Toni Rae

Toni Rae, a student in Northampton, talks about what it takes to come back to school as an older adult.  

Kheng

Kheng, 35 at the time of this interview, was born in Cambodia to Chinese parents.  She is studying for her GED at The Literacy Project’s Pioneer Valley Adult Education Center in Northampton.  She recently became a United States citizen.

I’m from Cambodia, in Southeast Asia. And I have been here about seven years…and I have been living in Florence since I got here in 1998.  I was 29 years old.  My husband started living in the United States.  He’s a carpenter.  And that’s why I’m here.  And we have two children.  My son, he’s six years old, and my daughter is four years old.

“I have to learn every single thing. Everything is new – the culture, a different language, about the society.”

It’s pretty…pretty hard.  You start – like every single thing, I have to learn every single thing. Everything is new – the culture, a different language, about the society.  The way we live was a lot different.  Overseas, it’s hot in summer.  Over here it got really cold.  And the language has been really difficult for me.  Here, they use a lot of body language.  In Cambodia, they like to talk straight.  A different culture.  Studying the social studies, it really helping me, about the culture in the United States different from where I come from.  So that’s helping me to figure out.

“The language has been really difficult for me.”

I took Cambodian for eight years, and four years Chinese. I spoke two languages, Chinese and Cambodian.  But now, after I have children, I speak English and Chinese.  We speak Ju-Jao [a Chinese dialect].  I was born in Cambodia, but I’m Chinese.  My parents, they were born in China, and so they have many, many different dialects.  Some, they speak Ju-Jao, some who are speaking Cantonese, some who are speaking Mandarin. 

I grow up in Chinese town, people speak Chinese, and also Chinese is – I love it. I’m still hoping that someday I can afford to have my children to go to Chinese class, Chinese school.  I miss my home town.  Some day I like to have a different society.  You can sit around and talk. I feel like Cambodia, I have more friends.  In Florence I live in a house, I do have neighbors, but everyone – they’re busy, morning out and night in.  And also they don’t have young children.  It’s so busy, you don’t have much time to talk.

“The first couple years I was lonely. ...Everyone - they’re busy, morning out and night in.”

The first couple years [I was lonely].  After I have children, it’s not lonely anymore. No time to be lonely.  Yes, [this area] is home.  I have two children here, that makes it home.  I think they have more better living than in Cambodia, like jobs.  Here, they have better school system, if you want to go to college.

[Schools in Cambodia are] a lot different from here.  [Here], it’s much easier because students, we got a lots of books, lots of materials, we have computers.  In Cambodia, we didn’t have things like that.  We didn’t have copy machine.  Much easier.  Over there, everything all by hand.  Now there are some copy machine, but not in school.  You had to go outside.

[When I was in school in Cambodia], at that time, they didn’t have high schools, have the civil war.  For a long time.  The Chinese school was opened in 1990.  It was closed for a little while because, after the Khmer Rouge, it closed, and for a little while it still closed.  It was illegal to take a Chinese class.  If you want to attend a higher class, you got to pay certain money for that.   I had my brother.  He finished all his school.  He’s an English teacher in Cambodia.  The whole family was happy that he finished that.

“When I was in school in Cambodia, they didn’t have high schools... It was illegal to take a Chinese class.”

I want to become a citizen, every time I call my family, the first question they ask me, ‘do you become a citizen?’  It is very important, if you want to go to your country, come back to your country, you need that…if something happens and you visit your country…not just to Cambodia, but you can go to any country and come back…

“Every time I call my family, the first question they ask me, “Do you become a citizen?””

I just got my citizen…I just – a few days ago.  I had a history book, I got from the library…I had to apply for – it took so long…it’s very hard. Every time you go to Boston to renew the green card…   Sometime you wait on the line, three hour by the time you get there, they say, this thing not right, you got the wrong information, you got to go home, you got to come next year….

