The Namesake

I went to see "The Namesake" last night. I'm a huge fan of Jhumpa Lahiri's writing and had read the book so I started crying before it even became sad because I knew what was coming and I kept on crying for most of the movie. There is tragedy, but it is also hopeful. Being a child of immigrants, I know how difficult it is to understand parents that seem so different from the world you grow up in. As their child, you don't usually think about what they must have gone through moving to a new country and being far away from everything that is familiar to them. That struggle often happens when you are too young to remember, or before you were born. In my case, I was still in the Philippines with my grandparents when my parents moved to New York City to intern at hospitals there. I felt a visceral connection to the story Jhumpa Lahiri tells, which is why I was really sobbing as I watched. The same thing happened when I first went to see "The Joy Luck Club." I couldn't help crying because I saw a part of my own experience on screen and it touched me. Thank you Jhumpa Lahiri for writing such a beautiful story and thank you Mira Nair for putting it on screen!