Our Neighbor's Shoes

Harper Lee once said, "You can't really get to know a person until you get in their shoes and walk around in them."

I love that in Christianity we believe that we have a God who wanted to be able to say, "I walked in your shoes." He experienced poverty. He spent the first several years of his life as a political refugee. He experienced grief, and hunger and fatigue just like us. And when walking in our shoes wasn't enough, he got down on his hands and knees, took our shoes off and washed our dusty feet.

There are so many pairs of shoes that I don't think I'll ever truly be able to walk in. For example, I have never feared for my life solely due to my religious or political affiliation. Sure I've been laughed at. I've been annoyed or embarrassed by the way my country's political representatives put their foot in their mouth often, or I've had serious concerns about their plans for our education or health care system. But, I have never lived through a famine so severe that I have had to feed my children dirt just so that their empty stomachs kept them awake at night. I have never felt the need to risk my life to escape my country because of my gender or family line. It's doubtful I ever will experience these things.  The majority of those who read this won't either. 

So, the closest I can get to walking a mile in someone else's shoes is through the power of story. Story is probably the subject that I have the most passion for because it grabs our attention and transforms us in ways that nothing else can. I think this is why Jesus told so many stories.  Stories are the closest thing we have to shape-shifting...being able to see the world through someone else's eyes for a hundred pages or so. And maybe at the end we still don't' agree with the decisions they made, but we are no longer able to view them as "less than." We're no longer able to use terms like "us" and "them" because for a moment we were them. We're no longer able to use dehumanizing language to describe them because now they have names and families and feelings. 

I have always been drawn to the stories of refugees. Immigrants who seek safety in the USA and other countries who are or once were known as welcoming the "huddled masses yearning to breathe free." 

Some of those stories have happened across the table, in the brave voice of a friend. About a year ago I got a call from a Ukrainian friend living in the apartment building across from my neighborhood. She desperately needed a ride to Winco. As we unloaded her groceries, she invited me to stay and share herf late night dinner and some tea, and I couldn't refuse. She'd always kept conversations light and polite, but something triggered a memory. And suddenly I found myself there as she recounted the call from a friend in the military who warned her that within 24 hours her life would change drastically. I relived with her the plans she made to pull money from the bank and stay with a sister who had a basement. She nodded towards her young son's bedroom, explaining the fear he still dealt with after waiting out bombings. She talked about all she'd had there that might never be again. All that was comfortable and familiar. And I said, "I'm so sorry you have to be here...you are safe but I know that it's not home." 

But most of these stories come from both non-fiction and fictional books. Both are important for different reasons. I decided maybe it would be helpful to compile a list:

1. Esperanza Rising by Pam Munos Ryan

This book is geared towards elementary school age children. One of the girls in the teen Bible study group I led was greatly impacted by it and urged me to read it, and I am so thankful I did. It may have been the first time I heard another side to the immigration story. One in which the immigrant was a main character and not a side character. Esperanza (whose name means "hope") lived a charmed life in Mexico until her father's suspicious death and the following actions of her greedy uncle made her, her mom and sister and grandmother afraid for their lives. Mother and daughter are smuggled into the United States where they join migrant workers in a very different life in the fields. Due to an injury her grandmother and sister do not travel with them. Throughout the course of this book, I learned a lot about some of the reasons for the declining economy in Mexico and how our changing trade and farming practices in the U.S. contributed to it. This was an important book that launched me into many more reads in search of answers to the questions it posed for me.

2. The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

This wasn't an immigrant story in the traditional sense. It was about the migration to California during the dust bowl in the Midwest. It was a bit of a modern-day Grapes of Wrath. It helped me understand my grandma and many others in her generation. But I couldn't help but see so many similarities between the way the migrant field workers were treated then and now. It highlights the way we want someone to blame when times are tough and it's easier to withhold from others when we see them as less human.

3. The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri

This is about a Syrian refugee and his wife. It is absolutely heartbreaking. First, it made me realize how little I pay attention to what is going on in the world. How have I not grieved or prayed for or been outraged to what has happened? But the second thing about this book that stood out was the realization that it doesn't end with the escape. These characters were going through extreme psychological trauma that in some ways grew even worse once they were out of the "emergency" of war. " Surviving is just the first step.

