Essay on The Tortilla Curtain

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The American Dream as generally defined is the idea of working one 's way up the ladder of life . It is the idea that an American can start with nothing or an immigrant can come here with nothing and with some hard work and determination , can have all the things he /she ever wanted . The American dream began as Horatio Alger story and ends up meaning suburbanites driving in their Lexus 's from their mansions . What this means is that while immigrants came here for the rags to riches story , as

we became acculturated , we began to want more and more Making a good living was no longer enough , and the disease of affluenza ' took over , of never knowing when enough is enough . Now we don 't just need a lifestyle to support our families we need the house in the suburbs (the more grandiose , the better , the fancy cars the nannies , the private tutors , etc . Immigrants who come here today see many families who simply make a good living , however they also see many people who spend extravagantly on ridiculous things . These extremes make it even harder when the common man ' or the immigrant cannot achieve the lifestyles they have dreamed of

The dream is perceived differently by people who came here as opposed to living here . Kyra Menaker-Mossbacher and her husband have a definite sense of the American dream . She is a big shot realtor who spends her days showing mansions to clients , never thinking about homelessness or other real world problems . She lives the American Dream in her exclusive housing development , Arroyo Blanco Estates , with all her luxuries . Delaney comes from wealth and spends his days freelance writing for a nature magazine . The Mossbachers can spend their time worrying abut trivial things like dents in the hood of their car However , this life is not enough for her she still wants something better . On the other hand , just below this housing development , the Rincons struggle and struggle . This Mexican family has come here illegally to strive for the American dream . Like immigrants before them they believe the U .S . is the land of wealth (like the early Chinese immigrants who believed the streets were paved with gold , calling this country Gold Mountain . Maybe the United States is the land of wealth but the doors to that vault of wealth are certainly not open to all . The Rincons find that no matter how hard they work , not only can they not achieve enough to have any sort of American dream , but also they cannot achieve enough to sustain life . They truly believe that in American society , everyone , even the poorest [has] a car , a house , and a TV (26 . They do not understand that there are many poor Americans as well But as they work and work , their frustration grows with their inability to achieve . America Rincon (s symbolic name if there ever was one ) will come to understand that her idea of an American Dream was...