A History Has Been Created

A History Has Been Created

Today November 7th, is a historical day for our country. This beautiful sunny morning I woke up with the news that we have our 46th president and vice president. Joseph Biden and Kamala Harris are our new leaders. Since election day, November 3rd, I have felt a lot of anxiety and uncertainty around me.  Like the tv channels went on with  the discussions about who the president will be.  I followed all the news and numbers closely. My classmates and close friends would not stop talking about election rumors. This is a historical day especially for girls like me because now we have a woman vice president in our white house. Let me put it in this way. We have a woman of color in the white house.This will inspire girls and women all over the world.Let me share a few things about our new vice president.

Kamala D. Harris was born in Oakland California to an Indian mother and Jamaican father. Her mother Shymala Gopalan was a biologist and her father Donald Harris was a Stanford university professor . Along with her younger sister Maya, Harris lived in Berkeley with a big black population. A neighbor regularly took the Harris girls to an African American church in Oakland where they sang in the children’s choir.Their mother then began to teach them about Hindu Mythology and took them to the local Hindu temple where they sang mantras. At the age of seven, Harris’s parents got divorced in the early 1970s. Shymala took her children to Chennai multiple times to visit the  family. Harris was very inspired by her grandfather Mr Gopalan and acknowledged him during interviews. After  high school,she attended Howard University, a historically black university. While at Howard, she led the debate team. In February 1998, San Francisco district attorney Terence Hallinan recruited Harris as an assistant district attorney. And finally in August 2000, Harris took a new job at San Francisco City Hall, working for city attorney Louise Renne.In 2020, Harris decided to contest for president from democratic party but later she was chosen as the vice president candidate for the democratic party. And finally, she is the first woman to be vice president. 

I clearly remember what happened in the vice presidential  debate between Mike Pence and Kamala Harris.  I was  impressed  by Harris’s confidence as she confronted Mike Pence when he kept interrupting her. 

She said “Mr Vice President, I’m speaking”.

 I was shocked by her ability to stand up  and speak for herself. During the debate, I learned that Harris is very empathetic and compassionate. Especially when she got emotional talking about the Covid pandemic and people dying in the country. I told myself, “We need a leader that is kind like her”.  Kindness is not weakness.

As a 12 year old girl of color, who believes in the power of empathy, I am very encouraged by the victory of a woman of color. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will lead our country in a good direction and I see a bright future for my generation. I want to end this blog here with some facts about Kamala Harris’s life.

Fun Facts 

• She is the daughter of Jamaican (father) and Indian/Tamil (mother) immigrants.

• Kamala means “lotus” flower in Sanskrit.

• She was the first woman, first African-American, and first Asian-American to become attorney general of California.

• She is the first African-American woman to become a California Senator.

• Kamala is Joe Biden’s vice president  for the 2020 US presidential election.

• She is the first woman of color to become a running mate in the US presidential elections, and the third woman after Sarah Palin and Geraldine Ferraro.

• Her stepchildren call her “Momala” (mother + Kamala).

• She published two non-fiction books and one children’s book.

• Gopalan (Her grandfather) was born in 1911 in Painganadu, a village ringed by temples about 180 miles south of Chennai, then known as Madras. His marriage to Rajam, who was raised in a nearby district of Tamil Nadu state, was arranged.The Indian government had dispatched P.V. Gopalan to help Zambia manage an influx of refugees from Zimbabwe which had just declared independence from Britain. It was the capstone of a four-decade career that began when Gopalan joined government service fresh out of college in the 1930s, in the final years of British rule in India.

Quotes of Kamala Harris

      “I’m the Daughter of a mother who broke down all kinds of barriers.

                   Im thankful every day to have been raised by her”

“My mother had a saying: Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make          sure you are not the last .”

                   “Our unity is our strength, and diversity is our power”

Congratulations to our 46th President and Vice President!

Creds- Wikipedia, google 

• LA Times- The progressive Indian grandfather who inspired Kamala Harris

     By Shashank Bengali,Oct. 25, 20193 AM