The immigration dilemma in the United States dates back to the time immemorial. Many of those who immigrate to the US do so in search of greener pastures, which they believe to find in the United States. In many cases, people immigrate due to suffering and dissatisfaction with their countries of origin. This may be as a result of war, famine or other inevitable factors. However, many of them end up facing unexpected challenges. Edward Park gives an insight into the dilemma faced by immigrants in the article Friends or Enemies: Generational Politics, in the Korean American Community. The challenges mentioned by Park are also quite evident in the film El Norte, which highlights the plight of the poor migrants.
In the film El Norte, the audience is introduced to the peasant family of Arturo Xuncan a coffee picker. He and his entire family are servants of a wealthy family. Here, the poor are tools of labour and have no place in society. In the film, as Arturo tells his son, to the rich, the peasant is just a pair of strong arms. Apart from the ill-treatment, the Xuncan family faces a series of unfortunate events. All this begins with the killing of Arturo due to his efforts to form a labour union which would unite the workers. Arturo and his fellow organizers are ambushed, and killed by government troops after a co-worker, who had been bribed, betrays them. Arturo’s wife is captured, which leaves their two children with no other option but to flee for their lives. The government becomes an enemy to its own people, who have to flee for their own safety.
At this point, the two young siblings head north after their god-mother gives them some money. They imagine of a better life in the US as they had envisioned when working together as a family. However, this is not the case as they discover that even in America, the poor are just a pair of strong hands, and live from hand to mouth-like they did in Mexico. During their journey, they encounter a lot of problems and face racial discrimination. They have a hard time explaining themselves to the immigration offices, and even have difficulties getting transport to their place of destination. At some point, Enrique and Rosa have to pass through a waste tunnel full of dirt and rats. Here, Rosa gets bitten severally by infected rats and acquires typhus. On arriving at the US, they get poorly- paying-jobs since they are immigrants without any certification.
However, after sometime, things start to run smoothly for them. Out of envy, one of Enrique's workmates reports him to the immigration office. Within the same period, Rosa falls terribly ill due to the infection she had acquired from the rats, and dies. This leaves Enrique devastated and disillusioned. In the film, El Norte, Rosa summarizes the plight of the immigrants at her death by lamenting "in our own land, we have no homehere in the north we are not accepted. When will we find a home, Enrique? Maybe when we die, we'll find a home.”
In his article, Edward Park also discusses the problems that immigrants encounter. The problems Park discusses are mostly political and differ from those featured in the film El Norte. For example, Park delves deeper to discuss the disharmony between immigrants and post-immigrant generation. The case of immigrants from Korea is different from that of the Mayans in El Norte. Here, the post-immigrants receive hostility from both the natives and the earlier immigrants. There is disunity between the two types of immigrants. Many of the post-immigrants have managed to have several of their people as influential leaders. The leaders come up with organizations that claim to care for the problems of all the Korean-American citizens. However, the post immigrants have often been criticized for dismissing the problems of the immigrant generations and pursuing community affairs rather than the plight of the immigrant community.
The post-immigrants have political activities, which generate a lot of money in the name of caring for the community. They use the pains and sufferings of immigrants to amass a lot of resources, but fail to share with the immigrants the resources generated. The KFLA, for instance, claimed to represent all Korean immigrants living in the United States of America (Park 164). They even called the president of the organization the mayor of Korea town and claimed that its mission was to look into the welfare of all Koreans living in the US. However, they did not actually have the interests of the Korean people at heart, but rather had political interests. This is why later on they changed their mission from “representation of the collective interest of Koreans” to “encouraging and supporting the efforts made by Korean Americans for political representation". This, therefore, left the immigrants without anyone to look up to after the division. Instead of attending to the needs of the Korean American immigrants, the political organizations took advantage of their plight to acquire wealth for themselves (Park 165). This is particularly blamed on the English speaking community leaders taking advantage of the poor and native speaking Koreans.
As stated earlier, the problems faced by immigrants from Mexico, in the film El Norte, are quite different from those faced by the Korean American immigrants. The only thing they share is that both suffer a great deal in America and do not receive acceptance whether in their homeland or in the US. Both leave their nations with the promise of a better life, but end up finding a tougher life. In the case of those from Korea, they receive hostility from the other ethnic communities, and end up suffering a great deal. Both groups are exploited, taken advantage of, and as a result, they suffer poverty and lack of support. However, there are other subtle differences facing the two groups. For instance, in their early days, Enrique and Rosa’s lives went on smoothly in the United States in comparison to the lives of the Korean immigrants.
Immigrants often have this belief, while leaving their countries of origin, that they will find greener pastures. However, this is not always the case. Many of them usually receive a lot of hostility on the basis of race and ethnicity. They are often taken advantage of, and do not actually have anyone to protect them, or care for their welfare since most organization leaders only care about their own interests. It is also difficult for these people to acquire decent jobs because employers look down on them, and often lack qualifications to match the job requirements of their new countries. As a result, many immigrants suffer silently in their new countries, and often regret their decision to move in the first place.
Works Cited
El Norte. Dir. Gregory Nava. Perf. Zaide Silvia Gutiérrez and David Villalpando. 1983. Film.
Park, Edward J. W. "Friends or Enemies?: Generational Politics in the Korean American Community in Los Angeles." Quality Sociology (1999): 22 (2), 161-175. Print.
