davethegrinch.net

Dave Says:
The US government is an organism on irony. For a country that was founded by and owes all to immigrants, it is the country in which it is now the hardest to become one. Ellis Island is closed for legal immigrants unless you have something to the government in the form of taxes or competitive advantage and if there is little chance of you actualy taking something from them such as unemployment or medicaid. If your potential circumstances please Uncle Sam he may just open the gates a squeek and you may be able to squeeze through.

There are billions of people in this world. 300 million of them already live in the US which still leaves billions who would probably love to live there. Of those, 50,000 may win what used to be called the Green Card Lottery but is now known by its less Vegas like moniker: The USCIS Diversity Visa Program. The program alots a percentage of the 50,000 green cards on offer to each country based upon a reverse order of it’s current immigrants to the US. For example, there are many Brits in the US so the UK would probably get 10 of the 50,000 whereas there are hardly any Sudanese so they would get more. The potential immigrant applies and, providing they can afford the airfare over, the applications is put into Uncles Sam’s giant top hat and winners are pulled out at random.

However, this is not a lesson on US immigration policy rather it is a story o immpossible odds and a culture shock to potentially rival my previous post on the benifits of cleaning one’s kitchen floor with cow dung.

It begins with the phrase: “Well, there we were…”

Well, there we were sharing a hard concrete roof top in the blistering heat of an average Parbatipur day when a young man of about 21 leans over us with a huge smile, holds out his hand and introduces himself as Subash Shrestha. In formal but slightly flawed English he apologises for disturbing us but would to talk about America. You see, despite the impossible odds of being a fraction of the billions, fighting for Nepal’s fraction of the 50,000, in this remote town of 2000 he had won a coverted Diversity Visa and, in another stroke of probability magic, had found two Americans right on his doorstep to discuss it with.

Over this and subsequent conversations we learnt that all he knew about America was that he needed a social security number. This handy survival tip, printed in governmental green ink on the pamphlet that came enclosed with the congratulations letter from Uncle Sam was the first of three bullet points under the heading “What to do when you arrive in the US.”. It read simply, “Obtain a Social Security Nunmber”. The second bullet was “Take a driving test and obtain a driving licence.” and the third bullet implied that upon sucessful completion of the first two, a job would be forthcoming.

Subash comes from Parbatibur where there is not the concept of government social services into which an individual contributes or withdraws via that magical social security number. Nor does Parbatipur really have the concept of a driving test or a piece of paper that allows you drive and purchase alcohol if you look remotely under 35. However, Parbatipur does have the concept of jobs and Subash has had many.

He told me his teachers are proud of him bedcause, in cricket parlance, he is a great all-rounder. He spent six months as an English teacher where the only qualification required was to speak marginally more English than your students. He can, and loves to, drive the local bus and he earned his diploma Microsoft Word and Excel from the nearest technical college. Subash is optomistic he can secure a job in the US. I am not. He was a little purturbed however, when I informed him that bus drivers in America do not get accomodation as part of thier salary.

The Nepalis are very interested in the concept of minimum wage. Earning over $5 an hour is a tremendous monthly salary for anyone in Nepal. The therefore think that they will work hard for a year and return to Nepal a “rich man”. Despite my repeated attempts to expain they need to pay for food, lodging, transportation and taxes in a country where $5 hardly buys a cup of coffee, they refuse to see how they cannot return wealthy. The concept of the basic things in life costing more that a few rupees is so very alien to them.

The “fish out of water” theme has been central to so much of our popular culture, from Mork and Mindy to Crocodile Dundee but during my conversations with Subash I could only think of Jon Voight in Midnight Cowboy. We think its funny that Subash is going to look the wrong way crossing the road or that he’s probably going to eat so much Ben and Jerry’s he’ll be sick. What’s not particulaly funny is that he doesn’t know Minnesota from Miami and doesn’t have a friend in the entire country to help him except for an old teacher in Michigan who, by the sounds out it, is trying to convince him to go to New York.

Subash has won his visa which means there is absolutly no way he’s NOT going to America. He knows that and everyone in the towns knows that. He is the local boy made good. They don’t understand the American Dream but they have faith Subash will be sucessful. America is rich, Nepal is poor - its as simple as that.

When we left Subash he was heading to Kathmandu to buy his airline ticket to America. He has nowhere to stay and nobody to meet him at whatever airport he lands at. Yet he won’t be the first to arrive in the US under such circumstances - this was how the country was formed. I have spent many hours trying to convince both Americans and non-Americans that the American Dream is alive, kicking and the backbone of the nation yet I often think only people like myself and Subash can really understand that. But, if my theories are correct, why am I frightened for my new Nepali buddy? Doesn’t Lady Liberty look after all those pass her gaze or does the American Dream exist only after one has obtained it?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 8th, 2007 at 5:20 am and is filed under Global Travels, Nepal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.