Unfulfilled dream

Unfulfilled dream

About two decades ago, Ayub Yahya (not his real name) was a
rich man by Indonesian standards. He had graduated as an
economist from a prestigious university and his wife held a law
degree. They lived happily in a large house in Jakarta with a
very spacious garden, about 1,000 square meters, and considering
the high price of land, Ayub could certainly be categorized as
affluent.

To top it all, he drove a Mercedes Benz limousine. It goes
without saying that the family lived in an elite neighborhood.

However, Ayub had a dream, an American dream, so to speak. He
reasoned that, if he could succeed in Indonesia, he could
undoubtedly succeed in Uncle Sam's back yard.

With his university degree and his fluent English, plus a
large amount of U.S. dollars at his disposal, by disposing of all
his possession in Indonesia, he was confident that even in the
United States he would not have any trouble in making a living.

As the first step toward accomplishing his dream, he sold all
his possessions including his comfortable Mercedes and migrated
to America. His three daughters were enrolled at a prestigious
school and having a sizable amount of dollars he easily bought a
home. So far so good! His dream had come true.

But when he tried to secure a respectable white-collar job in
one of the large companies as befitted a man with a university
degree, his dream proved empty. He sent hundreds of application
letters to prestigious companies, but they were all in vain.

When his dollars began to dwindle rapidly, he and his wife
decided to do something to make a living. They opened a laundry
shop in Los Angeles and although it meant hard work from sun-up
to sun-down, the family business flourished according to plan.
They could smile again.

A few months passed until one fine day, Ayub woke in the
morning to find a new Korean laundry shop had opened in the same
street. Trouble started again. All his customers preferred to
have their washing laundered by the Korean competitor and they
worked more efficiently, more professionally and, after all, the
charges were lower.

After a while, Yahya had to sell his laundry shop and other
assets and return to Jakarta. It was not hard to imagine that
they then began their life from scratch. Fortunately his wife
managed to find a well-paid job to further finance their three
kids who were still studying in the States.

A lesson to be drawn from this is that a bird in the hand is
worth two in the bush.

A. DJUANA

Jakarta