For my Master Capstone for the Gilder Lehrman Institute, I wrote about the legacy of the Agovino emigration from Sarno, Italy to New York. I focused on two different migrations conducted by uncle and nephew: the two men named Michele Agovino (my grandfather and his uncle). It’s fascinating how these two different men assimilated and adapted differently yet their descendants in less than a hundred years are writers, pharmacists, teachers, designers, photographers, World War Veterans, Army Infrantrymen, engineers, printers and countless other contributors to society. 

When I finished up my thesis, I learned a hard lesson about immigration and people. One can never truly calculate the human heart and its motives. I will never fully understand why my grandparents left Sarno. I will never be Sarnese in its entirety.  When going back, I do get emotional. It is a feeling of homesickness but as a foreigner. Zadie Smith once wrote that this is the tragedy of immigration; it is like water being boiled. Something is lost but something is gained. I am forever grateful to my grandparents for giving me this magical city. Other than my beautiful wife, this city is the best thing life has given to me. I would be lost without it; I wouldn't be me. The loss of my motherland has been the gaining of the most complex metropolis on the planet. Thus, the painful price of duality.

– Michael Agovino

Relationship:  Grandchild of im/migrant Grandchild of im/migrant