[When I took the citizenship test in Boston], it was really, really cold, and we then we got into the –it was SO big – we got inside of the…JFK building…oh my goodness…some ladies, they have to open up the inside of their sock!…but me I have two children with me, they say, ‘Ma’am you’re all set’…I got inside…I have no problem with the history, but he ask me something about the terror, after 9/11…I still [don’t] understand what he asked me, I was nervous…then he said you go out and wait for me, and let me decide if you be citizen…he gave me a green sheet, asked me to read, asked me to write, you know testing writing and reading skill, then after how long, he told me you coming, what the place…Faneuil Hall…and he told me to go there another hour, you…become a citizen…did I pass the test? Yeah, you did. If I didn’t ask them, they wouldn’t tell me…I had to remember that, to ask them.  I got to know, make sure I don’t have to wait one or two more weeks. My husband, they didn’t tell…after he passed the test or not, they say just go home, we will send more information to you. And then, in a letter, they sent to him…

[To take the oath] it’s much easier, it’s much easier, they don’t care about when you came, you just show up, stand on the line, they open the door, you just go inside, “No cell phone in the building!”…so I spend about three hours in the building…it’s many, many people…the first time they call their name – different nationalities…they call the line, the first line, the first row …a very, an old history building…  And I become a citizen. My husband so proud of me. He’s so happy.  Oh, it was so happy…we went and bought some Asian food, you know they have a lot of Chinese food there…

“The reason I get my GED…so I could help the children to learn, and do their homework.”

The reason I get my GED…so I could help the children to learn, and do their homework…I feel like just the school teacher is not enough…my son is starting to read…it’s good to start early…my daughter knows all her alphabet, I’m so proud of her…she’s only four years old, and she knows the alphabet.

I’m coming in this class, a little bit over a year, last January.  Three mornings a week I come here, and I meet with my tutor as well… for two hours, yes, and then also I work in the nursing home.  I’m a nurse aid.  It’s a hard work. Really busy…you see a lot of people, deal with a lot of residents’ families, talk with them, you have the chance to learn more English…I work 24 hours a week, 3 –11…and then my son get up at 6:00!  It’s a hard work, but it’s good work.

“My son is starting to read... it’s good to start early.”

I don’t think I could go to college right away… I think it’s good to go to college, but the financial part, I can’t work if I go to college…I still plan to go to college, some day…in four or five year maybe, when my children are doing better in school…It would be wonderful…maybe take one class…I think it’s good to think about it…

“I still plan to go to college, some day... It would be wonderful!”

John

John, 44 at the time of this interview, attended The Literacy Project’s Pioneer Valley Adult Education Center in Northampton. Here, he reflects on having a family and coming back to school after many years of “living on the street.”

I don’t remember too much about kindergarten or first grade, you know.  It was hard for me.  I didn’t comprehend like every other student in the class.  People can write down faster than I could.  Do the math better than I could.  And we have a spelling test.  The teachers throw it out, instead of handing it back to me.  I think that was in the third grade. 

“ I didn’t comprehend like every other student in the class.”

They found out I had a learning disability.  They asked for a psychiatrist to see what level you’re at.  You have to look at eight blocks.  They’d give you little colored blocks, red and white.  You had to make certain patterns of them.  I could make a couple of patterns.  But the other patterns were hard.  Then you have to connect the dots.  Or you had to write a little story.  I hadn’t learned any spelling, and my writing wasn’t good, and I couldn’t comprehend anything else.  And I had a speech problem.  I couldn’t say the letter ‘l.’ And I would talk too fast. 

It was rough, you know.   People picked on you because you got a speech problem, stuttering problem, learning problem.  People picked on you because you were like – like an outsider.  So that’s why I grew up fighting a lot.  That’s why I’ve shied off from people.  You could say I was a loner. 

“People picked on you because you got a speech problem, stuttering problem, learning problem. ”

I think I completed tenth grade.  My parents asked me if I wanted to continue going to school.  I said, “I’m quitting.”  You’re around the streets, hanging out all hours of the night.  Causing chaos.  Looking for trouble.  That was my education.  Street education. 

