Recorded from Salisbury, Maryland, 2021.
This snapshot was gathered by the Peale in conjunction with the Maryland Voices initiative at Maryland Humanities, specifically to supplement the "Voices and Votes: Democracy in America" traveling exhibition from the Smithsonian's Museum on Main Street program. This collection, made up of stories of first-time voters between the ages of 18 and 24, showcases the experiences of young people as they wrestled with the 2020 presidential election, issues around social justice, the environment, immigration, and the pandemic. The full collection of stories is available at www.museumonmainstreet.org.
Balil Chaudry (00:00): My name is Balil Chaudry. I'm a senior at Salisbury University and I grew up in Brooklyn and Salisbury, Maryland. I was in Brooklyn until I was 10 years old and then I moved down here for the rest of my life, basically and then I stayed here for college as well. It's an interesting mix because I got to live in both the city, more rush of a vibe and also Salisbury, which is a really small town, so I got to see the disparity and both aspects of America.
Balil Chaudry (00:33): The United States is great now, but there's definitely a lot of areas we need to work on. I'm not going to say there isn't, but it's great to be part of that, but, it can also be very discouraging at times when you see people in power who don't see certain changes that need to get done.
Balil Chaudry (00:49): And a lot of times it's either because they're not affected by it so they don't know it, or they're out of touch. I've talked to a few of my friends the other day and we were talking about how a lot of Congress members are in their seventies and eighties, so they don't know what the average American might need, plus Congress has unlimited terms, so there's that as well. Overall being American, it's great. Baseball games, apple pie, Bruce Springsteen, I love all that. But I definitely think being American is less of the picture of who the president is or what Congress is, but more, who the people are and what the people need, what represents them overall.
Balil Chaudry (01:33): When I moved to Salisbury, I was 10. So, I still finished up middle school and high school here as well. And I feel like that's where I saw discrimination, just because in college, a lot of people are coming from different areas in Maryland or around the nation and a lot of them are coming from diverse groups, so campus is probably one of the most diverse areas in Salisbury.
Balil Chaudry (02:00): But one thing that, shoots out to me is when I was in eighth grade, there were a lot of students from Korea moving to Salisbury and a lot of the kids in my class would say "oh my God, it's the [inaudible 00:02:13] Asian," they were middle schoolers, they're going to be childish, but it was one thing that really stood out to me because, even before that, when I first moved here, I was shocked about how white everything was, there wasn't much diversity.
Balil Chaudry (02:29): And I was just used to this environment where, if you're walking down the street, you'll hear people speaking in languages you don't know. If you walk down the street, you could get food from a variety of different places throughout the world and just around in the apartment we lived in, our neighbors were Italian, Brazilian and Russian on the same floor, so there was that great, I liked that melting pot vibe, you have people from different [inaudible 00:02:56], different stories, but as opposed to here, for the most part, it was a lot of white people.
Balil Chaudry (03:06): I think after the earthquake in Haiti, a lot of patients started living here, so added some diversity to that degree, but overall it was shocking to see that lack of diversity, but it was a little refreshing when I got into college and I got to see a lot more people from different [inaudible 00:03:22]. This isn't all that.
Asset ID: 2021.03.06.a
