Case #1
Paris, At la courneuve's Jacques Brel High School, Sanya Mirza just looks like a typical student. But at home, she’s been fighting with her parents over the “French” way she dresses and carries herself."My parents don’t like the way I dress," said the 17-year-old. "They want me to be like them, but I don’t know anything about their culture."
While her Pakistani family wears traditional Muslim garb – her mother wears the hijab in public and her father runs a Pakistani dabba under an Indian name at Gare du Nord wears suits – the Parisian suburb-born teen is more likely to dress in leggings, pipe trousers, boots, T-shirts and cardigans. After numerous fights with her father, Sania left home and has been living in a group home for about a year.
Sanya is a second-generation French, an academic term that refers to children of families who immigrated to France. Like many in this growing segment of the population, she’s struggling to reconcile her family’s culture with life in France."In their eyes I’m really bad just because I don’t follow the [pakistani] tradition and lifestyle, but to French I’m just a really nice girl," said Sanya.
As their numbers grow, more attention is being paid to their successes and failures.
to be contd...
