A crowded street in Sunset Park. The 2010 Census shows that this neighborhood is now home to the largest Chinese enclave. (Tiffany Ap / The Brooklyn Ink)

Asian-American civic groups are pushing for redistricting in Brooklyn that would give growing Asian ethnic groups a district and representation of their own.

Claiming that the Asian vote is too diluted across many districts, the groups are hoping to splice together sections of Sunset Park, Bensonhurst and Dyker Heights in a new district that would have a majority population of Chinese immigrants and their descendants.

After holding a public hearing last month, the New York State Legislative Task Force is expected to release a first draft of new district lines in January. District boundaries are remapped every decade to reflect demographic changes demonstrated by the federal census. If drawn correctly, districts should be areas of people that share some a common denominator. The law also stipulates that it must be contiguous and reasonably compact: its length should be no more than twice its width.

“We’re seeing in places like Sunset Park—and we’re seeing throughout New York—that the Asian population is currently at 20 percent or more and we think that could necessitate, or in theory you could argue for, the creation of more Asian-American districts,” says Rachael Fauss, the Policy and Research Manager for Citizens Union.

Research from the group shows that 15 assembly districts in the state have Asian-American populations of more than 20 percent and three are at 40 percent or more— not that you would ever know it by looking at the state legislature. No Asian-American has ever won an election in Brooklyn and currently, there is only one Asian-American representative, Grace Meng of Queens in a lower house made up of 212 legislators.

Meng’s district encompasses Flushing and was created during the last redistricting in 2000 to better represent the flourishing Chinatown in Queens. The new lines helped lead to Meng’s election as the first Asian-American in the state legislature.

“They drew that with kind of an eye towards empowering the Asian-American community,” says James Hong who works with the MinKwon organization and the Asian-American Community Coalition On Redistricting and Democracy (ACCORD). “I feel that everybody thinks that was well done.”

“But other than that, most of the Asian-American communities—East Asian, South Asian—were cut up. There was definitely potential for much stronger pluralities. Instead they were cut up into two, three, four, or five districts. I hope other districts will do what that district did, which is to keep a community of interest together.”

A map of the Assembly Districts that have an Asian-American population above 20 percent. (Map courtesy of Citizens Union)

The current district boundaries were drawn using the 2000 Census numbers when Asian-Americans were 5.5 percent of the state’s population. The latest 2010 Census shows that the Asian population surged by a third in New York City and is now 7.3 percent of the population, making it the fastest growing racial group in the state.

Underrepresentation is not a uniquely Asian problem. “There’s also been a growth among the Latino population,” Fauss states. “Something we’ve been pointing out is that the state legislature doesn’t currently reflect the diversity of New York state.”

The federal Voting Rights Act of 1965 requires that districts not be drawn to weaken or abridge minority voters.

Various civic groups say that the status quo is doing precisely that, however. In Brooklyn, the neighboring Chinese communities in Bensonhurst, Sunset Park and Bay Ridge are split into several electoral districts.

Hong says Asian-Americans are denied the opportunity to meaningfully participate in the political process as a result:  “At almost every level of government and almost every neighborhood, you see that it is split up so collectively, their voice is weakened. They can’t really come to the polls and have a unified impact through the electoral process.”

The new lines must be drawn by next summer. ACCORD officials say that many people still misunderstand the reasoning behind their push for uniting sections of Sunset Park, Bensonhurst and Dyker Heights.

“We’ve said over and over again that this is not purely an attempt to get more Asian-Americans into office,” Hong said.  “Though if the districts happen the way we want them, that may happen in the next few years.”

He makes it clear they are not lobbying for any particular candidate either. “There are—and I think there will be—some white candidates or candidates of other ethnicities that represent an Asian community well and vice versa. You don’t necessarily have to have an Asian representative to represent an Asian community. That’s never been part of our platform.”

Their focus is on seeing voters empowered and keeping them in the same district when they belong in the same community of interest. “We’re saying, hey, there’s something that looks like voter dilution that’s happening as a result of these lines, and we’re just trying to remedy that.”

In fact, the Supreme Court ruled in Shaw v. Reno that race could not be the predominant factor in setting district lines, though it could be one component.

