Tang Cheng, a 27-year-old Fujianese, left his hometown, Fuzhou, a southeast province in China, in November of 2007 and started a two-month difficult journey through five continents. Early this year, he arrived in the United States. As he reflected on his experience smuggling into the country, he expressed much regrets. Cheng was an owner of a convenience store back in his province in Fuzhou. In his hometown, all the pretty girls got married in the United States and all the strong young men left for the United States to find work. Leaving for the United States was the norm, so he was convinced to leave Fuzhou as well.
Through his relatives, Cheng contacted a “snakehead” and decided to pay $75,000 for the smuggling. His destination was New York Chinatown. He was going to start paying after he landed there.
On November 12, 2007, Cheng went to Shenzhen, where the snakehead provided Cheng with a visa to travel from Hong Kong to Paris. A snakehead took Chang from Paris to Africa, where Cheng flew to Cuba to get a visa. He then flew back to France and then to Colombia. He flew to Africa next. The following day, he flew to Guatemala. When he entered Guatemala, he used a fake Taiwanese passport, because Taiwan had a diplomatic relationship with Guatemala. It was until he arrived at Guatemala that his smuggling trip really started.
After customs in Guatemala, a snakehead took Cheng away. He lived in a local home for two days. On the third day at 4 a.m., he and another Chinese got onto a bus and hid in the bathroom the entire time. Afterward, they had to hike over a mountain for four hours. The next day, they got onto a bus and hid in the engine box. Fearing that they would die from the heat, they pounded the vehicle and left. The next night, once the weather was cooler, they tried again and hid in the engine box of a bus. They hid there for five hours. Afterward, they took the box to Mexico. When they arrived in Mexico, Cheng, along with two other Chinese smugglers and Mexican smugglers, sat in a safe of a large truck for 15 hours. They traveled from Mexico to Houston, where they rode a bus to New York for 24 hours. When he arrived in New York Chinatown, his cousin picked him up. The snakeheads had already contacted his relatives in New York.
Soon after, Cheng started looking for a job. Because he was new and lacked a legal status, he couldn’t find a job for about 20 days. After New Year, he worked in a restaurant in Pennsylvania. After a week, due to exhaustion, Cheng had to resign. His employer refused to pay him, claiming that Cheng broke some of the cooking utensils.
After he returned to New York, he thought about his treacherous smuggle into the United States. When he and another smuggler were in Guatemala, they saw an embassy. Hoping to cause a disturbance and get the attention of the guard, they started a heated argument. They hoped to get the attention of the embassy and have the embassy deport them back to China. However, no matter how much they tried, the guard at the embassy did not care to intervene. At Guatemala, one of the contacts who was supposed to guide them in the smuggling process robbed them of all their possession. He only had his undergarment left at the end. Almost naked, Cheng still had to hike over a mountain for hours. The experience was very humiliating.
Had he knew that the smuggling would be so dangerous and costly; Cheng would not have decided to do so. In the United States, the road to becoming a legal turning is also difficult. He was supposed to apply for asylum within a year of arriving in the United States, but he had no record of when he arrived here. In the next five works, he will have to work continuously to pay for his debts.
