Before you criticize a foreigner for taking our jobs, imagine the ones they left behind and ask yourself if you would do the same.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about who travels. Everybody goes someplace at some time in their lives. It doesn’t have to be far. People come to Martha’s Vineyard from places as near as Rhode Island, Connecticut, Boston. Where you go doesn’t matter, at least nominally. It’s still all under the heading “travel”.
They also come to the island from many corners of the globe. I’ve heard wanderers speaking French, German, Dutch, Polish, Bulgarian, and a smattering of English accents here and there. But for the most part it seems that the majority of the foreigners are coming from the Balkan Peninsula. Truly, this is the last thing anyone coming to Martha’s Vineyard for the first time would expect.
Bulgarians, Romanians, Macedonians. An islander told me that the population of the Vineyard in the winter is around 15,000 and during the summer that figure swells to around 100,000. A Bulgarian told me that there are no Bulgarians in Bulgaria–they’re all on Martha’s Vineyard. I’m no demographer, but in my rental the “natives” are outnumbered 3 to 1 by Balkans. You do the math.
But for what it’s worth, they are some of the most sincere people I’ve ever met. I’ve never known anyone else to continue to flood the bathroom with such gumption after being told not to on a daily basis; to wash the dishes, although with a smirk and a reservation that this is “woman’s work”; to open the bathroom door, consistently, on helpless toilet-goers. They leave any and every light on. They burn popcorn, potatoes, water and generally mix and match the contents of the trash and recycling bins. They are unapologetically from another world and have no desire to enter this one. But earn some money the red-blooded American way? Yes, this is okay with them.
Of my housemates, the fortunate ones have three jobs and work seventeen hours per day. Their day off is Sunday, when they only work eight hours. The unfortunate ones have two jobs, or one, and wish they could have three like their compatriots. They’ve all come to Martha’s Vineyard to make money until the season is over. Just under four months’ pay–if they can manage to save enough between rent, food, and Bulgarian night at the Island Bar–will bring them back a year’s salary in Bulgarian lev.
It’s difficult not to feel for them. During our first week together, while the English speaking part of the house would go out every night, eat too much, drink even more than that, and generally frighten everyone around us, our Bulgarian friends were eating raw hot dogs and ketchup once a day. Even still, their eyes were full of hope. Dollar signs, actually; the knowledge that soon they would be rolling in the greenbacks, eating a king’s feast, and throwing an (in)famous Bulgarian party. These days, if we see them at all it’s around midnight, their eyes heavy, right before they cash in for the night.
Sunday nights are usually a vocabulary swap meet. A litany of swear words, “shut up”: the usual suspects when it comes to informal language learning. Some needlessly harangue David Cameron and praise Obama. Others tell us about how corrupt Bulgarian politics are and how most people wantonly spend money on frivolous things instead of saving for the future. One more, a bouncer downtown, drifts in after a long day and dolefully complains about drunken tourists berating him while at work for “stealing our jobs.” A fairly comfortable thing to say in these parts. Consider the jobs he left behind and ask yourself if you would do the same. Go further: imagine how lucky he is just to be able to drown himself in credit so he can buy a plane ticket over here and work like a dog, compared to the ones who can’t even do that. Lots of people don’t travel. Not to Martha’s Vineyard, not to Bulgaria. Our English roommate had traveled to Budapest–only three and a half hours from Sofia–a city the Bulgarians had never been to. Most people in this world live like that.
Someone asks a Bulgarian what he will do with the money he makes this summer when he returns home in October. “I will buy a nice car.” Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.
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