Characters\' Struggle With Their Lives

¶ … characters' struggle with their lives in the United States vs. life in The Dominican Republic. The Colon family came from the Dominican Republic, immigrated to the United States, and found it was not a land of opportunity but a land of broken dreams. Life was hard in New York City, but it was even harder in the Dominican Republic, as the children see when they return for a visit. Their lives in the United States were difficult, but life in the Dominican Republic was even harder, as the author shows in this work.

There are many reasons Santo and Esperanza decided to immigrate to the United States, but the biggest one was Esperanza herself. She was addicted to the television show Dallas and believed she could find a better life in the United States. She thought everyone lived like the Ewings, and that she could have a better life. Santos really followed her because he loved her, but he wanted to go home, and realized just before he died that he hated New York. Cruz writes, But he didn't do anything more than remind Santo of what he had forgotten about himself. That he hates the cold weather. That he had had enough" (Cruz 77). He wanted to go home, but he died before he had the chance. In fact, he had far different dreams from his wife. He thinks to himself, "All he ever wanted was to live. Wake up to the sun and fall asleep, with the moon, like the old men in Los Llanos [...]" (Cruz 74). He follows Esperanza not for his own dreams, but for hers, and it drives a wedge between them that is never removed.

However, Don Chan has different reasons for his move. After losing his wife, he moves to New York to live with his son, Santos. His reasons for coming to the U.S. are based on loss and loneliness, while his children came filled with hope and dreams. He has nowhere else to go, and he is old enough that he can no longer take care of himself. Like Santos, he follows his family rather than following his dreams. He would rather live in Los Llanos, but he cannot, and so he comes to New York to live his last years with his family. In the end, the family finds that the United States was not what they thought it would be at all, and in fact, they all seemed to live pointless lives there, filled with work and little else. Don Chan returns home to Los Llanos after eight long years in New York, and dies there, which is fitting. He was never meant for life in the city, no matter how he tried to fit in. He was a man of slower tastes, few needs, and had outlived his vibrancy. It was as if he waited to die until he could go home again, and he knew the family would get along without him.

Their lives in the United States were more difficult than Esperanza imagined. She becomes materialistic and uses credit cards to mire herself in debt. Santos is killed in a taxicab robbery and she has to work even harder to try to support the family. Her son gets in trouble on the streets before he manages to turn his life around, and her daughter skips school and steals from her own mother. In effect, the family left the hardships of rural life and replaced them with the hardships of city life. They live in a dilapidated building; have little money, and no time for anything but work.

Yet, when they return home, Esperanza and Dallas cannot wait to get back to their lives in New York, while Bobby, the most well adjusted member of the family, could be very content to stay in the Dominican Republic. He thinks to himself, "He could live in such a climate. As long as he could plug in, he would be happy to stay" (Cruz 286). Esperanza, on the other hand, thinks, "Esperanza was sure that Los Llanos was never a place she could call home" (Cruz 286). Esperanza moved to America because she dreamed of having a ranch in Dallas, but she raised a son who could be content in the old world. It is a circle of time and family that cannot be broken, and the book shows how deep roots can run in some people. Don Chan had to go home to die, Santos' ashes traveled home, and Esperanza had to go home again to know that she had done the right thing by leaving. The experience in America was not what anyone had hoped it would be, but it became home for Esperanza, and somehow seems to make her work and her troubles worth it, at least a little bit.

Each of the characters experiences immigration in a different way, and some of those experiences are based on the age and generations of the characters. Early in the book, the author notes Don Chan is "afraid of change" (Cruz 1), and because of this, his experience is far different from his family's younger members. Of all the characters, Don Chan is the oldest, and his reaction to New York fits his age and generation. He is never truly happy in New York, and he always longs for home. As he grows older and his memory gets cloudy, he lives in the past with his family members who are gone, and the only time he really becomes himself again is when they return to the Dominican Republic for a visit. Don Chan's experience is framed by the turbulent 1960s, when he helped overthrow a corrupt government in his own way. Because of his age, he sees things differently, and realizes many of the things that are important to Esperanza really are not important at all.

The children are really Americans, because while Bobby was born in the Dominican Republic, he does not really remember it. They have a truly American lifestyle and ideals, and they have few of the values of their parents or their grandparents. Their experience is framed only by their American roots; they have little to tie them to their homeland. In this way the author shows how just one generation can change from Dominican to American with very little trouble.

Esperanza's experience is framed by her love of the television show Dallas, which she fantasizes about all the time. It is her motivation to move to the U.S. And adopt American ways. She becomes a "true" American, working long hours so she can buy expensive things, many of which she does not even use. In fact, after she learns how long it will take her to pay off her purchases, she thinks, "[S]he would be happy to return it all if it meant that the creditors would leave her along. Some of it was like new, in boxes" (Cruz 105). Sadly, she has fallen into American life all too easily, and fallen into the trap of greed and possessions. Her life is spent working to try to keep the family afloat and pay off her debt, just like so many other struggling Americans.