Jerry Vattamalla, a staff attorney for the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, says it’s not enough for one area to be dominated by any particular ethnic group to call for redistricting. The people need to “vote similarly and have similar interests.” Other areas the city taskforce will look at include common cultural background; shared language and language access needs; media markets; immigrant concerns; and public transportation.

Vattamalla says redistricting takes time and intense analysis because of all the competing interests. People grouped together by current districts may also have concerns about being split up in order to create this majority Asian-American district. “Nobody wants their community divided. That’s something the task force will have to decide on,” he said.

A first generation and native-born Palestinian opened the Middle Eastern restaurant Zaytoons on Vanderbilt Avenue in 2008 (Cristabelle Tumola/The Brooklyn Ink)

An Italian immigrant who came to America around the beginning of the 20th century likely encouraged his children to assimilate. It was the era of Ellis Island and mass migration. His children assimilated, but they also forgot their parents’ language and culture.

The U.S. is now in the midst of another mass immigration wave. According to a 2009 Pew Hispanic Center study, 12.5 percent of America’s population is foreign-born, the highest level it’s been in a century.

Today’s immigrants also encourage their children to assimilate, but what separates the current era of mass migration from the last one is that the nation now prizes multiculturalism as a fundamental American value. This enables the children of immigrants to more easily hold on to their parents’ language and culture while assimilating.

And what that means for the longtime burghers of Prospect Heights is food—ethnic food in a restaurant scene as dynamic as the arriving immigrants.

Some of these ethnic restaurants use imported ingredients from their homeland and serve food exactly like in its country of origin; others adapt their ingredients to fit local availability but use authentic cooking methods; and some use authentic ingredients but repackage their food for a wider audience.

Four restaurants—the Middle Eastern Zaytoons, the Korean Kimchi Grill and the Italian establishments Aliseo Osteria Del Borgo and Amorina—show how these trends cross national boundaries in ways that reflect how immigrant chefs may have more that unites them in their new country than separates them.

Each of their owners emigrated to the U.S. or has foreign-born parents. Ahmad Samhan, co-owner of Zaytoons, was born in Palestine and came to America as a child. Faried Assad, the restaurant’s other co-owner, is a first generation Palestinian-American. They have three Zaytoons locations in Brooklyn, including one at 594 Vanderbilt Avenue.

Phillip Lee emigrated from Korea as a child. He is co-owner of the food truck sensation Kimchi Taco, and around late October he plans on opening his first restaurant location on Washington Avenue.

All three of these men grew up eating their parents’ traditional food and speaking their native language at home.

“A lot of Korean parents they try to encourage the kids, take the approach to only speak English so they can learn English faster and be good in English. Or some parents take the other approach, which is to try to not speak English, try to teach their native tongue because they realize they will speak English eventually,” said Lee.

Lee’s parents also sent him to Taekwondo school. He credits all of these efforts to the strong connection he has to Korean culture as an adult.

Lee and Samhan also believe that growing up in the city helped them maintain their heritage.

Albano Ballerini didn’t grow up in New York City, but emigrated there as an adult to work as a photographer. Later he switched careers and opened two restaurants, Aliseo Osteria Del Borgo and Amorina, both on Vanderbilt Avenue.

Unlike many of the earlier Italian immigrants, Ballerini doesn’t come from the south. He is from Le Marche, a region in central Italy.

Ballerini also distinguishes himself from those immigrants in another way. They came to America out of poverty and need. “I was very comfortable in Italy. I didn’t come here out of necessity. Italy was too small for me. That’s all, ” he said. Ballerini doesn’t even call himself an immigrant, but rather an “ex-patriot.”

With his new career, Ballerini shares his native Italy through his cooking methods and seasonal ingredients.

Unlike Ballerini, Samhan and Assad use mainly imported ingredients. In Brooklyn there are many wholesalers who sell the ingredients they need, which allows them to keep it authentic.

Yet the majority of Zaytoons’ customers are non-Arabs. This fact doesn’t surprise Samhan: “That’s why there’s so many ethnic restaurants throughout not just Brooklyn but throughout New York City. Everybody should try something once, and if they like it, they come back and order different things on the menu,” he said.

