Aichou Lin’s Story

By Lorin Utsch

Aichou Lin is an active community member, a mother of three children, a church leader, a college graduate, and a migrant. Twenty-three years ago, she moved from a small village in China to the United States.

While she says her story is not an “extraordinary migration story”, her experiences add more insight into the reality of what migration looks like and how it is experienced by countless others like her.

For those who have only briefly heard her story, they might assume that she left China due to religious persecution. She said that though she remembers her family having to hide their Bible from government raids, her main reason for immigrating to the United States was to seek out an education.

She made the journey alone, with a suitcase full of dresses and high heels, because that is what she believed the fashion to be in the United States. Her arrival in the U.S. came with changes in community, culture, language, and perspective.

“Everything in your mind-- you just feel out of place in some way,” Lin explained.

When she first started graduate school in the U.S., her boss told her to speak accurate English. “It reminds you that you are just so different,” Lin said as she looked back on the alienation she felt.

As the years have gone by, she sees the personal growth within herself and has found the balance between her identity in China and her new life in the U.S.

“It’s taken much longer for me to be more comfortable with myself,” Lin said. “It’s ok to not be the same.”

Lin tries to visit her family in China once a year and says that Facetime and other technology has allowed her to stay very well connected to those she left behind. However, she acknowledged that there is still tension between those different sides of her as she decides how to raise her kids.

This struggle with identity is something many migrants and non-migrants face. Lin did not undergo violence or heart-wrenching trauma on her migration journey, but the effects of migrating changed the trajectory of her life and presented her with hardships she would not otherwise have had to face.

By listening to her and others’ stories, Lin believes that migrants can be viewed with more compassion. She views the discussion about migration as an opportunity to unite rather than divide.

“Sometimes people try to group the migrants. Sometimes they try to learn about them over the news,” Lin said. “I think it is very important to think first, you know, they are human beings-- not far from you and me.”