Enrique's Journey Sparknotes

In Enrique’s Journey, Sonia Nazario illustrated the complexity of immigration problems by noting Enrique, a 17-year-old teenager’s journey from Honduras to the United States. Immigration has always been an existing problem even today. People decide to leave their native hometown to seek for better opportunities or hoping for a reunion with their family members. However, it comes with a great risk. The problem of immigration remains to be ambiguous considering the motives, process and the results of immigrants.

Many immigrants, such as Lourdes, starts off their journey from their hometown from areas like Central America. They were forced to leave their family to pursue job opportunities and send money back home to support the living. Often times, they are law-abiding people who failed to provide for themselves. Without taking any actions, a whole family could just starve to death. Life forced them to make a painful decision of parting with their loved ones. This causes children to grow up with the absence of their parents- and it arises problems. Parents no doubt play a crucial role in a child’s growth, they are important in developing their mental mindset and their overall spiritual growth. With little understanding of why their parents leave them, they might develop extreme emotions towards their parents or even

However, after a long and harsh journey, one will change. When Enrique examines himself during the journey, “he sees a battered young man, scrawny and disfigured.”(3). Immigration might distort a person both physically and mentally. Coming from an impoverished environment, one might also be bombarded but cultural issues. "I'm afraid of them. They talk funny. They are dirty."(4), said one of the local people. Enrique was fortunate enough to be accepted by his family and acquire a job to provide for himself. Not everyone was as well off