Like Samhan, Ballerini can easily find Italian ingredients, however, he finds that it’s more authentically Italian to buy local ones. Many of Italy’s traditional dishes rely heavily on fresh local food. Most of his ingredients come from within a 100-mile radius.

Each week Ballerini visits the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket, near his restaurant, and the Union Square Greenmarket in Manhattan. Instead of using only imported Italian formaggio, 50 percent of his cheese is from local artisanal makers.

Phillip Lee uses the same ingredients and cooking techniques from his native Korea, but the name of his food truck sounds more like a trendy fusion eatery than an authentic Korean one.

Its Kim-Cheesesteak comes with a choice of Cheese Whiz or provolone and is served on an Italian hoagie roll. But the filling, beef, pork or chicken, is marinated in Korean flavors and sautéed with kimchi.

Korean food has been around for a long time, but has never taken off like other Asian fare. Lee’s business markets Korean food to Americans in a less intimidating way.

“Part of it was the cuisine itself and how the Koreans marketed and really didn’t want to change it to accommodate the palate of Americans,” said Lee. “I want everyone to sort of taste how great Korean food is,” he continued.

Although they tweak the food, many of the ingredients are exactly what are used at a traditional restaurant he explained. “It’s sort of like what you would call the packaging part of it [that’s different]. ”

Some criticize Lee and Ballerini for straying from authenticity, but like many of today’s immigrants, their food can assimilate without losing its native culture.

Gabriela Alvarado brushes her daughter Giselle Florez' hair before a parent ambassador meeting at Bushwick Impact. (Joe Proudman/The Brooklyn Ink)

Five years ago Gabriela Alvarado was in New York on vacation. She had just left her job in Puebla, Mexico, after the company she was working for changed owners.

She felt her life was due for a change after spending the previous 10 years engulfed in her career. She felt she really didn’t have much to show for it.  So her cousin, who was living in Brooklyn, told her to come visit, take some time to get her life in perspective.

She planned on staying for three months, but in mid-September a week before she was planning to leave, Alvarado attended a party for Mexican Independence Day. As she sat in one room, she began to listen to a conversation in the next room. A family member was asking a man if he cared if a woman made more than him. He said no. That’s really all Alvarado needed to know.

“At this time, at this party, I listened,” she said. “I never saw him. I only listened.”

Alvarado said at that moment she felt it—love. The only way she can explain falling for a man she hadn’t even seen, she says is that she just knew he was the man for her after he answered the question the right way.  She cancelled her flight back home. A few months later she and that same man were living together. Five years later, they’re married, with a soon-to-be three-year-old daughter.

When she fell in love, Gabriela Alvarado became a part of Bushwick’s burgeoning immigrant population. In 2008, nearly 38 percent of the neighborhood’s population was foreign born, according to State of the City’s Housing & Neighborhoods 2009 neighborhood profile. That means there are roughly 50,000 people in Bushwick who at one time were new to this country and, like Gabriela Alvarado, needed to learn to adjust to life in place far different than the one they left behind.

For Alvarado the transition to America was rough, but manageable, first the language, “I was a student of English in my country, but it’s not the same when you practice or listen,” she said. “Even now it’s sometimes difficult.”

But the hardest things for her were adjusting to the culture of the U.S. New York, she says, is less friendly, than Mexico, a reality that even today still makes the transition difficult. Going to the deli on the corner, or the grocery store or even just walking down the block people are just more cold than she was once used to, she says.

“I felt strange because for me it was the first time that I separated from my family,” she says. Alvarado was in a new home, “where I found different customs and lifestyles.”

Alvarado’s story is similar to that of the 50,000 immigrants in Brooklyn, all new to the country and facing similar issues with language and customs. Some, like Alvarado, have children. She says with children the pressure to provide and be successful in America becomes greater. “The most important thing for women with babies is to get an opportunity for a job, get an opportunity for health care for babies” she said.

One day, in 2009, Alvarado stopped by Bushwick Impact on Central Avenue. She doesn’t remember why she stopped in, but it eventually led to her transitioning from a person that just needed help to a person who was offering it through volunteering for Impact’s Parent Ambassador program.

