My husband & I traveled quite a bit but sailing aboard a cruise liner is still on our bucket list. We never went out in the open sea. It seems so adventurous & romantic, especially after watching blockbusters like « Titanic, » but, in reality, for those who actually were onboard, that was not so at all.
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The Titanic sank. Thousands of people died & those who lived were wounded for life. They all had grand aspirations for their immigration to America; instead, for many of the passengers, the Titanic became their last destination.
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What happened then? Wrong goals, pride & hasty decisions lead to the cruise liner hitting an iceberg. Six compartments out of sixteen were flooded, while the Titanic could stay afloat only with flooded four. The rest is history.
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Immigrant life, in some sense, resembles cruising in rough open waters. In this case, my husband & I are seasoned sailors with more than eight years of life experience. Based on this very experience, I compartmentalized our « immigrant cruise liner » into seven vital compartments:
– Motivation
– Personal Brand
– Education
– Communication
– Material Well-being
– Health
– Community
We have to keep an eye on all of them so that when some are flooded, we can fix the problems fast enough without letting our liner sink. Yeah, I know. But honestly, all people have to go through something similar when they have to change states or cities or neighborhoods or jobs… All of us have to pay attention to those seven compartments in order to succeed in our own new open sea adventure.
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Sailors have a saying: «7 feet under the keel ⛵️» when they wish each other successful and safe sailing, meaning that there should be no less than 7 feet of water between their vessels and the bottom of the sea for them not to run aground. I want to wish the same for all of us, especially brave immigrant sailors fighting for their lives and future for them & their kids in new countries over new horizons.
