessary, it will just worry them.” The mother-in-law just looked dazed. How could this be hidden from his parents? But he did not tell them about it. She told his mother about it when they met.
My brother, the Heir Apparent of the family, decided to cut himself off from the family duties by migrating to Canada. He found the responsibilities of collecting rent and giving up his sleep after a night of partying on weekends too stifling. So he decided to leave, for independence. He had gotten married and had two children. He didn’t want to be buried in family responsibilities.
I chose to leave with my brother. My marriage had fallen apart, and the only way I could get a divorce was to go abroad. I watched my brother as he struggled with household duties, with low-paying jobs. I found a way to get my divorce. As I prepared to leave Canada, he decided to open up to me. We lived together, but silence seemed to be his way of coping with this new life.
He told me that he found work as an hospital orderly. He asked our Dad who was the head of a military hospital in Manila to give him a recommendation letter. Dad said he wouldn’t sign it, but would give him blank stationery with the hospital seal, so my brother could type what he wanted on the paper.
He was given the job of an orderly to a surgeon who was doing circumcisions. As an orderly, he needed to shave elderly patients’ pubic hair. The surgeon came in to perform the circumcision. When he lifted the sheet that covered the genitalia, he let off a scream!
“You’ve never done this before!” the doctor said to my brother.
“No,” my brother meekly answered.
The surgeon had no choice but to shave the patient’s pubic hair himself. My brother watched so he would do better next time.
A Filipino nurse heard about this, and talked to my brother. She looked at his record and recognized my father’s name. My father was the head of the military hospital where generations of doctors and nurses did their internship.
“Does your father know about this?” she asked my brother.
“No,” he answered in a low voice.
“I know of a Nursery where you can work.” Sure enough, within a few days, my brother left the hospital and worked in a nursery where he tended to plants and sold them.
Starting a new life in a new country is always difficult. With the Ukranian war going on, there will be more migrants moving into countries that do not want them.
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