By Bhashini Weerasinghe

As we rapidly approach the upcoming election and brace for the inevitable and continued onslaught of campaign attacks on some of the most vulnerable populations, I cannot help but think about my own immigrant story. I was seven years old when my dad told us that he was going to go to the United States to get things situated before we would all join him in about a year. I remember the party we had on his last day in Sri Lanka and the ride to the airport to drop him off. I also remember waking up the next day and wanting to see my dad and having my mom tell me that dad is on a flight. She pulled out a globe to show me that dad is flying across the world. I remember asking if we could take the train to meet him. My seven-year-old brain was struggling to understand what an ocean was and why we could not see dad. I remember that year, I had many phone chats with my dad — but that meant, we get word that dad is trying to call, and we all would head to the town where there was a clothing store that had a phone and wait for him to call back. In Sri Lanka, we didn’t have our own phone — no one did. This was before cell phones were a thing, and before you could Facetime with your loved ones.   Read More