On the other side of the
world
MHS grad's career post takes him to
India
LAUREEN FAGAN
Tribune Staff Writer
Terry DeMaegd, a 1968 graduate of Mishawaka High School,
has certainly made his way in the world -- and now, he's
on the other side of it.
DeMaegd, whose son lives in the Homewood Avenue home he
hopes to retire to in a few years, is working in New
Delhi, India, where he is Officer-in-Charge for
Citizenship and Immigration Services at the U.S. Embassy.
Through an e-mail interview, DeMaegd and his wife,
Maggie, have described their lives since Terry took the
embassy position in August.
"Hopefully, it'll give some sense of living
day-to-day in India," Maggie wrote.
"And learning that the diplomatic life isn't all
balls and cocktail parties, tuxes and ballgowns."
Maggie adds that "the stuff you see on the streets
here is amazing, and not necessarily 'wonderful'
amazing."
For example, there are two markets she mentioned as
places she shops for fresh produce, Sarojini and Moti
Bagh.
"Sarojini is one of the favorite markets among
locals," explained Maggie. But it's also where one
of two bombs was detonated in October, killing nearly 60
people.
"I skip Moti Bagh on the days when the cows
outnumber the people in the market," Maggie says of
the other site.
As for Terry, he wrote that he was "praying the
electricity will stay on long enough to let me finish
this message."
And it did.
In India, Terry pursues his career in government service,
which began in the 1970s in Los Angeles when he took a
job as a criminal investigator with what was then the
INS, now part of the Department of Homeland Security.
"For several months in 1980, I was sent to Miami to
help process Cubans during the Mariel Boatlife
operation," he said, describing some of the problems
that arose as Castro "forced many undesirables onto
the boats at Mariel Bay."
After that, Terry took a position with the Department of
Defense in Oregon, married Maggie and became a father.
His other assignments have taken him to San Diego and
then Anaheim, Calif., where Terry worked as a political
asylum officer.
"I was scheduled to travel to Islamabad, Pakistan,
to interview refugees in the middle of September,
2001," he wrote. "However, 9/11 intervened, but
I was finally able to travel there at the end of January
2002."
The stay was brief, however.
Two months later, a bomb blast near the U.S. Embassy
killed two Americans, and DeMaegd was evacuated.
After short stints back in California and then
Washington, D.C., they were on their way to New Delhi.
But that doesn't mean that Mishawaka is ever far from
Terry and Maggie's thoughts.
Terry's family came to Mishawaka, he wrote, when his
grandfather immigrated from Belgium in 1909.
"He worked at the Kamm Brewery and at Ball
Band," Terry said, adding that his father, Leon,
worked at Ball Band for 40 years, too -- except for when
he was fighting in World War II.
"A few years back, I began to return periodically to
Mishawaka after many years, for high school reunions and
to see family," Terry wrote.
And he's always stayed a Notre Dame fan, even though he
lived in Southern California for so many years.
What does he look forward to after his Indian odyssey?
They'll retire to Mishawaka.
"And fish on the banks of the St. Joe River,"
he wrote.
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The Moti Bagh market in New Delhi,
India, is where Maggie DeMaegd shops for fresh vegetables
-- except, she said, when the cows outnumber the people
in the market.
Terry DeMaegd
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