Bushwick Impact in its fifth year, which is a hub for resources offered by the city and aimed at helping families with young children. Impact’s staff works with families to connect them with the various services available, such as food stamps and daycare, immigration or workshops on financial literacy. They don’t really complete any of that sort of social work in-house, but get families and people in touch with people and organizations that do. They’re a liaison to the community.

Impact does host several programs. Local artist hold classes for children and musicians stop in and play a few songs. The organization works with parents to improve their English not by holding classes, but by giving them a chance to practice by holding hour-long conversations. They also have a table outside their offices, with clothes for those who need them.

Bushwick Impact was launched in 2005 by the Agenda for Children of Tomorrow (ACT), which is a publicly and privately funded organization focused on serving children across the city. Impact was created to focus in on Bushwick and work with families of young children to get them connected with various resources.

Impact’s flagship community effort the past two years has been its Parent Ambassador program, in which it dispatches unpaid volunteers across the neighborhood to let new parents with young children know about what Impact does. Its most recent campaign sent out 12 women who, like Alvarado, at one time received help from Bushwick Impact, mostly with childcare, and were familiar with their services. They receive five weeks of training in public speaking, child development and financial literacy.

“They take the skills and go out into the community and engage parents,” said Nishanna Ramoutar, who works for Bushwick Impact. “When they’re out in the community, they don’t need to do any special outreach, they can be in the grocery store shopping for their own groceries.”

Simply due to the demographic makeup of Bushwick, most families Impact serves tend to be Spanish speaking and immigrants, just like the dozen women that serve as parent ambassadors. Impact feels that the community that it serves will be much more responsive to people that have been in or are in similar situations. The parent ambassadors target mothers of young children, using the fact that they themselves are parents as an icebreaker and a way to tell them about Impact’s services.

For immigrants with young families, “Shopping is hard. Paying your bills is hard. How do you find a job?” said Ramoutar. “There is this barrier between the services with the city. If they hear it from a mom they’re going to listen.

Immigrant life, Ramoutar explained, can be isolating: You don’t know the language. You don’t know many people. And if you’re here illegally – and two-thirds of those foreign born in Bushwick are according to Raul Rubio with the Family Services Network when he presented that figure to Community Board 4 on July 16, 2009 – you’re afraid to stand out because of your status. And if you have children, that experience becomes even more isolating.

“It helps our moms feel connected,” said Silvia Cruz, a parent advocate at Bushwick Impact. “In our population there is a lot of isolation. Having children is isolating and even more so being an immigrant is isolating.”

Because of her previous experience working as a safety coordinator in a factory in Mexico, Alvarado said she fit right in as a parent ambassador, chatting with people and passing on knowledge.

“I like to work with people,” she says. “In this case it wasn’t difficult for me.”

For example, this past Veterans Day in mid-November, Alvarado says that one morning while running errands, she stopped in the park in Bushwick with her daughter, who didn’t have school because of the holiday. While there she struck up a conversation with a woman who has a daughter similar in age to hers. They make small talk and eventually Alvarado told her about Impact and how it can help. It was a brief conversation, she says, and just like that, she was on her way. This is how the ambassadors work most of the time.

Cruz said the original goal was for the 12 women to sign up 250 families to come in and talk with Impact. But the women excelled that goal, signing up 382 families since May.

“It shows how important these mothers are in this community,” said Ramoutar.

On one October morning at Bushwick Impact’s Central Avenue office, 10 kids ran around while 15 parents squeezed into the back of the shoe-box shaped building for a meeting on financial literacy, which was being held in Spanish. All were women, except for the man who’d been sent by his wife because she couldn’t make it. This was a small slice of the results of the parent ambassador’s work over the summer and fall. From now until late spring, Impact will be holding classes such as this and working with those 382 families that were recruited. Then, come May the parent ambassadors will go out again. But in all reality, Ramoutar said, the women have become leaders, and are always pointing people towards Impact for assistance, and like Alvarado in the Park on Veteran’s Day, will continue even when they don’t have to.

Amanda Quichimbo calls members of the Senate to ask them to approve the DREAM Act at Make the Road New York's office in Queens. Originally from Ecuador, Quichimbo has lived in the U.S. for the past three years. (Manuel Rueda/The Brooklyn Ink)

By Manuel Rueda

As Congress prepares to vote on the DREAM Act next week, undocumented students in New York are making hundreds of calls to nudge politicians to pass this piece of immigration reform. In addition, demonstrations are planned for next week.

