Policy Fallout

On the way to Manhattan this morning we were really crawling and a young Chinese man near me was listening to American country/pop songs in Chinese, or rather, we all were, involuntarily. I recognized some of the songs, which melodically were almost the same as their American versions. I went to high school with a lot of Chinese students, and I know spoken Chinese is a tonal language, with the four tones – five if you count lack of tone – adding to the meaning of the words. As I listened to this guy’s music, I was struck by the lack of tonality as the melody took precedence and I wondered if that detracted from the meaning of the lyrics. Last night Sunday dinner was packed and loud, but E, a quiet girl who mostly speaks Spanish, approached me at the desk and handed me a letter from NYC. The letter was informing her that the Emergency Housing Voucher program, that pays for an apartment for her and her two year old, is out of money and that although they are trying to find another program to house her, they haven’t figured it out yet and they will be in touch in a few weeks. This is an effect of Trump’s cruel cuts to federal funding for housing. I explain to her what they are saying, and that there is nothing we can do but wait for the next letter and then depending on which program they identify for her, I can help her with the process. Robin comes along and says in Spanish that he told her I would know, and I point out to him that I don’t know yet, nobody knows where these people are going and that’s the worst part for the people who are trapped in uncertainty. Today I spent a long time with M., a trans client who has been with us for years. She arrived here with her family from Trinidad and Tobago when she was five, and she is a permanent resident with a green card. Except that she lost her green card some time ago and now she has decided that in this political climate she should have it. I don’t want her to go anywhere near the immigration offices, so I print out the forms – the form to replace the card, the fee waiver, a separate form to be notified by email – and we make our way through page after page of bureaucracy. Neither of us has any idea how long it will take to actually get the new card given the current chaos, but it’s a start at least. Once she headed home, I sat at my desk and thought about how E and M, with totally different problems, are both experiencing the fallout of the cruel policy decisions coming out of Washington.