Interview with an Immigrant

by Ren

On Tuesday, April 19, 2016 Megan Brothers, a South African Immigrant, came to Deborah and Jacob’s fourth grade class for an interview about her Immigration.

Megan is from South Johannesburg, a city in South Africa. She moved to New York City in 1998. She moved because she is an architect and a lot of buildings are in New York City. She now works at Brookfield, a company in Battery Park City, in New York City.

Megan said,

I was very surprised when I discovered that you walked most of the time in New York City.

She says that in South Africa everyone drove, even if their destination was a block away.

She says that in Africa there was a war in Sudan that affected her because the warriors and victims were coming toward her home city. In Africa there’s a lot of crime so Megan had to put fences and walls around her house. “My house looked like the house from New Jersey,” said Megan.

In Africa there’s a lot of animals and a few of them are lions, cheetahs, elephants, buffaloes and hippos. She remembers going to Africa and watching her children pet cheetahs. Her children are called Ren and Graydon.

In Africa there are special foods. Some of them are biltong, dried sausage, nick nacks and clementines. She brought those to Deborah and Jacob’s class and some of them said, “These are amazing!”

“I definitely learned a lot from Megan’s visit. I learned about animals, African culture and African food. Thanks Megan!” said Alfredo, a student from Deborah and Jacob’s fourth grade class.

Megan Moved!

By Shoshi Fine

Megan Brothers, an immigrant from Johannesburg, South Africa went to a fourth grade classroom to talk about her immigration experience on Tuesday, April nineteenth 2016. She came to New York when she was 24 (that was 18 years before 2016) because her husband is an architect, and he got a job offer in NYC.

Megan loves New York, but she still misses South Africa. “South Africa will always be my home, but I love New York.” One of the things she misses about South Africa is the animals there. Her favorite animal is the giraffe. Her favorite thing to do in South Africa is getting together with her family at her sister’s beach house. Another thing that she misses in South Africa is her family. All of her family lived there and she had to leave them all when she emigrated. They don’t get to see each other that often because it’s so far away. She visits once every one or two years. The flight takes 16 hours! Can you imagine living so far away from your family?

The most shocking thing to Megan about New York City is that she can walk everywhere! In South Africa she would drive everywhere. It was very different for her to walk to a restaurant, or to someone else’s house. “The first thing I remember seeing in New York was when I was given a very thorough interview when I first got here.” She said that she was very nervous and scared when it happened. Her favorite place in New York City is Battery Park. Megan spoke English, Afrikaans, and Zulu in South Africa, although the main language spoken was English. Lucky for Megan, she didn’t have to learn another language when she came to New York.

Once, when Megan went on a safari she encountered a scary elephant in a Jeep. Megan grew up with a lot of pets. She had rabbits, hamsters, dogs, cats, mice, and a couple others. There were lots of crimes in South Africa, so a lot of people built walls up around their houses to prevent other people from breaking in.

My favorite thing about moving to New York is being an immigrant. New York is very welcoming to new immigrants.

Megan brought in a South African snack for the fourth graders. She brought in biltong (dried meat), Guava juice (fruit juice), and noche (clementines).

One of the fourth graders said

OMG this is so good! Do they sell this in New York?

An African Adventure With
Megan Brothers

By Madiba

On Tuesday, April 19, a immigrant named Megan Brothers, Ren’s mom, came and visited Deborah and Jacob’s fourth grade at LREI. She lived in South Africa and she came to talk to the fourth grade about it. She came to NY when she was 24, 18 years ago. She met Ren’s dad in high school and then they both started to study architecture at the University of Cape Town. Megan came to the US because her husband got a job in the NYC.

It took 16 hours to get here including getting a refill of gas half the way from Johannesburg. In South Africa there were a lot of animals including the big five, lions, elephants, cheetahs and buffalo. The giraffe was her favorite animal and the hippo was one of the scariest animals. Once she had a scary encounter with an elephant on a jeep in a safari. In South Africa they have 11 different languages, Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga,Tswana, Venda, Xhosa and Zulu. The house she lived in in South Africa was just like houses in New Jersey.

The big difference between South Africa and NYC is that in South Africa many houses have big walls around them because there is a lot of poverty and crime in South Africa. Nelson Mandela, whose nickname was Madiba, which was also the name of his clan, was the beloved leader of South Africa. Megan loves New York City because New York City is very welcoming to immigrants. Her favorite place in NYC is Battery Park. Her favorite food from South Africa is biltong or dried meat and she also loves guava juice.

Megan said,

“South Africa will always be my home but I love New York City.”