After I left [school], we went to try to make a better life.  My father decided we would go to Puerto Rico, this is the way to get a better life.  But we got over there – it was chaos.  My father was an alcoholic.  Instead of staying to find a job, he hit the bottle.  [When] I was growing up, he was drinking on the weekends.  But then he got ill, he got sick, and so he started drinking more.  

“I was about 15 or 16, and I started hitting the streets. ”

When I come back from Puerto Rico, I was about 15 or 16, and I started hitting the streets.  And that’s where I lived for about 25 years.  In and out, going here, working here, not keeping a job, not having a good education, no diploma.  You just get the job you can get, you know, like cutting grass, raking leaves, cleaning stuff.  That’s the only kind of job I could get. 

“In and out, going here, working there, not keeping a job, not having a god education, no diploma. ”

I met this woman, I thought maybe I can settle down.  She was about seventeen, I was about nineteen.  We had a daughter together.  Then a year later we have another daughter.  And instead of settling down, I was on the streets, back on the streets again.  I couldn’t get a job, so I started selling drugs.  To keep the family going.  Then she wouldn’t have me.  She wanted to be free.  So she dropped off my daughter at my mother’s, gave my mother custody.  Put the other one in the foster home.  I couldn’t supply for my daughter what I can’t supply for myself.  So I gave her up, too, to foster care. 

At the time, I didn’t know if I was a good father or a bad father.  I was too much on alcohol and drugs.  I didn’t know whether I was coming or going.  So the best for me there – I put the girls in homes and pray that they could get involved and they could get what I couldn’t get from my parents.  What my parents couldn’t give to me, I couldn’t give to my daughters.  Only thing I could give to my daughters was to learn how to run the streets. And I didn’t want them to end up like I was.  So I decided to put them in a foster home, so that way they could get adopted to some decent parents. 

“What my parents couldn’t give to me, I couldn’t give to my daughters. ”

I got myself in the run with the law.  I got picked up for a controlled substance.  Cocaine.  I did 100 hours community service.  Get up every morning, every Saturday morning for like three or four hours.  Clean the streets, pick up the garbage on the sidewalks, down in the park.  See you on the back of the dump trunk, everybody in town see you. 

“Only thing I could give to my daughters was to learn how to run the streets. And I didn’t want them to end up like I was.”

I moved up here from New York State.  My brother got married, so he decided to move the family up here.  So I moved up here a year later.  I lived in Northampton Lodges for about eight months.  Then I moved in with my sister’s ex and his son.  And he was coming here, too, at The Literacy Project.  And we were talking about it, “You know, maybe you could go to school.”  And, “Let me think about it.”  Because I didn’t know anybody.  So I decided.  I made an appointment.  I went in there, took the intake.  To see how my reading level was.  And when I went in there, it was not so hot.  So I came to the morning class.  I’ve been there…it’s almost about five years.

“Trying to learn the math, reading. It was hard for me. For a guy who had no reading, no skills, just street wise. It was rough.”

The first few years, it was rocky for me.  After so many years on the streets, and then coming in the door, not knowing anything.  You come off the streets, from New York, to try to live in a new area, new town, you don’t know anybody… Trying to learn the math, reading.  It was hard for me.  For a guy who had no reading, no skills, just street wise.  And then staying here, coming to school every day, it was rough. 

What I know now, it’s a miracle.  It’s amazing.  Six years sober.  I’m still here.  I’m trying to get my GED.  I got a lot of work to do, still a lot of work.  Still have a lot of work on math.  So next practice test, I want to try for my reading and writing, see how far I came on that one.  I made a lot of progress. 

[I‘d like to] work with other people.  A counselor or something.  Because I been through a lot.  Someone who’s going through it now, like I went through – maybe help them out before it’s too late.  Because all my siblings, we all was like that.  But everybody decided to get straightened out.  My brother, my sister…  We’re all doing okay today, by the grace of God. 

“What I know now, it’s a miracle. It’s amazing. Six years sober. I’m still here. I’m trying to get my GED.”

