BY TANYA ALBERT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
UNION TOWNSHIP -- A waist-high gray conveyor belt shuttled empty mail bags to Vinod Bhatara.
Standing alongside the belt, he waited for the heavy-duty plastic sack's arrival so he could check them for holes and forgotten mail. Bosses watched him and his co-workers from officers above the conveyor line. Beeping from a forklift backing up in the warehouse drowned out the radio playing the background.
In the dimly lit storage facility, Mr. Bhatara patted down the bag with his gloved hands and glanced over it. He picked up the bag; he turned and placed it into the proper corrugated storage box. He repeated the process again and again. Eight hours daily. Many nights. He left there for a second job at Pizza Hut.
They were not his dream jobs. But they paid the bills.
And that is what was most important as he and his wife and two teen-aged children have tried to make it in America. The family immigrated to Greater Cincinnati in April 1997.
"We're used to working long hours in India," Mr. Bhatara said in February. "But the job opportunities in America are better." It's a big change in lifestyle for Mr. Bhatara.
He has a bachelor's degree from Lyellpur Khalsa College in India. With it, he ran a photocopy business. He was his own boss.
In his family's West Chester apartment in March, his alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. so he could be to work at the U.S. Postal Service's Mail Transportation Distribution Center in Blue Ash. On nights that he delivered pizzas, his day didn't end until 10 or 11 p.m.
The career move at age 45 may dishearten many Americans. But not Mr. Bhatara.
Although there have been days where he felt uneasiness about the future, he faced each day with goals in mind:
Put a 15-year-old daughter and 18-year-old son through American colleges.
Buy a house.
Save money to go to school and take computer courses to become a marketable worker.
Those dreams are getting closer to reality.
The family plans to buy a house by the end of the year. Mr. Bhatara quit his second job at Pizza Hut a couple of months ago. When his temporary six-month job at the postal service ended in May, he got a new job at Cintas, where he is embroidering name labels on uniforms. The pay and benefits are better there.
So is the future.
"If you get computer courses, you can move ahead," Mr. Bhatara said this month. "The post office job was a casual job. Here we are feeling security . . . because it is a good company with a good future." He starts computer classes in September.
Insight into India
Mother finds her own independence
Daughter struggles to find her niche
Son embraces all things American
