An Immigrant's Lot
Reading the Dominique Strauss-Kahn stories in the paper, I am reminded of what I learned about asylum seekers in Chris Cleave's wonderful novel, LITTLE BEE.
It's virtually impossible to get out of one's country to the West without crafting a very dramatic story. In LITTLE BEE, Bee has lost her family and smuggles herself out only to wind up in a detention center where she officially has no story--and has to figure a way into freedom staying true to her ethics. In real life, a woman from Guinea is admitted as an asylum seeker to the US, along with her daughter. In NY she finds work as a hotel maid and in her off time, becomes involved with a drug-selling man who gets caught and sent to an immigrant prison. Because this woman has been accused of telling falsehoods in her asylum seeking story--her rape in Guinea was an "ordinary" one, not a gang rape--and because of the bad boyfriend, the prosecutor in NY doesn't think she deserve to charge DSK with raping her. Question: could it be possible for someone who's been victimized in the past to be victimized again? And if a person was forced to lie in order to ensure her and her child's safe arrival in the US, does that brand her as a terrible person not worthy of the same protection from crime as the rest of us?
If you haven't read LITTLE BEE yet, you must. It will hold you spellbound.
It's virtually impossible to get out of one's country to the West without crafting a very dramatic story. In LITTLE BEE, Bee has lost her family and smuggles herself out only to wind up in a detention center where she officially has no story--and has to figure a way into freedom staying true to her ethics. In real life, a woman from Guinea is admitted as an asylum seeker to the US, along with her daughter. In NY she finds work as a hotel maid and in her off time, becomes involved with a drug-selling man who gets caught and sent to an immigrant prison. Because this woman has been accused of telling falsehoods in her asylum seeking story--her rape in Guinea was an "ordinary" one, not a gang rape--and because of the bad boyfriend, the prosecutor in NY doesn't think she deserve to charge DSK with raping her. Question: could it be possible for someone who's been victimized in the past to be victimized again? And if a person was forced to lie in order to ensure her and her child's safe arrival in the US, does that brand her as a terrible person not worthy of the same protection from crime as the rest of us?
If you haven't read LITTLE BEE yet, you must. It will hold you spellbound.
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