Category: Queens College

More Than a Coin Purse

As humans we often assign personal value to objects and my parents were no exception. When my parents migrated from Colombia in 2011, they packed their whole life into one overfilled suitcase and when it could hold no more, they carried essentials in their hands and pockets. One of these essentials was a coin purse. This coin purse was a carefully hand crafted small brown leather coin purse stamped with “Colombia” and the colors of the Colombian flag. To many, it might have seemed like a simple coin purse passing by, but to my parents, it represented the love and pride they had for their country. Despite this, what we love is not always what is best for us. This is why my parents felt forced to leave due to the increasing violence in Colombia associated with the Colombian armed conflict, as well as the economic difficulties that persisted from the early 1980s through the 2000s. They were in search of safety and opportunity. My parents were lucky enough to find that in New York where they were uplifted by their Colombian community in Jamaica, Queens. Over time, the coin purse was passed down to me. Now every time I hold it I am reminded that the coin purse carries more than just physical currency but also cultural currency and it represents a story that didn’t end with my parents, but continues through me.

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Authentically Faux Pearls

Throughout my life, asking questions about my family’s history within Asia has proved futile. My ancestors arrived in China from Korea multiple generations ago, yet fragments of the past were never passed down and instead were lost. However, during a visit to China in the summer of 2025, my paternal grandmother gifted me a tangible reminder of my family’s muddled history, a faux pearl bracelet. This bracelet, though cheap, has become a priceless symbol of connection. It carries the weight of my family’s migration from South Korea to China, and my maternal grandparents’ and parents’ eventual departure from their homes to live in the United States in the 2000s. My family chose to continue this pattern of migration, cultivating new and better lives for themselves, settling in the Asian-dominated community of Flushing, NYC. Having the privilege of living in the United States, I am constantly reminded of the sacrifices that had to be made for me to lead a more stable life. These reminders fostered a deep desire to situate my family’s unique journey within the broader history of Korean migration and displacement. I have come to understand that 20th-century mass migration from Korea was driven by survival and shaped by multiple instances of wartime and political instability. With this, my simple faux pearl bracelet has come to represent the struggles and resilience of countless Korean migrants, including my family.

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Golden Pig, Wealthy Pig, Chinese Pig… Big Pig

Pigs were a blessing in Chinese culture, symbolizing abundance, wealth, and great fortune. My mother immigrated from the quaint town of Taishan in the mountains of China to the United States in 1997; she later gifted me a pig plushie when I was born in 2007, which I would come to name “Big Pig.” In Cantonese, I call it “大猪猪 (Dà ZhūZhū).” It is a soft, pink stuffed pig plushie with large, adoring, beady black eyes and a cotton-like texture that has worn down over time. As her first gift to me, Big Pig represents the beginning of my life and my relationship with my family. I am a first-generation Chinese American woman, born in the United States. My life has always existed between two worlds. This object has traveled with me between America and China throughout my childhood, when my parents were unsure about our living conditions. I carried it on airplanes when I was navigating Asia, kept it beside my bed in different homes as I moved from Corona to Fresh Meadows, and held onto it on nights when I cried myself to sleep. My family’s roots fresh out of China, our life in America created a constant sense of movement as they attempted to settle down comfortably in the States. Carrying 大猪猪 everywhere with me between homes, cities, and countries symbolizes immigration, cultural identity, and what it means to grow up between being both Chinese and American.

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Russian-Soviet-Jewish-New-Yorkian-American-Parisian Tea Culture

Every night after dinner, my mom asks me a one-word question: “Tea?” After I nod my answer, she pulls out two teacups, two saucers, and a teapot from the cabinet behind her. In the teapot, she prepares zavarka, a concentrated form of tea, using black tea, named Paris, which I bought from a company based in SoHo. Over tea, she tells stories about her home country, Moldova, and adjustment to NYC. In 1993, my mom and her family immigrated to NYC from Moldova, along with the 35,900 other Jews emigrating from the former Soviet Union. After 1970, the largest wave of Jewish immigration since the 1920s occurred, and one of the largest locations of settlement was NYC. Migration was influenced in part by war breaking out when Transdniestria, now considered a region in Moldova, declared independence from Moldova. This region was composed mostly of the minorities of Moldova’s population, and Moldova refused to recognize it. When she escaped this situation as a refugee to NYC, my mom was one of many Soviet-Jewish women married early. She received one of the most common Soviet wedding gifts: a tea set. This set now stands in a cabinet in my mom’s kitchen, displayed as a reminder of her Soviet roots, but when used with American tea and her American daughter, the tea set reminds my mom of her adjustment to a new home.

