Day 4 (Denmark in America)

We drove to Solvang. It is a little town in Santa Ynez started by Danish immigrants in the 1800's and early 1900's. The town is decorated with Danish flags , danish bakeries and cafes serving Danish food and from time to time, you get to see women wearing Denmark's national costume. Not to mention, the many places called "copenhagen". Solvang is another example of America's diversity and the integration of immigrants in the American society. It is not only home to Danish immigrants though. Recently, many other ethnic groups started moving to Solvang. The latino presence in Solvang is obvious. They are employeed in supermarkets, bakeries,cafes and other places. Interestingly, I had the chance to meet a Palestnian Arab immigrant who moved to Solvang in the 1970's. Mohammed Ramoni came to the United States to go to university in Los Angeles. After getting a business degree, he decided to stay in the US. During a trip back home, he got married and brought his wife with him to America. Ramoni is another sucess story but his story is different than that of Latino immigrants primarily because he is an Arab and a Muslim. I heard and read alot about discrimination towards Muslims and Arabs in the post 9/11 world. I heard it all from Muslims getting their stores burned down, girls forced to take off their veils and racist grafitti in Muslim neighborhood. Ramoni's answers proved to me that people have different experiences here. Living in America for over 30 years, Ramoni never felt any discrimination and although his daughters are veiled, they didn't face difficulties too. He said that this is mainly because he treats people well so they treat him well too. His answer was interesting but it was very debatable. I believe in the golden rule "treat others how you would like to be treated" but still the media and the surrounding might shape your ideas sometimes in a very negative way. I think it is because he lives in California and more specifically Solvang. It is a very multi-cultural city not to mention, it gets alot of tourists. This means that they are used to all kinds of people. This differs if he lived in a little town where there is barely any diveristy and all the information they know about others (Arabs, Latinos etc...) are those from television and papers. In this little town, people will tend to be xenophobic unlike Solvang.

I wasn't surprised by his strong attachment to his religion but I was surprised by his attachment to some old traditions such as "arranged marriage". Obviously, he is against dating and pre-martial relationships and he believes that his children should have an arranged marriage. When he said that his children are ok with it, I had my doubts because they were raised here and they will defintily be influenced by the society. Shortly after that, we had the chance to meet his son and apparently, he disagreed with his father. His son believes that arranged marriages should take a more modern form. His son described himself in a great way when he said that he has a "cultural conflict". A good example of this is his opinion about arranged marriages. He believes that they are not a bad idea aslong as the two couples get the chance to meet up through family, date and get to know each other in a socially-approved context. His culture is telling him that arranged marriages are the right way but the his new culture is telling him that dating and pre-martial relationships works as good as the traditional way. Being part of both cultures, instead of thinking of himself as lost in between, in the gray area, he chose to take the best out of both cultures. Ahmad's Cultural-conflict and identity conflict reminded me of my own. We were both raised in countries we are not originally from and our culture is mixed. He said he doesn't feel American in America and he doesn't feel very Palestnian anywhere. I don' t feel very Sudanese in Sudan however I feel Sudanese elsewhere. Over the years, I've learned to incorporate other cultural norms and values into my own special culture. Ahmed did the same thing but his culture is different not only because he is Palestnian but because it is heavily influenced by religion.



Walking around in Solvang later that afternoon, we had very interesting encounters. We learned some history of the Danish immigration to the United States and their successful integration here at the Elverhoj museum. A museum built by a Danish artist. While getting to know how the Danish immigrants started Solvang, it was interesting to know how poor immigrants who immigrated searching for a better life built a famous tourist destination and nice town. Solvang is a great example of how immigrants contributed to America. Their contributions could be culture,academic,intellectual,architectural,artistic but in the case of Solvang, it was cultural, artistic and architectural.

Danish immigrants are not the only ones who should take credit for the beautiful town of Solvang. I approached a man inside one of Solvang's little shops to ask him about immigration in the United States and his opinion about the recent immigrants to Solvang. Howard, an artist and a New Jersey native who moved to Solvang about 25 years ago expressed his appericiation of the immigrants work in Solvang. He said that if there were no immigrants in Solvang, the whole town will collapse. Apparently, the immigrants in Solvang do all the work not done by others such as running bakeries,gardening etc...

After the conversations we had, I've come to the conclusion that when it comes to Solvang , Immigrants are simply the backbone of this town.