immigration to the states

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21 August 2009
Friday 7pm

I would like to go home for Thanksgiving or Christmas. And I would like to take Lenin, too. But, before we buy tickets, we need to get him a tourist visa using the Nonimmigrant Visa Application.

We have filled out the application. Now I just need to figure out the next step. Where do we send it? How do we pay? How do we get an interview set up? And when do we know if he gets it so that tickets can be bought.

Thank god he has his passport already. One less step to take.

In other news, he is impatiently waiting for the camera to arrive so that we can go to Wiwili and visit his family. I am well aware that it takes a few weeks for packages to arrive, but he is not. He will learn.

My rich neighbor - the only family with running water in the kitchen, a maid, a huge corner store, two motorcycles and a truck, and one of two families with satellite TV - left the day before yesterday to cross “mojado” to the US…

To cross wet. Slang in Spanish for crossing illegally. Like slang for us, too, wetbacks.

I have conversations about immigrating to the States all the time. Like, at least one conversation a week. And despite my warnings that crossing through Mexico is dangerous as hell because there are bandits who capitalize on every immigrant trying to cross, and the border between Mexico and the US is heavily guarded by the government and private security… Despite my warnings that employers will not pay minimum wage if they know you’re illegal…

Despite all of that. Making three dollars an hour is more than a labor worker makes here in a day. And that is worth the risk. Worth the risk of crossing Central America. Worth the risk crossing Mexico. Worth the risk of crossing the border. Worth leaving your family behind.

And this man is not poor. His work involved trading in the bean business. Being the middle man with the pulperia and transportation who could buy 100 pound sacks of beans from the farmers in our village and sell them at the bigger markets for a good profit. But the price of beans in the last couple of years has dropped and thus he is not making enough profit.

So, for the first time in his life, he is going to try to work in the USA. For four years. That is his plan, anyway. Last we heard he was at the border, still on the Mexican side. A day and a half and he’s at the border.

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Comments

[Mom]

"Come on up!"
Yes, WE ARE SOOOOOO ready for you guys to come up! Anything we can do to help with the Visa? You know, Molly, you have actually been a DRIVER OF A VEHICLE a relatively SHORT time of your life, huh? Had the Tempo during high school, no car during your 4 years of college (including your times in China), no car in India and Goa, no car working in Philly, half a car (borrowing Arielle's) in Memphis, Kia for a short time delivering mail here, and no car in Nica! BTW....is your license still valid?? Do you even have it with you down there? Or, do I need to find it before you come home? Hmm...hadn't thought of it until now.

[Mom]

Strange...
In a different way, it's kinda strange how you see, every day, the illegal immigrant side of of the story that is so very news-worthy up here right now. Huh? Makes it 'personal'.