Intro: Welcome to Boston

Andala Coffee House. Image by Authors.

In a city of transients, we are always looking outwards past the skyline of Boston. As students, our time at MIT seems paradoxically drawn-out as it simultaneously passes in the blink of an eye. While we are working, making, and doing within the walls of the institution, we forget to be present in the city that houses us.

“The Borders of Boston” aspires to reflect on Boston as a city of “temporaries” by looking to its past history of permanent transience. Since the end of the nineteenth century, the fabric of Boston transformed from a small port town to an international industrial city, with waves of migrants eager to reside in the new world. Though the land was foreign, these newcomers did not forget their own heritage and instead forged the neighborhoods of Boston as their own. This column steps back to contemplate how the city has evolved over time by entering into the worlds of those that have carved their own marks within history.  

This research evolved from analyzing the narrative of the immigrant—the “immigrant lifescape.” We propose this concept not to reduce the tribulations of migrants to a “lifestyle”—which may imply a conscious choice—but instead understand “crossing,” as a narrative landscape that has been forever altered by navigating through a border line. The imprint of the border follows immigrants through the movement from point of origin to final destination. But this line is a heavy weight to bear in an alien place; only where there is agency and control of space do lines disappear, and a sense of belonging is instilled.

For immigrant restaurant owners, they carry this line proudly as a badge—for they have managed to inscribe and maintain their own culture in a motley city of identities and histories. Their restaurants are where they can call upon their old worlds to bring comfort not only for themselves, but to others who crave a “taste of home.”

We hope to reveal and share the worlds that we have been graciously invited to. By crossing the thresholds of restaurants, we have crossed borders. Through eating their food, we have travelled to cultures far and wide. By sitting at their tables, we have rested with them at the end of the journey.

It’s with great hope that we share these stories here as a platform to reveal, reflect and teach. By the end of this, we hope that when you walk past the local immigrant-owned restaurant around the corner, you will be prompted to pause and ask, what is your story?

And we hope that you take that first step to cross the line and into a new world.