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Bronze Star Medal

Bronze Star Medal

As a child, I was intrigued by the mysterious medal on my grandmother’s shelf, and I sought to uncover what this object is and why it deserved a place of prominence. As I grew up, I discovered that this was my great-grandfather’s Bronze Star medal, awarded in 1945 for his heroism and meritorious achievements during WWII, and an important symbol of my family’s immigration story. My great-grandfather, Manny Weinberg, was born in 1923 in Berlin, Germany, and fled to New York in 1939 as antisemitism and Nazi persecution increased. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he enlisted in the U.S. Army, hoping to fight the Nazis who persecuted him. A new military intelligence unit recruited him alongside other Jewish immigrants. They trained at the Military Intelligence Training Center at Camp Ritchie, Maryland, earning them the name “The Ritchie Boys.” My great-grandfather was in one of the first classes to graduate and deploy, landing on D-Day at Omaha Beach. As Jewish immigrants, the Ritchie Boys had the rare opportunity in which members of a community fleeing persecution returned to the place they fled and fought their oppressors. The medal symbolizes immigration to New York, wartime intelligence and how military service can reshape immigrant identity. My great-grandfather’s army service marked his turning point, deploying as a Jewish, German immigrant soldier, and returning to New York as a war hero, securing the right to consider himself a New Yorker and true American.

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The Infinite Spiral Cord Between Each Other: The Landline Phone

Despite the 3,000 mile distance between Ecuador and New York, my family managed to maintain connection through conversations over the landline phone. This particular phone is not something from my family. Instead, I bought it as a reminiscent artifact. Whether it was on the side table of my great-grandmother’s living room in Portoviejo or the travel agency in Kew Gardens where my mother would make international calls, the landline phone has been a significant part of my early life that I continue to honor and cherish. Its presence in our family was key in making sure we never forgot each other’s voices.

This means of communication began with my grandmother’s immigration to New York in the 1960s. My abuela Josefina came to New York decades ago and eventually brought her children, fostering the beginning of a new life for her family. However, the landline phone was not the main source of communication; the quality was poor and the price was expensive. This may have been especially difficult for Josefina, a new immigrant, as it could have been unreachable to make such calls without access to a landline phone at her place of residence. But with each occasional call, the long process ended. Josefina could finally hear the sounds of home.

Hearing the ring of the phone, I reflect on that same ring echoing through the past apartments of my grandmother, my aunts, and my parents as new residents of the bustling city. ¡Qué dulce!

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Salwar Kameez

A picture of me wearing a traditional Bengali lavender Salwar Kameez.

The object I chose is a lavender Bengali salwar kameez, detailed with soft pastel embroidery and paired with a light, flowing dupatta(scarf). I wore it for Eid-Ul-Fitr in 2026 in Queens, New York. At first glance, it is simply a traditional outfit, but to me, it carries a story shaped by memory, growth, and identity.Most of all, it brings nostalgia. The delicate patterns remind me of Eid mornings in Bangladesh when I used to get ready with my cousins, share laughter, and feel surrounded by family. Those moments feel distant now, yet this dress allows me to hold onto them.At the same time, wearing it in New York shows a different side of my identity. In a city where Muslim communities are visible and welcomed, I can celebrate Eid openly. It shows how different communities in Queens tend to have a positive attitude towards different religions. This balance between comfort and change defines my experience.What makes this outfit especially meaningful is that I bought it with my own money. As a child, I admired clothes like this but could not always afford them. Now, earning my own income reflects my transition into adulthood and independence. Although life in the United States is different, this salwar kameez keeps me connected to Bangladesh. It represents both who I was and who I am becoming, showing that identity can grow without being lost.

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I Don’t Need the Bat Anymore

Photo of my dad's cricket bat

When coming from Trinidad to New York City in early 2001, my dad brought along the most important tool needed to keep his passion alive: his cricket bat. This wooden bat has evolved throughout centuries, dating all the way back to the 17th century in England and it’s swung low to hit a ball. Growing up in a West Indian neighborhood in New York City, cricket was a common sport to me, and I believed it was a globally famous one, like basketball and soccer, that everyone in the world knew and played at least once. However, as I got older and started to become more familiar with New York City as a whole, I realized my childhood community, specifically my father, influenced this way of thinking. 2013 was the first time I held and was taught how to swing a cricket bat by my father. At that age I was shorter than the official bat itself and needed a smaller one, but nonetheless my dad started to pour all the culture of cricket from Trinidad into my mind and hands. This cricket bat, or really the sport of cricket as a whole, puts into focus the impact of Trinidadian immigration and its effect on the New York community, as cricket has become a much more popular sport with many professional leagues in our boroughs. Now, I can stand above the bat and swing just like he taught me to.

