Dear America

Dear America

by

Jose Antonio Vargas

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Dear America makes teaching easy.
Lola (Tagalog for “grandma”) is Jose Antonio Vargas’s grandmother Leonila Salinas. In 1984, she and Lolo moved to California, where their daughter Florie already lived. Lola began working as a food server, and she and Lolo became citizens just before their grandson (Vargas) reached them in 1993. Lola took care of Vargas during his teenage years and constantly worried about him after he became a journalist, but always remained supportive. Vargas frequently thinks about the sacrifices Lola made to come to the U.S. and, in particular, the way Lola’s decision to immigrate cut off her relationship to Vargas’s mother.

Lola Quotes in Dear America

The Dear America quotes below are all either spoken by Lola or refer to Lola. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Citizenship, Belonging, and Identity Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 5: Filipinos Quotes

But my family is from the other Mountain View, which is part of the other Silicon Valley. This is the Mountain View of immigrant families who live in cramped houses and apartments, who depend on Univision, Saigon TV News, and the Filipino Channel for news of home, not the homes they’re living in but the homes they left behind. This is the Silicon Valley of ethnic grocery stores in nondescript and dilapidated buildings, where sacks of rice and pounds of pork are cheaper, where you hear some Spanish, Tagalog, and Vietnamese before you hear a word of English. This is the other Mountain View, in the other Silicon Valley, where the American Dream rests on the outdated and byzantine immigration system that requires families to wait for years, if not decades, to be reunited with their loved ones.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Lola, Lolo
Page Number: 27-28
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 1: Playing a Role Quotes

I ended up watching Lola watch the movie, wondering how much she had given up to come here, how rarely she got to see her own daughter. At that moment, I realized it wasn’t just me who missed my mother—Lola longed for my mama, too. But I was too selfish to want to see it, too absorbed with my own pain.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Vargas’s Mother, Lola
Page Number: 55
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 16: Second Coming Out Quotes

As people mingled with each other through the buffet dinner of chicken curry, samosas, biryani, and naan, I realized that I had made a mistake by keeping everyone apart all these years. I was afraid that they wouldn’t have anything to talk about. It was not until my family life, my school life, and my work life all converged in that Indian restaurant that I discovered that they indeed had something in common: their generosity to me.

And to be seen by so many people, so many good people, meant that I was here, and maybe even that I was supposed to be here.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Lola, Jim Strand, Mary Moore, Pat Hyland, Rich Fischer, Uncle Rolan, Teresa Moore
Page Number: 118-119
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Dear America LitChart as a printable PDF.
Dear America PDF

Lola Quotes in Dear America

The Dear America quotes below are all either spoken by Lola or refer to Lola. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Citizenship, Belonging, and Identity Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 5: Filipinos Quotes

But my family is from the other Mountain View, which is part of the other Silicon Valley. This is the Mountain View of immigrant families who live in cramped houses and apartments, who depend on Univision, Saigon TV News, and the Filipino Channel for news of home, not the homes they’re living in but the homes they left behind. This is the Silicon Valley of ethnic grocery stores in nondescript and dilapidated buildings, where sacks of rice and pounds of pork are cheaper, where you hear some Spanish, Tagalog, and Vietnamese before you hear a word of English. This is the other Mountain View, in the other Silicon Valley, where the American Dream rests on the outdated and byzantine immigration system that requires families to wait for years, if not decades, to be reunited with their loved ones.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Lola, Lolo
Page Number: 27-28
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 1: Playing a Role Quotes

I ended up watching Lola watch the movie, wondering how much she had given up to come here, how rarely she got to see her own daughter. At that moment, I realized it wasn’t just me who missed my mother—Lola longed for my mama, too. But I was too selfish to want to see it, too absorbed with my own pain.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Vargas’s Mother, Lola
Page Number: 55
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 16: Second Coming Out Quotes

As people mingled with each other through the buffet dinner of chicken curry, samosas, biryani, and naan, I realized that I had made a mistake by keeping everyone apart all these years. I was afraid that they wouldn’t have anything to talk about. It was not until my family life, my school life, and my work life all converged in that Indian restaurant that I discovered that they indeed had something in common: their generosity to me.

And to be seen by so many people, so many good people, meant that I was here, and maybe even that I was supposed to be here.

Related Characters: Jose Antonio Vargas (speaker), Lola, Jim Strand, Mary Moore, Pat Hyland, Rich Fischer, Uncle Rolan, Teresa Moore
Page Number: 118-119
Explanation and Analysis: