The Move :: Personal Narrative Moving Essays

The Move Summer of 2000, my parents decided we should move to California. From Georgia to California, East Coast to West Coast. I do not think my mom really wanted to move. It was my Daji’s (Dad’s eldest brother) fault. He and his son bought a motel in Morro Bay, California. Daji wanted my dad to help him run it(the motel). So in order for that to happen, we would all have to move. My mom was not coming with my dad, sister and me, just yet. We still had our house and my mom still had her job. We needed the income. We were going to drive to California in our white Nissan Previa. As we traveled through the southern states, my mom got news from Zambia, where her family lives, saying that my grandfather had a heart attack. So now my mom was not going to be coming to California when she was suppose to. I was going to be mom-less for longer than I was willing to be. I cried and cried (in despair). I know my dad felt bad(horrible about what he was doing) but he could not tell his older brother no. All those dumb respect rules. In our culture, that is the Indian culture, we must respect our elders, even if that means doing things we do not want to do, but(I believe) sometimes you can say no. We drove the rest of the way to California. We stayed at the motel, the one my Daji bought. It had an apartment attached to it. The apartment had two bedrooms, a kitchen, living room, dining room, and a full bath. My sister and I shared one of the rooms, my cousin and his wife had the other room, my dad slept in the living room and my aunt and uncle slept in one of the motel rooms. We hated it. Back home we had our own rooms, our own space. My sister and I were not very close at this time, so it was difficult to share and talk about what was happening. We did not like it(the idea of moving) mostly because we were away from our friends, our world and most importantly our mom. (when we got to California we had to be enrolled in school. So we went to the closest school My dad took us to the school, which was thirty minutes away from where we lived, in a completely different town.