4. The Ungrateful Refugee by Dina Nayeri

On a trip to London to visit her grandmother, Dina's Iranian mother fell madly in love with Jesus, and made a dangerous decision to convert to Christianity. This eventually led to a need to flee to the United States as political refugees, leaving Dina's beloved father, and everything she'd known and loved in Iran behind at a very young age. 

Dina is a writer with spunk and can be brutally honest.

I learned that immigration is not a straight line, and that there are often many long stops spent in limbo along the way. This can have a lasting impact on those who's life went on pause.

I also think that one thing we often miss about the refugee experience is in a perfect world they would not want to be here. In a perfect world they could sleep in their own bed, listen to the music they grew up loving, speak their native language all day long, eat their comfort food and play with friends who they've known all their life. Home is familiar. 

"Don't you feel so lucky to be here?!" stings a little. This doesn't make someone ungrateful. But we need to empathize with the feelings of being overwhelmed that come along with the tragedy of being forced to leave one's home.

5. Everything Sad is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri

How cool is it that Dina's brother wrote a book too! I loved being able to compare and contrast. Kind of like when someone's been telling you stories about their family and then you meet their family members and you're like, "I feel like I already knew you but I (pictured you taller, imagined your voice different, etc.)"

Daniel's story is somewhat warmer towards his mother's faith that led to their life upheaval. I had this immense respect for this woman who risked everything because Jesus was worth it. I also mourned the way Daniel had to struggle in American school, making American friends who would never really understand him. Last year I had several students who were from Middle Eastern countries, and I felt fiercely defensive of them, maybe because I could still hear Daniel's voice explaining his struggles. 

6. The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez

I truly loved this book. Whenever I hear "someone" describe immigrants as dangerous criminals that will bring down the American way of life I shake my head. What if we're the scary ones with the backwards way of life? My favorite part was the disgust the mother felt when the corner convenience store was the closest thing they could find to a supermarket. And the closest thing to "real food" they sold was a jar of very Americanized "salsa." She was absolutely mortified. 

I was reminded that there's a lot we think we know about work visas, and "doing things right" that we don't truly understand. And that "not knowing" is a privilege to be grateful for.

Warning: If you're a book-crier, it's a tissues necessary one.

7. American Dirt

I want to start by saying that I now understand why this book is controversial among Spanish-speaking immigrants. First of all, the author is NOT an immigrant from a Spanish speaking country, and as the writer of a bestselling fictional novel she benefited greatly from the stories and hardships of others. Others who were every bit as capable of telling their stories with excellence. And the overwhelming number of extreme situations of violence and trauma squished into these 400 pages is what some might call "Trauma Porn", which blurs the lines between reading for understanding and reading for entertainment. 

That said, I have personally seen good come out of this book. With so much rhetoric about "criminals...rapists, murderers, drug dealers" and "WIDE open borders" going around, a large portion of our country has never asked themselves what crossing the border really involves, and what might be so terrifying back home that it would cause someone to sacrifice their lives to escape it? And is it possible that many of those coming over the border are like this brave journalist's widow and her son with autism? It's worth considering, right? There was no way to get to the end of this novel and not be cheering for them to survive.

The other best thing about this? Is in a discussion with a dear friend, she discussed a much BETTER book, a memoir, written by someone who'd earned the right to tell this more realistic version of an immigration story. Solito.

8. Solito by Javier Zomora

Solito tells the first-hand account of Javier's dangerous trip to the United States from El Salvador at the age of 9. Most of us will never understand the complexity of the political climate of El Salvador in the 1990's. It's definitely worth researching and talking to your Salvadorian friends about.

Long story short, Javier's father left for the United States when he was very young. Eventually Javier's mother was able to make a dangerous trek to reunite with them. When they were ready, they arranged for Javie, who had been living with grandparents to travel with a group of immigrants led by a coyote up through South America, and Mexico, eventually emerging in Tuscon, Arizona. 

I warn you again about this one. I don't think you can walk this desert with Javier the nine-year-old longing to be with his parents and not be changed. I don't think you can read the chapter in which a landowner north of the border aims a gun at a nine-year-old's head for trying to get some life-saving sips of water out of his garden hose and think that ethics and laws are synonymous. 

