Louis Sanchez DB 1

1. To start off, Bahadur wanted to research about the history of her great grandmother & why she decided to go aboard a ship while she was 4 months pregnant all alone, especially because she did not leave any “letters or diaries describing the circumstances that led her to climb aboard a ship” as stated by Bahadur herself. During her journey she found written documents that were left there by planters, captains, immigration agents, all which stated how they all slept with these Indian women, which was an issue for Bahadur because not only did it limit her on constructing the information she needed, but this also left out information from the women’s point of view such as how they felt on a day by day basis, or what their everyday thoughts, were. This made Bahadur much more curious, especially since women at the time were “illiterate” which is why there is not a single existing narrative from a woman at that time. This lead to Bahadur expanding her ways of finding information about these women, such as going back to the village where her grandmother is from and studying unofficial sources such as the songs that was listened to at the time, the photographs that were taken, the tattoos people used to have or even postcards that were found. She even went as far as studying about her own journey in India and her current profession so she can acquire as much knowledge as possible. Honestly this helped me realize how much women were restricted back then and the amount of information we do not have because of the fact that they were not educated enough to leave documents from their point of view. On top of that, it made me want to go out and even learn about my own history with my family and just my country in general. If I was to construct an archive about my own family I would start off by researching how the country (Dominican Republic) was doing around those times economically & even politically. On top of that I would fly out to Dominican Republic and ask my grandma, uncles, and neighbors about how life was for them back in the day & even how hard it was for their family as well.

The person I watched was Grant Din, who lives in Oakland and is the great great grandson of Gong Him Hik, and helped his family complete the journey of migrating to the United States. Gong Gim Hik, the great great grandfather, was someone who worked on the railroad in the United States which motivated him to bring his whole family back. Grant Believes his great great grandfather was an adventurous person specifically because he decided to travel all the way from a small village called “Lok Cheung” Village to Nevada so he could work on the railroad, then go back to get his wife and family to travel right back to the states. Grant din struggled on finding written down information about his great great grandfather migrating to the United States, however there was an author who wrote a book which was based on how Chinese people migrated to the United States, which mentioned the small village his great great grandfather lived in and how people from the village worked on the railroad back in the United States. In addition, Grant had family members such as uncles, aunts & even his grandfather which confirmed the story. In addition Grant got most of his information confirmed by a website called ancestry.com which helped him understand more. When his great great grandfather migrated to the United States, they ended up opening a local laundry business to try and make money to bring in the rest of the family from china to the United States. What surprises me the most is the fact that his great great grandfather was basically fascinated by the life in the United States and worked so hard to bring his whole family back and start a new life here. This oral history confirms for me that asian Americans came to the United States the same reason many other races migrated as well which was for a better & new life. I would like to know about the day to day lifestyle & process it took to migrate to the United States.