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The Greatest Fast-Food: Turkish Döner

Gyros, shawarmas, and al pastor tacos. Besides being delicious, what do they all have in common? They are all different variations of the same food: the Turkish döner kebab. The dish consists of seasoned meat in the form of beef/lamb mix or chicken, roasted on a vertical rotating spit device. Döner can be eaten as a sandwich or alongside rice. My parents both ate döners often as children when growing up in Turkey during the 80s and 90s, whether it was a cheap version from a shop off the streets, or a better quality and more expensive version in Turkish restaurants.

My Dad, pictured above in the year 1998 next to a döner device in a Turkish restaurant in Brooklyn, described döner as a “comfort food.” When they immigrated here in the late 1990s, döner became a bridge to Turkish culture for them despite being abroad. For me, growing up in NYC meant eating many different versions of döner: whether it was from an authentic Turkish restaurant in Astoria, a gyro from a Greek food cart, a Berlin-style döner with fresh vegetables and tasty sauces, or as a home-made Iskender kebab (a different Turkish dish with döner meat). All of these foods, while delicious to eat, provide a special connection to me through döner being a cross-cultural food, allowing me to connect my childhood and the döner I eat/ate here to what my parents ate in Turkey.

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NYC Postcard

Old postcard showing lower Manhattan, NYC

In terms of immigration or migration, I may be a citizen but that is only because of the stories that come from my parents before me. My mom immigrated from communist eastern Europe to the United States when she was just eighteen years old. She was born in 1970’s Hungary, during the cold war and occupation of several countries by the Soviet Union. Life during this time was far different from how it is now, with communism and socialism playing roles in my Mom’s life. In 1989 communist rule in eastern Europe collapsed with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the transition from communist rule to a democratic system in Hungary. Two years later was when she first came to the United States all by herself. My mom was raised in a smaller town, so she was always amazed by the big American cities that were on TV, especially New York. More importantly, she also had a postcard displaying the big buildings in Manhattan. It served as another form of seeing what other parts of the world look like, and what her life could be or look like as well. That postcard she had was something that really helped to give that ambition to change her life trajectory by doing what not many can muster the confidence for in immigrating to NYC alone, and is a big part of why our family is here today.

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Refuge to Service

This Army Commendation Medal was awarded to my grandfather, Captain Murray Kohn, for his exceptional service as a dental officer at Fort Benning, Georgia, from 1970 to 1972. Born in the Bronx in 1943, Murray was the son of Jewish immigrants who had escaped the rising tide of antisemitism in Austria and Poland just years before his birth. His father, David, fled Austria in 1939, while his mother, Shirley, arrived at Ellis Island in 1926. Growing up in Washington Heights, Murray’s path to American identity was defined by education and service. During the Vietnam War, he entered the military through the “Berry Plan” as an obligatory volunteer, ensuring the health and readiness of soldiers heading to and returning from the front lines. This medal represents more than just military merit; it symbolizes the full circle of his family’s migration story. For a family that had fled state-sponsored persecution in Europe, Murray’s service as a commissioned officer and his receipt of this honor marked a profound transition from being outsiders seeking refuge to being integral protectors of the American nation. As the only dentist in his cohort to receive the medal, it stands as a testament to the “steady hands” and exactitude he inherited from a lineage of survivors. Today, this object serves as a bridge between his parents’ struggle to reach America and the civic legacy he built for our family.

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The Megillah

The Megillah

This Megillah was a constant companion in my family’s journey across multiple countries, keeping them connected to their roots. A Megillah is a Hebrew scroll read every year on the holiday of Purim. This Megillah was made in the city of Tetouan, Morocco, where my family lived until the mid-20th century. In the 1950s, after Morocco’s independence, the Megillah took on a more meaningful role in my family. Tension rose between the Muslim and Jewish communities in Morocco. Families started to leave behind the only lives they knew in order to escape the pressure. My family moved to Israel, where they could freely practice their religion. Due to economic difficulties, my family migrated to New York City in 1982, their final destination. Despite various moves, the Megillah has remained a constant pillar and has become a symbol of their identity. Today, our family’s Megillah is read annually in my local synagogue on the holiday of Purim, a community tradition. This object represents the immigrant experience in America by blending personal experiences and community. NYC is a city built by generations of immigrants who have each brought their own unique culture. The Megillah is an example of how culture and tradition can be maintained while still being part of a broader American identity.

