Lottery to decide my life

I don't understand Dag as investing in that way at all. So not what she is about, which is why this is so ironically disgusting, that she should have to even consider play and ploy with those who go there, and maybe in the not considering, lose.

Cripes.

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For friendly, I can recommend the new land of the head hamster (and hopefully me too soon), Costa Rica. If you can write a business plan that makes it appear positive for tourism; a $50,000 investment in a Costa Rican Corporation will get you citizenship ($200K if not tourism related). Alternately; 2 passport stamps a year pretty much negates the need to go for citizenship there. (Just pointing out that options are limited only by your imagination).

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Right. I can't ploy and plot. I physically cannot do it. I understand that in the grand scheme of things it wouldn't matter much, I'd perhaps even trick the system and such cool things, but I can't.

My father was a professor at the department where I studied. Well, in fact he founded the department and was a rector of the university, so if I wanted to study poli sci, I had no choice.
I never got any favors. In fact, I had to do my exams in front of a committee (we had oral exams, one on one. And he's an easy grader). For my thesis and state exams I had 5 member committees instead of 3, just to demonstrate impartiality.
He never bribed anyone. Not even a doctor, which was totally expected of everyone (you bring coffee, or a bottle of something... a little present). He just wouldn't do it, no matter what was at stake.

So you see, if I succumbed and went that route, I would feel so low. It's not worth it to me, even if the reality will be awful.

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OCCOM BILL wrote:

For friendly, I can recommend the new land of the head hamster (and hopefully me too soon), Costa Rica. If you can write a business plan that makes it appear positive for tourism; a $50,000 investment in a Costa Rican Corporation will get you citizenship ($200K if not tourism related). Alternately; 2 passport stamps a year pretty much negates the need to go for citizenship there. (Just pointing out that options are limited only by your imagination).

Hmm. How many internationally based NGOs in conflict resolution, focusing on the role of historical memory in protracted identity-based conflicts are there though? If I can't do my current job, I'm going home. In an ideal world I'd have this job AT home in Slovakia anyway, but there's no such thing there, which is why I stuck around here. I'm not lured by Costa Rica. Bratislava, Trnavka, somewhere near my parents house sounds great to me. And Cambridge, MA, because of my job. That's it, though.

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Well, that's something I totally understand ... grew up very similar myself.

"I am used to wet shaving and have to look in the mirror every morning" :wink:

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Understand.

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I don't follow you too well, but I got your point. Back to crossing fingers on the 1 over the 1.3.

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dagmaraka I know we don't know each other and when I read all this it bothered me to see you write that you could care less about this country.

I really care about this country and it disturbs me to hear what you are going through. From what I read it means that this country, my country, is going to turn down visas to highly trained intelligent people as yourself due to a congressionally mandated cap. Then top it off by using a random lottery system to determines who stays and who goes. This just appalls me. I can't imagine the hurt, anger and frustration you must be feeling. I think it is a travesty for this country to do such a thing. I read up a little on it and found this:

"Cap-Exempt Petitions: As directed by the H-1B Visa Reform Act of 2004, the first 20,000 H-1B petitions filed on behalf of aliens with U.S.-earned masters' or higher degrees are exempt from any fiscal year cap on
available H-1B visas. USCIS does not yet know how many of these petitions it has received as those petitions are mixed with the cap-subject cases received on April 2 and 3. USCIS will make a future
announcement regarding the "final receipt date" for these petitions."

So if I read it and understand it correctly up to 20,000 could potentially be in that 150,000 meaning your odds of getting a visa will increase. I know it is not much but every little bit may help. I truly admire your honesty and courage in your situation. I hope you win.

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dagmaraka wrote:

Thanks though for all the willingness to leap forward to help in practice. Also to fishin and jespah who ran to my help through PMs. Feels good to have a home like this.

The Boston A2K Posse is ready to help. Here's a picture of us from 1620.

http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~julieann/art/first-landing-pilgrims-HUS1-57.jpg

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Maddening. Absolutely maddening.

Of course this is a Character Building Experience, but a body becomes very weary of Character Building Experiences.

As I type, a nearly-yellow goldfinch is pigging out on black oil sunflower seeds and a female cardinal is allowed to eat from the feeder, not the ground.

These are good omens.

Hold your dominion.

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Dag - Did you attach a pic of you in costume to let them know how multi-talented :wink: you are?

Hoping and thinking positive thoughts for you.

Although, I really think the pic woulda done the trick ... uh, no pun intended.

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Hi Dagmaraka,
What a bummer! Good luck to you. And yeah, your odds don't sound bad at all.

Wanted to also say that my husband & I have gone through any number of immigration hassles. After a long, agonizing time, things finally came together last summer and we could start breathing again. We had a super-smart, awesome lawyer. I know you said you have a great law-firm you're talking to, but if you'd like to consult with someone else, just to see if they might have a different perspective, I can send you the info. (We did that, talk to a few lawyers, get different perspectives, LOTS of Internet research - specially on http://boards.immigrationportal.com/)

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Just saw this. Im putting an extra strength mojo on the skillet. Never fails..

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dagmaraka wrote:

Right. I can't ploy and plot. I physically cannot do it. I understand that in the grand scheme of things it wouldn't matter much, I'd perhaps even trick the system and such cool things, but I can't.

My father was a professor at the department where I studied. Well, in fact he founded the department and was a rector of the university, so if I wanted to study poli sci, I had no choice.
I never got any favors. In fact, I had to do my exams in front of a committee (we had oral exams, one on one. And he's an easy grader). For my thesis and state exams I had 5 member committees instead of 3, just to demonstrate impartiality.
He never bribed anyone. Not even a doctor, which was totally expected of everyone (you bring coffee, or a bottle of something... a little present). He just wouldn't do it, no matter what was at stake.

