Blogging from Shanghai, part 19

Basketball and backlogs. Turns out that one of Shanghai’s more famous migrants to the United States is Houston Rockets superstar, Yao Ming. Yao Ming (Chinese: 姚明) is currently the tallest player in the NBA, at 2.29 m (7 ft 6 in).

Yao, who was born in Shanghai, started playing for the Shanghai Sharks as a teenager, and played on their senior team for five years in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA), winning a championship in his final year. He entered the 2002 NBA Draft, and after negotiating with the CBA and the Sharks to secure his release, was selected by the Houston Rockets as the first overall pick of the draft. He has since been selected to start for the Western Conference in the NBA All-Star Game in all seven of his seasons, and has been named to the All-NBA Team four times.

When I was a kid, I dreamed of becoming a basketball star. Growing up in Arizona (in the 1950s and 1960s), I was a big fan of the local Arizona State University Sun Devils basketball team and the Boston Celtics (who always seemed to be on TV). My favorite Sun Devil was Joe Caldwell, and my favorite Celtic was Bob Cousy. I played a lot of backyard basketball, and one day my father told me that his sister, my Aunt Fong, was finally going to be able to immigrate (sibling category). My dad knew I would be particularly happy to get to know her because she was a basketball star in elementary and high school growing up in China.

Once I heard about the impending immigration of my aunt, I practiced even more, looking forward to special lessons from my aunt once she arrived. When the day came and I met my aunt for the first time, as gracious and wonderful as she was, she was in her late 50s, and her basketball playing days had long passed. That was my first experience with the effect of backlogs in family immigration categories; the second was when my mother’s sister died while waiting on the backlog. The effects of severe backlogs continue to this very day. At least my father and Aunt Fong were able to eventually reunite; other siblings are not so lucky.

Comprehensive immigration reform must include a strategy to clear the backlogs for immigrants who have been waiting patiently in the family immigration categories, while maintaining the family categories. We owe it to those citizens and lawful resident aliens who long to be reunited with family members. Family immigration must remain the foundation of our immigration system.

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