One of the most exciting things about moving Chicago is being able to say that I live in Illinois! It may only be temporary, but for someone who has spent the last 18 years of her life living in Valparaiso, IN (minus a semester in Costa Rica), spending two months in the big city is a pretty big deal. One of my favorite parts about living in the city is listening to people speak in their many native tongues. When I’m at the train station, I can hear a pair of students conversing in Arabic. While I’m walking through Millennium Park, I can understand the parents talking to their children in Spanish. When I walk down the street, I recognize one of the very few German words I know as a man talks on the phone. During the time I spent at my internship over the last two months, I have heard conversations in French, Arabic, Rohingya, Burmese, Tigrinya, Somali, Mon, Farsi, and a plethora of other languages that I don’t know a single word of.
As a self-declared lover of languages, hearing so many languages in such a small space is exciting. As an intern at Heartland Alliance and as a language teacher, listening to their voices is inspiring. This is what the whole world will probably be like in a few more decades, and I for one can’t wait to be part of it!
Unfortunately, not everyone shares my love of languages, and even more unfortunately, not everyone recognizes the value of living in a community as diverse as Chicago. Once the United States accepts 50,000 refugees this year, no more will be welcomed in unless they have a close family tie here. Thousands of people who have been waiting in refugee camps for years will be denied access to the place they want to call home.
Instead of sparking political debate, I want to use the remainder of this blog post to praise the efforts of people who are working to welcome people into our country. Last week, my family and I had the opportunity to attend Chicago’s celebration of World Refugee Day. The day was one of protest, but the time was mostly designated for celebration and fun! It was a wonderful opportunity to interact with coworkers and participants outside of the work environment, but more importantly, it showed them that they are valued in the larger Chicago community. We gathered together as people from all over the globe to participate in a march, eat international food, watch the “Refugee World Cup,” and dance to international music. One of the songs they played there was also the song that the English students sang loud and proud at their graduation from the last quarter of classes, and I can’t think of a better way to sum up what the refugee experience in the United States should be like:
“This land is your land, this land is my land,
From California, to the New York Island.
From the Redwood Forrest, to the Gulf stream waters.
This land was made for you and me.”