First Night In America

The good USA is the land of freedom, opportunity, and new beginnings. Every year millions of immigrants migrate to the United States with the notion that life will be better and easier. As they arrive here, they soon find out that things are not necessary all that much better and they are at a big disadvantage. In the novel Jasmine by Bharati Mukherjee, Mukherjee tells of the hardship, mental and physical abuse, and struggles of a young Indian women, Jasmine, first days in America.

Jasmine is a young Indian girl about the age of 17 and is going to America to burn the suit of her deceased husband. Jasmines husband, Prakash, was accepted to go the Florida International Institute of Technology and of which they were going to start a new like in America. Several days later, Prakash was killed by a bomb and her plans of a new like in America were changed. She felt that it was her duty to go to America and pay respect to her husband.

Jasmines first night in America is a night success but also a night of evil and torture. Once Jasmine arrives to America, there is a notion of success. She is 17 years old, knows nobody, and went through weeks of hardships just to get to America. She has made it and now she can start her new life. In not knowing what was about to happen, her life and thoughts are going to be change forever. Once on land, the captain, Half-Face, of the shrimp boat she traveled on told her that she can come with him for the night and that “there’s some bad fellows up yonder. Best you and me keep us a little company” (Mukherjee p108). Half-Face continues on and say that she is going to owe her something for his generosity. After that Half-Face rapes Jasmine. “For the first time in my life I understood what evil was about” (Mukherjee p116). Jasmine encounter the true evil and hardship America can bring on her first night and survived.

Even though America is the land of the free and people immigrate here to have a better life one must also remember that there is evil everywhere. Times are going to tough and it may seem like it would have been easier if they have just stayed where they were. One must remember that things can only get so bad and eventually with hard work and an honest living things will turn for the good and then America will stand up to its name.