Because I have one of the most amazing, audacious friends, I had the opportunity to have breakfast last December with Javier. He's so very human and down to earth. No one would have ever suspected that this plainly dressed guy who probably woke up ten minutes before was a New York Times Best Selling Author. He's a poet, and an activist, who still bears a lot of scars from the trauma he experienced during his 3,000-mile, two-month trek as an unaccompanied minor. 

You probably won't get to meet Javier in person. He's a busy guy, and it took us more than one try. But I really do hope you meet him through his words in Solito.

9. I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sanchez

This is different from many of the others I have suggested because it is really about the life of children of immigrants. One foot in two worlds. The burdens that go along with it. The sometimes-delayed appreciation for the love their parents had for them and the sacrifices they made for dreams that aren't always shared. The frustration of being misunderstood.

10. I Didn't Survive by Naghmeh Abedini Abedini Panahi

There are many, many layers to why this book needs to be more widely read. It really pulls back the veil on "pop-evangelicalism" and where optics mean more than truth. It helps readers understand abuse and the many reasons someone might stay with an abuser a very long time before acknowledging their situation for what it is. She also really promotes the idea of the smaller house church movement, as a protection against "celebrity pastor" downfalls and authentically focused community. 

But, for the purpose of this blog, I want to point out that we have painted immigration from primarily Muslim countries with a broad stroke. There are many in places such as Iran whose lives depend on an openness to asylum seekers.

11. Salt to the Sea

This young adult book takes place during World War II, and once again humanizes those whose lives may have seemed like an unremarkable speck in a much bigger story. I learned some things I hadn't known about the conflicts between Russia and Germany during this time.

12. Next Year in Havana

I had never read very much about Cuba before. Despite being a fictional novel, I learned a lot about Cuba, past and present, and once again what might cause someone to risk their lives to leave. 

13. Beyond the Sand and Sea

This is my current read and I'm not too far into it yet. It is a true story highlights the very long and drawn-out process of immigrating to the U.S.A. for a Sudanese refugee family living in a Kenyan UN refugee camp. The story follows Asad Hussein, who was born into the world's largest refugee camp, and had never seen anything outside the encampment until he was a full-grown adult. Brilliant, and mostly self-educated, he eventually became the first person born into the Dadaab encampment to be accepted to Princeton University.

So far, this is really good.

14. Refugee by Gratz

This is my "next read", currently sitting on my nightstand. It's also a young adult book. What I think draws me to it is the fact that it weaves multiple stories of those in search of safety. It includes a Jewish boy from the 1930's Germany, a Cuban girl from 1994 and a Syrian refugee from 2015. 

I've thought a lot about how hindsight is 20/20. Most of us believe we would have done anything to save others from the Nazi death camps. We certainly would have been on the right side of history. But sometimes we don't believe that anyone today is in similarly dangerous situations. Or we get caught up in scarcity mentality. Like Rose hogging that door from Jack in Titanic, right? What if we drown? 

Maybe we can't "let everyone in". Maybe we will drown? But I think we should have to look them in the eyes in the ways books like this force us too. To truly understand who we're saying no to, and why they're here. I get it. Sometimes it's easier to not know. 

I hope this didn't come across as preachy or political. Actually, I'm sure it did. But here's the thing....

We may not agree on how to make sure God's children are all well cared for. 

Maybe you truly want the same things that I do...for children to be well cared for, fed, loved, educated, protected. For our elderly to be surrounded by loved ones and given the respect they deserve. For moms and dads to not have to choose between groceries and medicine. I think most of us agree on those things. We want this world to reflect God's perfect kingdom here more like it was created to be. 

But maybe we have different "political strategies" for accomplishing that. Maybe you see a way forward with some traditionalist strategies or progressive strategies, or even politically neutral strategies. And I'm ok with that. Really, I am. I can seek to understand and trust your heart even if we don't agree.

What I am not ok with is a belief that some people are just born more worthy than others. Less deserving. Destined for suffering. Or that even worse yet, some people are less human. I am not ok with objectifying and vilifying entire groups. I'm not ok with referring to people groups in the same way we might refer to a termite infestation. 

If you find yourself fearful of your neighbor, I hope you'll find the time to pour yourself into their stories and see how you might be transformed.