I got married.  This is the first time I got married in my life.  I got married.  My wife [and I,] we both go to school together.  We both want to get our GEDs.  Try to be better parents.  She’s been through a lot, too.  She was from the same town I’m from.  She came looking for me. 

[Our son,] he’s a beautiful kid.  Beautiful kid.  I love the guy.  A little wise, but he’s smart.  He’s smart.  He loves school.  He loves doing more work.  He loves it.  I wish I knew when I was six years old what he knows today. 

[I’m] trying to be a husband and a father at the same time.  In the beginning, it was rough.  Because you know, nobody teaches you how to be a parent, how to be a father.  But you know what? It was okay.  It is okay today.  I can say we love each other.  I can be a husband, a father, a friend, an uncle, a brother, today. 

Ralph

Ralph, 41 at the time of this interview, was a student at The Literacy Project’s Pioneer Valley Adult Education Center in Northampton.  Raised in Florence, MA, he now lives in South Hadley with his wife.  His goal is to get his GED and graduate from cooking school, before he turns 50. 

I was an out-of-control kid.  I got into fights.  Because the kids would call me stupid and I’d fight them after school.  They sent me to a private school, and the teachers treated you like they’re all mighty and you’re down at the bottom of the ladder.  And I didn’t like that too much.  I got in fights with the teachers.  I was taken out of school at 13 years old [by my parents].  Never forced to go back into school.  Nothing. 

I got a job at a recycling plant, because of my size.  I was 295 pounds at 13.  So they thought I was older.  Do you know any other 13-year-old kid who has a job making $450 a week?  What 13-year-old kid needs $450?  He’s happy if he gets $10.  Or $5.  If I could reverse time and go back and be 13 again, I would stay in the school.  I would never take myself out.  I didn’t understand why [they] took me out.  

“If I could reverse time and go back and be 13 again, I would stay in school.”

My mother worked in a nursing home for nineteen, twenty years.  My father worked in National Felt in Easthampton.  He was the first one in when the door opened.  He worked there for thirty-five, forty years.  And I’d like to get in that number.  My brother-in-law is my hero.  He’s been at Hamilton Papers in Holyoke for going on almost thirty years.  And he was sixteen, seventeen when he went in.  I want to be one of them people.  Proud to say I’ve had a job for twenty years, forty years.  I don’t want to be known as a ball, bouncing job to job. 

“I lost a lot of jobs because I couldn’t read right.”

I’ve had all my life people calling me stupid because I didn’t know how to read.  People calling me all different names because of my size.  I’m 365 pounds.  I’m a big guy.  I lost a lot of jobs because I couldn’t read right, or I wasn’t fast enough.  I had a couple of bosses call me slow.  I had a job let me go ‘cause I moved too slow.  I just want somebody who’s going to come in and say, “You move slow.  That’s all right.  If you move too fast, you could break things.”  And when somebody says you move too slow, it makes me cry, one.  I don’t care if anybody knows about that.  And it makes me feel like I’m less than human.  I’m a human being.  I got feelings. 

I don’t like people talking down to me.  It gets me mad.  Because before you got the job of an employer, you were the employee.  You were in the same boat that I was.  They talk down like you don’t have any smarts.  Maybe I don’t have any smarts.  But I do know how to talk to people and get my word across without talking down to them.

“I don’t like people talking down to me. ... Because before you got the job of an employer, you were an employee. You were in the same boat that I was.”

I’m not slow.  I have a disorder of reading and math.  Last week I helped my brother-in-law.  His water pump broke on his truck.  I never put a water pump in a truck, but I took over.  Seven o’clock in the morning, I had the water pump out and the new one in at quarter to eight.  Without reading the instructions.  I don’t have to read the instructions.  I look at the paper, look at the design, and I put it all together.  He kept on thanking me because, one, I did the work, and, two, there was no leakage.  I was so proud.  But I don’t want to go through that anymore.  I don’t mind doing stuff, but I want to know how to read. 