“With Thanksgiving coming up, we want to say we are grateful for what the congressmen have done for us,” said 18-year-old high school senior Francisco Curiel. “But we also want them to approve the DREAM Act, so that we can study and give something back to our communities.” A dozen other students, immigrant families and members of the press attended a pre-Thanksgiving press conference at the offices of the immigrants rights group Make the Road New York.

The DREAM Act would grant legal residence to undocumented immigrants between the ages of 18 and 35 who have finished high school in the United States and are pursuing a college education or have served two years in the military. Although the bill was introduced in 2002, it has been turned back several times by Republicans – and some Democrats – who say it will encourage more illegal immigration into the country.

The proposal was last rejected by the Senate in September, when Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) unsuccessfully attempted to attach the DREAM Act to a defense authorization bill.

But calls for the DREAM Act to be passed were renewed after November’s mid-term elections, in which Hispanic voters – who generally support this proposed law – saved several high-profile Democrat congressmen, including Reid, from losing their seats to Republicans.

After the elections, House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would bring the DREAM Act to a vote on November 29th, this time as a stand-alone proposal. Senate majority leader Harry Reid also promised he would step up efforts to take the DREAM Act to the Senate floor, and its supporters across the country once again stepped up the pressure on Representatives and Senators who may be on the fence about this issue.

Amanda Quichindo, a 17 year old junior from Cuenca, Ecuador, who has been in New York for the past three years, said she was happy to be in the United States, because this was a country that “provided educational opportunities,” adding that without legal residency, she would not be able to access scholarships and financial aid that she urgently requires if she wants to fulfill her dream of studying medicine. After attending the press conference in Queens, Quichindo headed to a phone bank at the back of Make the Road New York’s offices, along with Francisco Curiel and half a dozen students belonging to the immigration group’s youth project.

Staffers at Make the Road New York are concerned that if the DREAM Act does not pass now, it will be extremely hard to get it approved next year, when Republicans become the majority in the House next January.

But even passing it this year it is a complicated affair in the Senate, where Democrats need 60 votes to pass the law and only hold 59 seats.

Natalia Aristizabal, a youth organizer for Make the Road New York, remains cautiously optimistic. “I think you need people, the community not just organizers taking action,” she says. “And the best way that representatives from New York or anywhere else are going to know that this is what the community needs is if they get the phone calls from the people and they – the people – get active.”

Aristizabal says her youth group of twenty to thirty – depending on the week – is regularly making calls to Senators Reid and Schumer and to a group of Republican congressmen.

She says her volunteers make hundreds of calls every week and managed to make 300 calls on Monday, when volunteers from a local high school gave them a helping hand.

Calls into representatives’ offices are flooding from across the country, according to Aristizabal, who gets a daily report on how many calls were made through the toll free line used by several immigrants rights groups. She says that on Monday, 7,000 calls were made across the nation.

In addition, immigrants rights groups are planning to stage rallies around the country, and in Texas a group of students has been staging a hunger strike in Austin for the past two weeks.

Despite the large number of activities, it will not be an easy task to get the House and Senate to move on an issue that is not a priority for congressmen from both sides of the political aisle.

Javier Borja, an 18-year-old volunteer from Ecuador at Make the Road New York’s offices, says he has U.S. citizenship because his dad is Puerto Rican. Still, he says he regularly attends organization’s calling sessions because he has friends and family who live without papers and has seen how they struggle to get jobs and educational opportunities.

“What I do is not much,” he says, “but with the heart and the soul, you can achieve thousands of projects.”

As Christhian Diaz celebrated his graduation from Cooper Union last May, his mother insisted that he take pictures with everyone: friends, classmates, even seniors he didn’t know well. She had a lot to be proud of. Diaz, who is a 24-year-old illegal immigrant, had overcome many obstacles to get his diploma. He interrupted his studies twice to work and save money for school, where tuition is free but student fees and insurance cost about $3,000 a year. Even during those difficult times, though, Diaz never doubted he would finish. His education was a privilege that few illegal immigrants have and he valued the opportunity.