So you see, if I succumbed and went that route, I would feel so low. It's not worth it to me, even if the reality will be awful.

It is a sad commentary that our immigration laws and policies are combining to keep out educated, employed, ethical people....

Of course, the immigration laws and policies are designed to protect the kinds of jobs that require education.

Sorry to hear of your woes. I hope everything works out well for you.

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Dag -- Since you travel so much for your job anyway, is it possible you could live in Canada (Montreal, maybe?) and telecommute to Boston? You could always hop a short flight to Boston when you'd absolutely have to be there.....?

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tryingtohelp wrote:

dagmaraka I know we don't know each other and when I read all this it bothered me to see you write that you could care less about this country.

I really care about this country and it disturbs me to hear what you are going through. From what I read it means that this country, my country, is going to turn down visas to highly trained intelligent people as yourself due to a congressionally mandated cap. Then top it off by using a random lottery system to determines who stays and who goes. This just appalls me. I can't imagine the hurt, anger and frustration you must be feeling. I think it is a travesty for this country to do such a thing. I read up a little on it and found this:

"Cap-Exempt Petitions: As directed by the H-1B Visa Reform Act of 2004, the first 20,000 H-1B petitions filed on behalf of aliens with U.S.-earned masters' or higher degrees are exempt from any fiscal year cap on
available H-1B visas. USCIS does not yet know how many of these petitions it has received as those petitions are mixed with the cap-subject cases received on April 2 and 3. USCIS will make a future
announcement regarding the "final receipt date" for these petitions."

So if I read it and understand it correctly up to 20,000 could potentially be in that 150,000 meaning your odds of getting a visa will increase. I know it is not much but every little bit may help. I truly admire your honesty and courage in your situation. I hope you win.

Thanks, tth. Unfortunately, my MA is from Slovakia. I know about that category, and they are separate from the pool I'm in.
About the not caring - I didn't really mean I don't care about this country at all. Obviously I do, otherwise I wouldn't live here for about 10 years now. But I don't really care that much in which country I live and work, I meant. My work is more important to me. As I said, I'd prefer to move back home, but Boston really did become my second home and America as well. I grew up during communism, and we admired America for its values, civil society, for being a place where anyone can make her dreams come true... and while I may have many qualms about the current administration, I still feel the same about the land and the people.

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Eva wrote:

Dag -- Since you travel so much for your job anyway, is it possible you could live in Canada (Montreal, maybe?) and telecommute to Boston? You could always hop a short flight to Boston when you'd absolutely have to be there.....?

Well, if I could telecommute, I'd do it from Slovakia. We have projects in Netherlands and Kosovo, so I could put in an argument that to have an office in Europe makes lot of sense for us, but I do run a lot of things, most importantly fundraising, from Boston... So moving right now would suck. Maybe in a year or two when we'll secure more funds and can hire a CEO so that I can become less place-dependent and really work from anywhere.

So... I spoke to the lawyer right now, and the picture is even more grim. Even more people applied after she gave me the number, so my odds now are perhaps 1:4 or 1:5, we don't even know. She is hoping that Congress will raise the cap, since far more people applied this year than any time before. Congress does that every now and then.
Good news also is that I can apply for the green card even if my H-1B doesn't come through. Shortcoming - I won't be able to travel internationally for 6-8 months. Which, for my work, is...ummm...not good.

I'm not going to India this May, which is actually a relief personally, but sucks workwise. We have to cancel a workshop at the prestigeous Indian School of Business (yep, the one George Bush visited on his last trip to India) because of me. Makes me feel guilty, though I know it's not my fault. But I hate to cause things.

Sorry for rammbling. Today is better than yesterday, because I got used to the idea that the battle is not over, there's a few (quite a few) more months of it ahead and I do see options I have a bit clearer than yesterday. But it's still overwhelming and I have to sort my mind. It's a bubbling mess right now.

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dagmaraka wrote:

Eva wrote:
Dag -- Since you travel so much for your job anyway, is it possible you could live in Canada (Montreal, maybe?) and telecommute to Boston? You could always hop a short flight to Boston when you'd absolutely have to be there.....?

Well, if I could telecommute, I'd do it from Slovakia. We have projects in Netherlands and Kosovo, so I could put in an argument that to have an office in Europe makes lot of sense for us, but I do run a lot of things, most importantly fundraising, from Boston... So moving right now would suck. Maybe in a year or two when we'll secure more funds and can hire a CEO so that I can become less place-dependent and really work from anywhere...

The reason I ask...I have a friend here in Tulsa who telecommutes to Dallas, but also flies in to the Dallas office 1-2 days every week. (It was cheaper for his company than paying for a move.) If you could handle fundraising by telephone, internet, etc., and consolidate your in-person appointments into 1-2 days per week, it might work. At least for the next year or two.

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(and almost anywhere in Canada is waaay cheaper to live than Boston)

I actually thought Costa Rica was a pretty good idea. Seems there's a fair bit going on there in regard to the peace and conflict movement.

ahhhh

this place

http://www3.unesco.org/iycp/uk/uk_visu_projet.asp?Proj=00251

United Nations Agency/University for Peace/located in Costa Rica.

You could teach there - and run your part of the agency from there.

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http://www.upeace.org/

http://www.upeace.org/news/index.cfm?id_activity=475&actual=2007

Quote:

UPEACE and Harvard Business School collaborate on innovate course offering

25 March 2007

Location: UPEACE Headquarters, San José, Costa Rica.

(they've got an office in Switzerland as well - closer to home)

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Lottery to decide my life

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