Dozens become U.S. citizens at Nellis ceremony
Lydia Desagum went from relying on nannies in her hometown of Manila, Philippines, to getting by on her own.
In that island nation, it’s not uncommon for many in the middle class to have nannies, who wait on them hand and foot.
In the United States, well, welcome to the United States. That sort of stuff is usually only afforded by the Hollywood persuasion. Or the billionaires who own the casinos.
Such are the sacrifices, but they’re well worth it, said Desagum, 42, who, after 10 years here, admits she is finally getting the hang of it all – the cooking, the cleaning, the running to the grocery store in her car.
“It’s a different lifestyle,” said Desagum, who on Friday gave a rousing speech to an audience of more than 100 at Nellis Air Force Base, in which she remarked how honored she was to become a U.S. citizen.
It was a long time coming.
She was one of 25 immigrants who were sworn in to defend and protect their new sovereign, the United States of America.
The swearing-in ceremony has long been a tradition with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service and the Air Force base to celebrate Veterans Day on Sunday.
And so as is customary, if not judicially obligatory, the base’s tarmac was turned into a federal courtroom as more than two dozen people, many of them Air Force members, raised their hands and took the citizenship oath.
Presiding U.S. Magistrate Judge William C. W. Hoffman Jr. called it “a once-in-a-lifetime event.”
Subjected to high winds and cloudy skies and over the occasional din of roaring fighter jets, the 45-minute ceremony went off without a hitch.
The immigrants hail from 11 countries, from Australia to the Philippines to Mexico to Belarus.
Together, they waved tiny American flags in the wind while Wayne Leroy, a member of the Protective Order of Elks, schooled the newly anointed on the significance of the flag’s colors: red is for the blood, white is for the tears and blue is for the “heavenly skies under which it flies.”
Leo Holston, director of the new Las Vegas field office for the Immigration Service, said just before the ceremony got under way that the new immigrants qualified for citizenship because they were “of good moral character,” they know how to speak, read and write English, and they have lived continuously in the United States for at least five years.
Lester Villarin, 23, a native of Cebu, Philippines, was one of them.
“It’s a real honor,” said a happy Villarin, an airman 1st Class who is an auto mechanic on base when he’s not swearing to uphold the U.S. Constitution and to defend the United States in time of war.
“And the experience I’m getting in the Air Force is something I couldn’t get anywhere else,” he added. “I get to travel, my education is paid for, and in six years when I’m done, I have the option of re-enlisting. Everything is perfect.”
If that’s not an unsolicited and unscripted advertisement for serving in the armed forces, then nothing remotely approaches it.
It would seem that U.S. citizenship, at least among the younger airmen, was more of an added value bonus of serving rather than the goal. Many of them said they have lived in the Las Vegas Valley for years and were legal permanent residents – until Friday.
Or, as Col. Robert A. Garland Jr. commandant of the Air Force Weapons School on base, so eloquently pointed out: “Last night you went to bed as citizens of other countries; tonight you’ll go to bed as U.S. citizens.”
In her remarks to the audience, Desagum said she studied a great deal to pass the citizenship test and in the course learned a lot about Martin Luther King Jr., whose dream became her dream.
She even referenced him in her speech, saying, “I had a dream just like Martin Luther King Jr., and now that dream has become a reality.”
Contact reporter Tom Ragan at tragan@reviewjournal.com or 702-224-5512.