Professors who were close to Diaz and knew about his immigration status were proud, too.  Some of those teachers had supported him through the hard times by finding him freelance jobs. For Diaz, such support and kindness was overwhelming. “To know that there are people who care about what I do with my life now,” Diaz said, “it made me really emotional.”

Yet for Diaz the celebration was muted. While many of his classmates were moving forward to fellowships, teaching positions, or residencies at distinguished art institutions, his future was uncertain. Though Diaz is talented and attended a prestigious college, the opportunities that are normally afforded to most graduates don’t apply to him. While New York State has laws providing some rights to illegal immigrants when they are students, now that he has his diploma, Diaz’s immigration status prevents him from working legally in the United States. He faces a choice few college graduates have to make: stay in the U.S. and work at a menial job in the shadows, far below his education and training, or leave America and work in a “home country,” Colombia, that he has never known.

“It’s like coming to an intersection in the woods, but there isn’t actually any road to take,” Diaz explained. “I find my self stuck. It’s like the roads are not there yet.”

Diaz is hardly alone in his dilemma. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates that there are 11.1 million illegal immigrants living in the U.S. According to an analysis of the same data by the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington D.C.-based migration think tank, 114,000 illegal immigrants have received a post-secondary degree while living in the U.S. Like Diaz, these products of college and graduate school have few options to advance their careers because they cannot work legally. Many choose unauthorized work, beneath their training and abilities, to support themselves.

In late September 2010, Congress considered a bill that could open a possible path to citizenship for the thousands of illegal immigrants such as Diaz. If passed, the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act – better-known by its acronym as the DREAM Act―will open a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. before the age of 16 and have completed at least two years of college or military service. The bill is currently stalled and is expected to be reconsidered at the end 2010.

Margie McHugh, co-director of the National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy at the Migration Policy Institute, explained that the DREAM Act would allow young illegal immigrants who are college educated and skilled to integrate into U.S. workforce.  “Given that the prospects for comprehensive immigration reform are so grim,” McHugh said, “the DREAM Act may be the only path to legalization for anyone who was born in another country, but was raised in the U.S.”

For Diaz, life has always been defined by his immigration status. He is still unclear why his mother made the decision to leave their home in Bogota, Colombia. His mother doesn’t talk much about her life in Colombia, but he knows that she tried to start several businesses, including a restaurant that failed due to repeated robberies. Diaz thinks maybe she was frustrated with failure and she wanted to live somewhere with more opportunity.

Diaz remembers their immigration process as abrupt, but he realizes now, in retrospect, that it took his mother six years to adjust the documents for the two of them to qualify for a visitor’s visa to the U.S. When they were finally approved for their visas in 1999, Diaz was told his mother told him to pack a small suitcase for their trip to Florida. “I knew where we were going,” said Diaz. “The thing that I didn’t know when we moved here was that I wasn’t going back to Colombia.” After six months both he and his mother had overstayed their visas and were living in the U.S. illegally.

At 12 years old, Diaz could see that West Palm Beach was a town of contradictions. He and his mother lived in a trailer park among many poor Hispanic immigrants, while nearby gates and fences enclosed whole communities of Florida’s wealthiest citizens. Behind the fences, Diaz’s mother would earn a living cleaning homes. He would go with her to work on the weekends, to help her clean houses faster so they could do more work in one day. When he was old enough to work on his own, his uncles bought him a lawn mower so he could make extra money.

“There was always a feeling of great need and survival,” Diaz said. “It was about putting bread on the table and trying to move further up the ladder.”

Painting by Christhian Diaz inspired by his mother's immigration experience. (Kristofer Ríos/ The Brooklyn Ink)

Things started to change for Diaz when he was accepted to art school. He admits that he had no interest in art before he applied to Alexander W. Dreyfoos School of the Art, a magnet school in West Palm Beach considered to be one of the country’s top public art high schools. Diaz applied to Dreyfoos because he overheard his teacher encouraging a classmate to look into the high school. When it came time to choose his options for high school placement, Diaz remembered the name and selected the school as one of his choices.

As Diaz approached high school graduation 2005, his immigration status appeared as an obstacle to his future hopes. “My status was real clear to me when it came to applying to college,” said Diaz. “I realized it was like applying to a job in that I needed a Social Security number for financial aid and I didn’t have one.”