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The Passover Spoon

From Silk Road trading tables to my family’s Passover seder in Queens, this gold-plated “Passover spoon” has carried nearly two centuries of movement across continents, holding a significance far greater than the meals it serves. Each year at our Passover seder, we share a bite of my grandmother’s Plov from this spoon, preserved since 1828. As a child, I was fascinated and repelled by how many mouths the spoon had touched, but now I see it as a witness to migration, trade, faith, and continuity. Family oral history suggests the spoon was acquired through trade, reflecting generations of interactions and shared meals among Muslims and Jews in Central Asia. My father’s side of the family are Bukharian (Mizrahi) Jews with roots in Iran, Afghanistan, and Syria, who worked as merchants along the Silk Road before settling in Tajikistan. They lived under Russian and Soviet rule until my father immigrated to New York in 1992. Earlier periods reflected coexistence and shared commerce between Muslims and Jews, but rising antisemitism and restrictive Soviet policies led to major waves of Jewish emigration in the 1970s and early 1990s. Religious holidays, meals, and language unify my family. We speak Russian, Bukharian (a dialect of Farsi), and English. This spoon brings these elements together in a single ritual. In Queens, one of the most ethnically diverse places in the world, our Passover table reflects the cultural coexistence that shaped my ancestors’ lives along the Silk Road.

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A sound carrier: My uncle’s talking drum

On a shelf in my uncle’s reading room sits a small talking drum. You can easily recognize it by its wooden frame, which is surrounded by leather strings and fitted with two leather faces. The drum only ever leaves the shelf when someone asks about it, and when it does, it always ends up in my uncle’s hands. He is very fond of it and his arms tend to fold around it like wings closing over a nest.

Traditionally, the drum is used during celebrations and coronations for kings because it has the ability to mimic the tone of a person’s voice. However, in my family, it takes on a different role. When it comes out, we gather around whoever is playing and take turns trying to guess what the drum is saying. When it reaches my uncle, the drum settles into a playful rhythm that makes people want to dance. Its crisp, tight sound is what first attracted my uncle to it. That sound was harder for him to find after he moved to the United States in the 2000s, which prompted him to get a talking drum of his own. The sound of the drum celebrates my family’s life in the U.S, but like a heartbeat, it is also a reminder of home. We carry the sounds of home with us, and the talking drum is my family’s way of sharing that sound.

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Double-headed Eagle

A single piece of jewelry bears the weight of identity, family sacrifice, and cultural survival across generations. My pendant is a small gold necklace featuring a gold double-headed eagle. Two heads are facing outward on a single body, mirroring the Albanian flag. As a first-generation Albanian-American, I did not grasp its significance until my mother gave it to me during my sophomore year of high school, a time when I was searching for who I was and where I came from. The two heads represent the unity of Albania’s two groups, the Gheg and the Tosk, and the nation’s position between the East and West. Under communism, the government forbade citizens from expressing national identity, yet the eagle was worn close to the heart, because identity cannot be legislated away.

My own parents were among the Albanians who left after communism fell. My father served in the military before boarding a boat to New York, where he rebuilt his life working in factories and pizza shops. My mother followed family members by plane, carrying Albania with her while forging something new in America. Together they labored to provide for my siblings and I. This necklace ties me to a country I did not experience firsthand, while enabling me to carry Albania’s history and my family’s story into my own American life. I now use this as a reminder to keep on working hard (just like my parents did) at the things that I want in life.

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A recipe through time

Ever since I was young, the holiday season meant baking desserts and sweet treats with my family. About 10 years ago, in 2016, my mother shared our family amoniaczki recipe with me and passed down the tradition of baking these cookies together. Made with ammonia powder, these cookies are crisp and airy. Also, when baking the cookie, a layer of brown sugar is baked on top which adds the sweetness to the cookies. For years, I thought this recipe was my mothers, until I learned it came from my great grandmother. She originally wrote it by hand in her recipe book with traditional Polish desserts and taught it to my grandmother, who then passed it to my mother when she was growing up in Poland. When my mother immigrated to New York in 2004, she brought this recipe book with the amoniaczki recipe to the United States. She used this recipe as a way to stay connected to her home and preserve her culture while raising her family, especially through her two daughters. Now, baking amoniaczki has been a tradition I continue, especially for Easter and Christmas. I also get to see my sister teach the recipe to my niece and continue to pass down the family tradition. I have seen this recipe for so many years, but now I realize what once seemed like a simple recipe has come to mean much more. It represents history and tradition passed down through generations of women in my family.

