Feature Story

Story

David Berardo and his wife Cristina took the decision to immigrate to the United states when he was 27, in the November of 1999. He was decided and saw many reasons to come here. He saw the future was not in Argentina but the U.S. He had to leave many things behind that at first was hard to do but the experience of immigrating completely changed his life.

David and his wife felt a feeling so strong to take the decision and immigrate to the United States. He knew there were risks, but he did it anyway. He also knew that coming here was going to be really difficult but he was willing to do what it took.

David saw that the main reason to come here was to study and get a degree applying this to his wife too. David knew the education here was better. The decision on where to situate themselves was Utah.

“We chose Utah because they were the first to accept us in a college and it was exciting for us to actually make a dream come true, so we took that and decided to live there for some time, meanwhile we finished our studies,” Berardo said.

When David communicated to his family his decision they didn't quite understand. The family thought it was a stupid idea and it wasn't going to work.

“My family didn't understand why we took the decision to come here,” Berardo said. “They didn't like the idea and they today still don't like it.”

After making decisions David prepared himself to come here and made sure everything was ready so he had to go to the US embassy in Argentina to have an interview and make sure the the visas were for us to leave the country. .

“We prepared ourselves by going down to the US embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina which was six hours from where we lived,” Berardo said. “They interviewed us and made sure everything was in place. We also had our visas checked.”

Before he left David spoke to his grandpa and they both talked about the risks he was going to face and the good things.

“I saw a comparison with me and my grandpa when he immigrated from Italy to Argentina,” Berardo said. “He told me it was not going to be easy. I saw a pattern between me and my family.”

When everything was ready David said his goodbyes to his family. All the family was sad and it was hard to say goodbye. Although it wasn't as hard to say goodbye as his wife had to say goodbye to her family.

“It wasn't all so hard to say goodbye to my family as it was to my wife,” Berardo said. “Although we were used to being separated from our families for a time because we had done it before in other situations.”

When David came here his first impression was great. He liked the place. He got to see some destinations like different states to take different planes, all with different weather but he liked it.

“What I liked about here is that there was peace,” Berardo said. “There was no stress around and it was a safe place to live.”

Another of the many things they saw different were the food and the greetings, which were hard things to leave.

“Greetings here are different, in Argentina we greeted with kissed on the cheek.”

“The food was also very different like different meals for dinner and lunch, and leaving all of that was hard,” Berardo said.

There were some plans and goals David wanted to accomplish like a shelter first of all and plans to study later changed because the not enough amount of money.

“We had to buy a car first than anything,” Berardo said. “There was a nice family we knew that let us live in their house for some time meanwhile we found a place to live. Later we saw that university prices were expensive and we couldn't afford it so my wife started to work while I studied. We saw that with degrees, here you can use them anywhere in the world when in Argentina that couldn't happen.”

When learning English it was hard for David. There were circumstances were communications and conversations were hard to hold for both David and his wife.

“Learning a new language was definitely hard, people didn't understand us and we didn't understand them,” Berardo said. “People looked at us in a strange way, but the only way of learning is with people and being able to hold conversations with them.”

David thinks the country he left is now very different as he left it.

“We never got to go back, but if we did it would be so different as we left it,” Berardo said. “ I am also different and I have a different perspective of things. I think there would be a disconnect and a shock of how things have changed over the years.”

After all David really likes it here and likes living here. It is a good place to live for him and although it may be hard he doesn't back up on his decisions.

“No I don't regret the decision on coming here,” Berardo said. “What I learned here I wouldn't have learned it in Argentina. The experiences I lived here are those I’m never going to forget. I grew as a person, learned new things, I had my family here and I'm going to say it was hard but it was definitely worth it.”