When teachers at the school became aware of his immigration status, they called in immigration lawyers for him and two other students to advise them on the law. After learning about his options, Diaz realized that he could go to college if he applied to schools like Cooper Union and School of Visual Arts, both in New York City, that offered generous or full scholarships. With free tuition, Diaz would not be required to apply for financial aid, and therefore also not required to produce documentation papers for a Social Security number. In February of 2005, he received a letter that he was accepted to Cooper Union.

Diaz knows that he is lucky for the opportunities he’s had and is grateful for the education he received. “Right now, I feel a great burden having received this education,” Diaz said. “I feel like I have to give back and help share the knowledge passed to me.”

He wants to work with young people like himself and hopes to work as a public school teacher, but without legal status that’s not possible. For the last three months, Diaz has paid the rent on his small Sunset Park room by working odd jobs and freelance gigs, but he’s knows the work is not permanent and he’s unsure of his next step.

There are few options left for Diaz. His immigration status prevents him from working in this country legally and he feels like he’s come to an impasse. He knows that to be a teacher he’ll need a master’s degree and he will most likely apply to graduate school, but without a full scholarship it is unlikely he will be able to afford more schooling. He’s thought about asking one of his uncles to sponsor him for citizenship, but the chances he’ll qualify are slim and he fears that if he enters the system he might be detained.

“Because of my nationality, because of the way I came in to the U.S., it leaves me at odds with immigration,” Diaz explained. “There are not very many options.”

Diaz is aware of the DREAM Act, but is skeptical that it provides any real option for him. “Your citizenship is not guaranteed,” Diaz said. “I can imagine people applying for residency and a business owner will have a greater chance of citizenship than an artist. They’re not going to grant citizenship to everyone, they have to keep tabs on who they let in.”

The one option that seems most realistic to is a return back to Colombia, but that has its own challenges. The years away from Colombia have alienated Diaz from the family he left. Diaz admits that he doesn’t feel culturally connected to his birthplace. “It’s hard for me to identify with any kind of cultural customs,” Diaz said. “Because I have not been there, I don’t really know them.”

Leaving the country would also jeopardize Diaz’s chances for citizenship if he wanted to return. Under current immigration law, Diaz would be barred from applying for a return visa to the U.S. for 10 years and disqualified for citizenship through the DREAM Act.

Diaz tries to remain optimistic about his situation. He admits to being scared about the idea returning to Colombia because he would have to start his life over again, but he also thinks it offers new opportunities. “Here I’ve always felt placeless,” Diaz said of his life in the U.S. “There may be more culturally for me in Colombia. I don’t know.”

We will continue to bring you news from the courtroom as it happens.

Photo from the Russian American Jewish Experience Program

The sons and daughters of Russian Jewish immigrants converse over frothy beers at the Jewish Center in Brighton Beach. They are here, ostensibly, to study the books of Jewish law, something their parents could not do when they lived in the Soviet Union. The children of these immigrants, now mostly in their 20’s, are also here for something more: they are here to find themselves.

Biana Lupa, 25, came from Ukraine when she was three years old. She comes to this Brighton Beach synagogue’s program to learn Judaism. She says her parents were forced to live secular lives under the Soviet regime. Now, she wants to reclaim her Jewish tradition.

“I grew up in the States,” says Lupa, “I’m not Russian, but I don’t feel only American. Plus, I’m Jewish and my parents don’t observe Jewish traditions. I wanted to know who I was and I wanted to find a community of people like me to share with them my struggles.”

Lupa’s struggles come at a particularly emotional time. Although, Lupa questions her faith and her relationship with God at times, she finds comfort in a program in her synagogue called Russian American Jewish Experience or RAJE. It is a program that promotes Jewish values and traditions among young Russian Americans in the south of Brooklyn.

Rabbi Dovid Goldshteyn, one of the teachers of the Talmud in this synagogue, explains that, back in the Soviet Union, it was very hard to for Russian Jews to profess their faith in a secular society because the regime prohibited them from doing so. Hence, most of these immigrants had lost their religious tradition long before coming to America. “A hundred years ago all of our ancestors were Jewish Orthodox, living in terrible poverty conditions,” says Goldshteyn, adding that Judaism “was stolen from us by the soviet regime.”