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Persian Kabab

Kabab is a Persian dish eaten in Persian households and restaurants, as well as at family gatherings and celebrations. It has been a central Persian dish for almost 2,000 years, made with ground beef, grated onions, and turmeric placed on skewers and grilled. The dish is commonly accompanied with basmati rice and sumac and a grilled tomato. Kabab is unique as its preparation is communal; in family barbecues, we each work together to get the ground meat, onions, and spices ready, to put beef on the skewers, and to grill. Making cultural dishes is one of the central ways that my family and other Persian immigrant families keep our cultures and traditions alive in our new homes. For American immigrants as a whole, making traditional foods is one of the key ways of maintaining a tangible hold on our cultures and heritages, even when we are not in our homelands. Persian immigration to the United States has dramatically increased following regime change in Iran, with my parents leaving Iran in the late 1980s, and these cultural traditions and dishes always remind us of our family members still in Iran and all we had left behind. Our hearts are in Iran and the war brings pain and sadness to us constantly. We hope that the people of Iran will soon live in freedom and that the people of Iran will continue to flourish as they have for millennia.

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More than a Scarf

“Come on, Baba. We’re almost late for the prayer at the masjid,” I exclaim.
He responded: “Give me a second. I’m going to get our ajraks.”
My father has always taken great pride in our culture as Pakistani-Americans living in what he called the greatest city of the world. Regardless if we have to run to the mosque to attend the Eid prayer on time, Baba emphasized the importance of carrying the ajrak with us whenever we go. The ajrak is a cultural scarf embroidered with all sorts of geometric and kaleidoscopic images. Yet to my dad, it was more than a mere piece of clothing worn around the neck. It was one of the only tangible links in his possession that connected him to his village in Sindh, Pakistan which was over 7,000 miles away.
His passion eventually became my own as I started wearing the ajrak for my high school’s cultural events and festivities. I was proud to display the culture that my parents carried with them from Pakistan and wanted to share it with others, telling them of the ajrak’s history and its familial significance. It was small moments like these that reaffirmed to me why my father dedicated himself to preserving his culture abroad. No matter where I am in the world, as long as I have the ajrak, I will always have a piece of my home with me.

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Psalms and Self-expression: The Bukharian Jewish Journey

This Book of Psalms was gifted to me by my parents in August of 2018. They were drawn to this contemporary version of the ancient text because it includes different paintings from Jewish artists to match the tone of each Psalm. The Book of Psalms, which Jewish tradition attributes to King David, has been an integral part of Jewish culture for three thousand years. The 150 poems that compose the Psalms reflect diverse themes, such as faith, hardship, and determination. My family is Bukharian Jewish: Jews from Central Asian countries like Uzbekistan. The Book of Psalms has shaped my family’s journey to New York as they escaped the Soviet Union in 1991 and found comfort in the Psalms’ humanity. Chapter 23 of Psalms, which is recited every Sabbath, resonates particularly with Bukharian Jews who immigrated to New York because it contains themes of uncertainty, self-confidence, and belief in God’s protection amid hardship. My object reflects the immigration journeys of Bukharian Jews, who have achieved success despite facing challenges, while maintaining their heritage. To many Bukharian Jews, achieving their dreams and having the freedom for self-expression is the epitome of the American identity. Just as my Book of Psalms contains different pieces of art, Bukharian Jews allowed their creativity to shape their individual paths after immigrating to New York, each embodying their own version of what it means to be an American.

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Chai Strainer

This kitchen utensil is used to strain chai, catching tea leaves and spices to produce a smooth drink.

From a small village in India to our home in New York, my family’s chai making tradition tells a story of heritage, migration, and cultural influence. This drink originated in India, where it was consumed for thousands of years as a spiced tea known as “Masala Chai.” Blending traditional black tea with spices such as cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves, mixed with milk and a sweetener. It became widely popular during British colonial rule when tea production expanded, and Indians adapted it with their own flavors. Later, it became popular in the United States as “Chai Tea”, translating to “Tea Tea”.
In my household, my parents and grandparents make chai at all times of the day. It’s their comfort drink, made for one another with care and for guests who enter their home. Representing hospitality and togetherness. When my grandparents emigrated from Kerala, India, in 1976, they brought with them several sets of strainers from their local appliance store. They firmly believe these are the best strainers and we can’t use any other type. After moving to New York, my family continues to make chai the same way, preserving every detail of the tradition without changing a single thing. My family’s chai, which started as a meaningful tradition, grew into something widely appreciated today in the United States. This illustrates how immigration continuously enriches and reshapes American identity.

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