Land of Immigrants

I had an early flight out and had called for a car the day before. It beat trying to round up a cab in the morning rush hour. A young woman arrived at the appointed time in a van. I tossed my duffel ahead of me and jumped in, unsure if there would be others joining us on the run to the airport.

“Will it take long to LaGuardia?” I asked. Since I was staying on the east side of mid-town – and having had problems getting rides to JFK on Fridays in the past – I’d arranged a flight out of the less active airport in New York.

“Nah. It’ll be easy, this early in the morning.” She sensed I was open for conversation and began chatting. She was from Syria, having left her country by hitching a ride with some soldiers into Lebanon and then flying to New York. Pretty gutsy for a woman traveling alone, I thought. Now she was working six and seven days a week driving a car.

“Why do you work so much?” I asked. “What are you planning to do with the money you earn?”

“It’s not the money. I work because I like it, because I want to be doing something. If I were a man, I’d do lots of things. But as a woman, there are not so many things I can do. My uncle owns this car. He’s always calling me to drive – somebody doesn’t show up. Besides, I like driving. I like being out.”

I pondered her response. Surely women had fewer opportunities; but she was a dynamo. Was the path of such an energetic woman so blocked?

“Why can’t you start a business? Maybe drive your own car, or join with some others in some business.” She’d be an asset to a company with such willingness to work.

“If I were a man, I’d do that. But it’s not for a woman.”

I considered her resolve on the matter to be too arbitrary, too soon. But hey, even in the U.S. women earned considerably less than men. Those who broke the glass ceiling were famous, not only for their ambitious determination but also for their rare numbers. I wasn’t a woman; hard for me to judge.

“Is it okay if we stop for coffee?” she asked.

“Sure. I could use a cup myself,” I answered. I’d been hoping for some java to shore me up. The hotel had nothing and I hadn’t time to go scouting the Manhattan streets.

“There’s a place up here. They know how to fix it.” She pulled up by a small cluster of stores. Next to a deli was the familiar logo of a coffee chain! I was saved.

“Hey, a Starbuck’s!” I commented suggestively.

“No; I never know what to order there. The deli here, they know how to fix it.”

“Okay, get me one too. Here’s some money.”

“No, it’s okay. You let me stop.”

It was with some curiosity that I awaited my “fixed” coffee. I could understand her confusion about Starbucks, what with wet soy lowfat carmel frappuccinos these days. The list was incomprehensible to me as well. I think I’d even seen a brochure describing the vocabulary of ordering at Starbucks. Hopefully this favored deli would have that rich, knock-you-on-your-butt cup o’ New York java. Otherwise it would be cheapo stuff left on a burner too long.

She returned, climbed in and passed me back my cup. Watching for tidal changes as we pulled back out into the road, I sipped. The temperature was just below boiling, even with milk and sugar, which I gathered was the “fix” part. Yup, on the burner long enough to kill any misconception of “fresh,” even if the packets it came from were roasted within the last year or two. Demonstrating considerable risk tolerance, I decapped the concoction and blew across its surface. If I were to keep my remaining taste buds unscalded, I’d have to cool this baby down. Sometimes I marveled at my own culinary hypocrisy. I might not enjoy this, but I knew I’d drink it — whether for the caffeine or the conversation.

We talked more about her life here and her immigration to the U.S. Limited as she felt, America offered her more than her home country. I tried to imagine her exodus. Would a single woman on a truck of Syrian soldiers have been assaulted? Did she have to trade sex for transport? Or were her benefactors just a bunch of guys happy to help, happy to have a girl to travel with? It wasn’t for me to ask.

We arrived at LaGuardia. I tipped her, wished her luck and turned to find my plane. Maybe she’d question her perceived constraints. I hoped she would. Then at least she’d find out whether those obstacles were real. If they proved false, then she could go bumping up against all the other obstacles to entrepreneurial endeavor. Somehow, I’d bet she could handle them. Opportunity and confidence: these were two essentials as important in the emerging new economy as they were in the old brick and mortar. How else could you wing it into the unknown?