“I’m not slow. I have a disorder of reading and math. ”

I’ve been doing cleaning cars without reading for almost 29 years.  The correct word is a professional detailer.  I buff, wax, shampoo the whole car, make a dirty car look like it just came off the showroom.  You got to know what kind of chemicals to use on a motor.  You got to know what kind of chemicals to use on everything.  29 years, I’ve never had no complaints, thank God.  But I second guess myself when I’m using chemicals.  That’s what slows me down. 

I finally told my wife after nine years that I have a reading disorder.  She said, “Well, I’ll just help you out the best I can.”  My wife is a very nice person.  I’m not saying that because she’s married to me.  She used to write the [job] applications out.  But [now] I write the applications out, but I have her make sure I have spelt the word right.  So she’s like my teacher, too.  Having someone in my life, and having teachers understand me, is making it a lot easier to admit it.  I admit it to people I talk to who don’t have anything to do with the classroom here. 

“I finally told my wife after nine years that I have a reading disorder.”

[My wife] gets mad at me when I say I’m stupid.  I get really upset when I can’t figure something out and just come out and say, “I’m stupid.”  And man, that’s a mistake saying that around my wife.  Because she knows I’m not.  Streetwise, I’m a very smart guy.  I can recognize a bologna artist.  I’ve been around them a lot, and sometimes I have to be one.  When I lived on the street for two years when I was sixteen, I had to realize who was telling the truth.   The way you tell is the way I’m looking at you, I’m looking you right at the eyes.  If somebody’s lying to you, they’ll just look all over the place.  Well, I’m not a liar.  I’ll tell you honestly that I love coming to this program. 

“Having someone in my life, and having teachers understand me, is making it a lot easier to admit it.”

I felt uncomfortable coming in the door, but after sitting down and talking to Lynne [Paju, Site Director], my teacher, I didn’t feel uncomfortable anymore.  I felt at ease. The teachers are here to help you.  They make you feel comfortable.  I told Lynne one time, ‘I feel stupid.’  She said, “No, you’re not stupid.  You have a reading disorder, and we’re here to help you.”  When you come through that front door, the teacher and you are on the same level. 

“I felt uncomfortable coming in the door, but after sitting down and talking to ... my teacher, I didn’t feel uncomfortable anymore. I felt at ease.”

My wife has seen the progress of reading since I’ve been here.  It got better.  I read newspapers with my wife, and I try to read books.  These people make it so relaxed.  I got to come in to a relaxed area.  [Learning is coming] a lot easier.  Finding these classes… I’m not the loner.  There’s other people with the same problems.  It makes me feel a lot easier.  And we get along and joke.  But when it comes to working on a problem or writing something, there’s no joking about it.  It’s all serious.  After, we joke about it.  Joking…reading…joking.

“When you come through that front door, the teacher and you are on the same level. ”

That’s a homemade tattoo.  That’s my jail reminder.  I spent almost four years in jail up in Northampton House of Correction.  When you go to jail, the first thing you hear is: Slam.  Click.  That’s the prison door shutting behind you.  You hear that 7 days a week, 365 days a year.  Anytime I feel that I can get upset at someone and will end up getting into a fight, I hear that.  And it calms you right now.  I’ve been out of trouble since ’86.  It’s 2005.  That’s a long time. 

“I got a grandson, two and a half months old, yesterday. He’s going to come up and say, “Grandpa, read me this story.””

I don’t miss the rowdiness.  I’m married.  I’m old.  Rowdiness is gone.  I fish a lot.  And my number one partner in my fishing is my wife.  Took me two years to teach her how to cast a line.  And she’s actually a little bit better than I am.  When I go fishing I don’t think about schooling, I don’t think about my family, I think about my wife and me having a good time.  That’s our escape.  We seen deer, foxes, bears, moose, everything up the Quabbin.  It’s God’s country.

I got a grandson, two and a half months old, yesterday.  He’s going to come up and say, “Grandpa, read me this story.”  I want to read the story to him.  It’s going to be great to sit in a rocker and just read him the story and rock. 

“It’s going to be great to sit in a rocker and just read him the story and rock.”