From My Home to Yours

My name is Shaan, and tomorrow is the day I will go to America.

Right now I live in a country in Asia called Pakistan. I was born and raised here, so I do not know what to expect when I go to America. Will the children my age be nice to me? Will we be able to tell each other our favorite TV shows and superheroes? When I grow up I want to be a superhero.

I have always liked the circus. I want to be able to hang, swing, and jump everywhere like the acrobats. That is why my favorite superhero is Robin. He grew up as an acrobat and turned into a superhero; he saves good people and fights bad ones.

Whenever I try to picture moving, I get this feeling in my stomach. It doesn’t hurt but it doesn’t feel good either. I don’t know if the kids in America will look like me. As long as they are nice I think I will be happy in America. I think being happy in your new home is important. Being sad only makes you want to move back and that is not good at all.

I almost forgot I haven’t packed all of my things. Tomorrow is the day we leave, and I need to be ready. I pack my Gameboy and all my games I have on it. I pack my shalwars and kurtas, but in the cartoons and video games I never see anyone wear what I wear. Mom says that they wear jeans and pants and that they wear shirts and jackets. Maybe I will be different after all, because I like to wear topis and they wear caps and hats.

It is getting late; I need to go to sleep early so I will be ready for tomorrow.

***

Today is the day we leave. We drive to the airport with our bags; mine has my clothes and games in it.

In the airport we get in line and send away our bags. All the big bags get on the plane before us. We get in line, but we have to put everything we have in bowls. We get out stuff back after they take a picture of us.

After we get past all the lines we finally get on the plane. My sister is sad she is leaving so she cries on the plane. When we are flying I get sleepy but my ears start to hurt. I wonder if Superman’s ears hurt when he flies because he flies so fast. I finally go to sleep thinking about how fast Superman flies.

When I wake up I see food in front of me. A nice lady gives all of us food and drinks. She gave me apple juice, she seemed nice. There were also games on the plane. Every person had a screen in front of them where you could play games. I tried playing chess it was hard. I had also found it hard to understand the pilot. He spoke English so fast. I will have to really pay attention to hear people if everyone talks this fast.

The pilot says we have arrived at our destination and the plane finally lands after a long time. This is it, the last part of our long trip to our new home. We get off the plane and enter America.

We get in line but this time one of the people takes one of my brothers away. I do not know why they do this. My brother is thirteen. He was doing the same thing as the rest of the people in line. And why are they shouting at us, it is making me scared.

My mom looks worried but she can’t do anything because we are still in line. After we get past the line we wait for my brother. They bring him back later. My mom runs to him and hugs him. My brother looks like he had been crying.

We finally reach the exit of the airport, so we take our first steps out of the airport. The sun greets us in our new home. I can imagine all the kids welcoming me to America as well. I then tell them your home is now our home let’s have fun together. Let’s laugh and play together, let’s eat and drink together, but most importantly let’s become superheroes together.