Journal of Asian American Studies

Stories are extremely important, and in my life very relevant as well. The power of some stories is what changes the minds of some people outside of the immigrant community. My story starts with the realization of the implications of my immigration status when I was a high school senior. Like a lot of undocumented immigrant students, it was difficult to confront a reality that was unexpected, because [we are] told that as long as you try hard in this country, you'll get somewhere—the American Dream essentially. So feeling like [I was] ambushed by a situation that I couldn't control was really difficult at the time. My alternative solution to going to a four-year college, which was what I was anticipating, was to go to a community college. I think at first that whole stigma of going to community college, dealing with that was difficult. But going to community college and hearing stories and learning and being able to be in the presence of a lot of different people coming from different walks of life was very important to me. It grounded me as a human being. During the past two years, it's been an amazing journey as a human being but also as someone who's part of the movement [for immigrant justice]. During my community college endeavors, I was exposed to an internship program called Dream Summer² where I met undocumented activists from all over the country. Through that I was able to find a support group and network, ASPIRE Los Angeles³, an undocumented group of Asian Pacific Islanders, and that was really important, because often, the immigration narrative shows only one side of the story. It's the narrative that dominates the mainstream dialogue, but immigration in general is also portrayed as affecting only the Latino community, which is untrue. Being affected by the model minority myth which attempts to reduce our experiences, it was really important that an organization like ASPIRE existed in order to increase the visibility and to [End Page 113] uplift our narratives as undocumented Asian and Pacific Islander youth. I remember the very first time that I came out publicly about my status. A surreal experience because [was] something that [I held] as a fear and as a weakness for so long, and then [I released it] in front of a lot of different people that [I didn't] know. The fear of deportation is very real in our community, so having to step back and just [be public] was really difficult. But once I [went public] I felt an empowerment that I've never experienced. This is why I'm here today speaking to you. It's interesting that the more visibility I had within my community, I felt safer even though under the law it just didn't seem like that would be the case. We weren't being silent, and yet we felt more safe, and we felt much more empowered than ever.