Sunday, November 12, 2006
Immigration, cuatros leches cake, old friends
Today, lunch with an old friend I haven't seen in years, Michele Wucker. We know eachother from police reporting days in Milwaukee. These days she lives in NYC and is a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute at the New School. She also works for a clearinghouse that supports efforts in some cities to allow non-citizens to vote in local elections. She's in town to speak and promote her new book, Lockout: Why America Keeps Getting Immigration Wrong When Our Prosperity Depends on Getting it Right.
Lunch at LaDuni. Chile rellenos, popover sandwich with sausage and avocado, and cuatros (not tres) leches cake. Yuca fries that mystify me -lightly crisp outside, soft inside, but not mealy. How do they do that? She passes my basic restaurant test - share your food.
She also passed along some interesting info. Common argument: immigrants shouldn't be allowed in because they're just going to suck up our money and take it home. But fewer immigrants today return to their home countries than in previous waves.
So much of the debate centers on folks coming for lower-income jobs, but she points out that in an era of global competition we need to look to top minds from around the world to help with academic and corporate research. She interviewed some students from MIT, including one who had a multi-million dollar grant for cutting edge research, who wind up spending up to a year in China, trying to get back into the country to finish their work. And so on....
She told me about making the transition from Latin American bureau chief for a business publication to freelance writer, author and fellow. Bottom line: It's not easy. Five years in, she's still figuring out how to make it work financially. BUT, those struggles are balanced by truly feeling good about the work she's doing and challenged by it.
Last Spring in San Miguel Allende, I met so many people who talked to me about transition and life changes that I began to think they were being placed in my path on purpose. That seems to continue. Wonder if that's because I'm more open to it.
Lunch at LaDuni. Chile rellenos, popover sandwich with sausage and avocado, and cuatros (not tres) leches cake. Yuca fries that mystify me -lightly crisp outside, soft inside, but not mealy. How do they do that? She passes my basic restaurant test - share your food.
She also passed along some interesting info. Common argument: immigrants shouldn't be allowed in because they're just going to suck up our money and take it home. But fewer immigrants today return to their home countries than in previous waves.
So much of the debate centers on folks coming for lower-income jobs, but she points out that in an era of global competition we need to look to top minds from around the world to help with academic and corporate research. She interviewed some students from MIT, including one who had a multi-million dollar grant for cutting edge research, who wind up spending up to a year in China, trying to get back into the country to finish their work. And so on....
She told me about making the transition from Latin American bureau chief for a business publication to freelance writer, author and fellow. Bottom line: It's not easy. Five years in, she's still figuring out how to make it work financially. BUT, those struggles are balanced by truly feeling good about the work she's doing and challenged by it.
Last Spring in San Miguel Allende, I met so many people who talked to me about transition and life changes that I began to think they were being placed in my path on purpose. That seems to continue. Wonder if that's because I'm more open to it.
# posted by Anne @ 5:34 PM 
