American Son Blog 1

The book that I am reading for Issues class in the moment is called American Son by Brian Ascalon Roley.  The book represents the story of a Filipino mother and her two children, Tomas and Gabe, who immigrated to America with the help of her ex husband who was an American soldier.  Their mother believed that once they moved to America, life will be so much better because America is the place that everyone wants to be.  They believed that America gives them everyone equal opportunity and privileges that are beyond their wildest imagination like a better  lifestyle, better work ethic, and better education.  But things are not always as it seems for them.  This is the issue itself, that America has not fixed the problem of underdeveloped places in their states and its violence has not been wiped out from the face of the earth.  I know this because I am a Filipino born and raised in the Philippines myself and I came to the United States almost 5 years ago and I have felt the same experience with Tomas and Gabe's mother.  Coming to America, I thought it was going to be a piece of cake and everything would be easy but I was dead wrong.  Me and my parents had limited income and living the American life with limited rights because we were visa holders.  Even through the times that were the toughest of the toughest, we made it through and still happy by the way we lived.
In the first two chapters, Betino, the brother of Ika, the mother of Tomas and Gabe, wrote to her from the Philippines.  The news was that her daughter graduated from Ateneo University, one of the elite universities of the country, and is preparing a party in their home.  The rest of the note shows that Betino expressed deep concern for Tomas because he has stayed in America for so long, he has embraced the Mexican gang culture in the country. Now that he is a self proclaimed gang member of the Mexicans, he makes gang signs and says anything with slang.  But worse of all, he has lost his discipline and values because us Filipinos live by that code of honor.  Tomas' dirty transformation made him lose his respect for himself and particularly, his mother and brother with no shame whatsoever.  Betino considers his sister that if the boys remained in the Philippines they would have been more disciplined, respectful, and showing honor to people who are older than them and especially coming back will strengthen their faith specifically, Tomas.
In the chapters, the family lives in the South side of Los Angeles, the underdeveloped and dangerous town in the city where gangs and violence come together to burn the town.  Ika has two dead end jobs to support them, Tomas, sells dogs for celebrities, and Gabe helps out around the house.  Their life is nothing different to their life in the Philippines because both places are in poverty with a few  hardworking and a lot less wealthy classes.  It is revealed that the family did visited the Philippines back then but Ika did not like it as much as she used to because she was complaining a lot during the whole visit because of the high temperature.  His sons told her that you are used to this but she said its different now.  This tells me that she does not want to go back to the Philippines but at the same time, she does not want to live in America anymore because of the influence that it has brought on Tomas and possibly, Gabe.  So Ika has no choice but to stay in America because its her only option to at least get better benefits than the Philippines has to offer.  Later on, Tomas has an offer to sell a dog to an actor in far north, the total opposite and wealthy town in California.  On their way, they stopped at the mall to eat and it was filled with wealthy people that are probably white.  As they were eating, a few people stop and stare at them but Tomas does not show that he notices it.  This is skepticism that has been "programmed" in to the minds of people with better advantages and they would judge people differently because they have not seen a lot of the likes of Tomas and Gabe around their clean and privileged town.  That is similar to where I live currently, Deerfield, the majority are wealthy white people.  So there is not a lot of diversity and when they see someone different, they look down at them for what they look like and wear.
There's more judging when they came to the neighborhood of the client because the neighborhood is filled with mansion with built in cameras.  This makes Tomas more uncomfortable but does not admit it because their car is the Mexican's vehicle of choice through the eyes of wealthy people.  It was unveiled in the chapter that Tomas got pulled over by cops because they thought he was a drug dealer and a gangster because of the condition of his car and outfit with tattoos and a bandanna.  While on the way, Tomas continues to insult Gabe because he believed that Gabe messes up a lot and says that I am better than you.  But actually its the total opposite because during the dealing, Tomas was nervous and never knew how to step up to the offer he was given and in this time, Tomas lost all his young and tough attitude.  So this means that Tomas throws all his mistakes in to his brother because Gabe is easily taken advantaged and Tomas wanted to get his mistakes off of his chest.  Another reason why he does this is because Gabe is the nice one of the two and he is jealous of him because he was more intelligent than Tomas can ever be.  This is a tough life not only socially but personally.