RAJE is not the only organized group with the goal of connecting children of Jewish immigrants with their roots. The worldwide organization Ezra USA also has a center in Brighton Beach. But RAJE targets young adults and their outreach programs get very creative.

Every Tuesday evening, students congregate at this Jewish center to attend Rabbi Goldshteyn’s lectures about the Talmud and to drink beer. Rabbis and students sometimes cook a potlock. At other times, they order kosher food, but there are always kegs of beer around. Tuesday are known as Happy Tuesday.

Alexander Schiller, 23, comes to Happy Tuesday religiously. He says that drinking alcohol is part of being Russian and part of being Jewish. “Our parents made vodka in their bath tub,” says Schiller.

His view is echoed by another Russian American, Igor Komissarenko, who said that to him a big part of being Jewish means enjoying yourself. However, for Komissarenko, the search for a Jewish identity was unsuccessful. “I was curious for a while,” he says, “and then I lost interest.”

Komissarenko does not go to Happy Tuesdays, nor does he observe Jewish traditions. He was born in Ukraine and moved to America with his family when he was 8 years old. Today, he is 24 and he remains secular, like his parents.

When Komissarenko was 18 years old, he says, he worked at a kosher bakery in Avenue U. Rabbis constantly invited him for dinner or to observe Jewish holidays. But it did not take long before he realized the religious path was not for him. He said that after attending synagogue a few times he felt a bit of pressure by his peers to become observant.

“I wanted to be free, to be the way I want to be,” says Komissarenko.

For Erika Michelle Koltun, a life-death experience put an end to her quest of searching for an identity. Koltun’s best friend died in a car accident three years ago, exactly three weeks after she first started attending this Russian American Jewish Experience program. It was her best friend’s birthday and Koltun was invited to go out with her and some friends to celebrate on a Friday night. She debated between going to her party of observing the Sabbath.

“I decided to go to Sabbath instead,” says Koltun. “It was crazy! I was supposed to be with her. I was supposed to be in that car,” Koltun says.

When she looks back to the accident, however, Koltun admits that she had been “hanging out with the wrong people” at that time. She says she knows now for sure she was in the wrong path. Koltun wishes her friend was alive and what happened to her still hurts.

At the time of the accident the rabbis of her synagogue were teaching her that “if you keep Sabbath, Sabbath will keep you,” Koltun says. “When I was at the hospital I was so sad and angry I wanted to rip my star off my neck and my mother stopped me,” she said. “God protected me, my mom told me. God saved me from being dead.”

Koltun is now studying at the Yeshiva University, in Manhattan, and she is Orthodox. She said she still has a long way to go in her knowledge and her faith.

While Koltun has embraced her faith, not all Russian Americans do so. Many who come to this synagogue’s program are merely seeking to make sense of who they are. They search for answers in Judaism despite of what their parents think of this search.

Because they are secular, the parents of these young people are not always at ease with the possibility that their kids end up being Orthodox. Koltun’s parents are more supportive. “My mother started lighting candles on Friday night,” Koltun says, “Actually, it was my father who pushed to light the candles.”

Koltun hopes her parents follow her steps one day. But the small signs that they are showing lately are enough to make her happy.”

“Sometimes they go to a kosher restaurant and they would call me saying ‘Hey, we’re eating kosher.’ It’s really cute. Maybe one day,” says Koltun.

Alexander Schiller is dedicated to his Talmud studies, though his parents are not as thrilled as Koltun’s. Schiller’s mother was a teacher in Ukraine. His mother told him she was denied a job promotion back in Ukraine for being Jewish. Schiller says his parent’s faith has brought to them nothing but trouble. He says that here in the States his mother tells him sometimes to take his yarmulke off his head to show respect for others because they live in a Catholic neighborhood.

His father is still suspicious of his devoted attendance to synagogue. His father, he says, would tell him: “What do you do there, what do you do? Do you drink alcohol? Do you drink with the rabbi? You do marihuana? Why are you so happy?”

Schiller replies to his father that he is searching for what the Soviets took away form him.