the american dream application process

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I know a few things to be true. I do not know where I am going, where I have come from is disappearing, I am unwelcome, and my beauty is not beauty here. My body is burning with the shame of not belonging, my body is longing. I am the sin of memory and the absence of memory. I watch the news and my mouth becomes a sink full of blood. The lines, the forms, the people at the desks, the calling cards, the immigration officers, the looks on the street, the cold settling deep into my bones, the English classes at night, the distance I am from home.

— Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth (2011)

“Memphis to Boston” by Alex Nabaum

For the last eleven months, I have been working as an Immigration Paralegal in a law firm located in Upstate New York. This coming Thursday will be my last day in the office. I’m typing this while I’m at work because I actually have the time to do so. No more cases are being dropped on my desk because everyone who normally calls upon me knows that my time here is coming to an end. Why make me start something that I won’t be around to finish?

The work I’ve done with this firm hasn’t been easy. Given that it’s a relatively small firm, my duties extend past the regular research work expected of a Paralegal. My work is a lot more client-facing. Since my very first day here, I have been given the task of onboarding asylum-seeking clients.

Potential clients come in and they tell the secretary that they are currently in removal proceedings. They’d like to apply for asylum. They’d like the firm to represent them in both instances. The secretary will tell them there’s a consultation fee of $250—two hundred and fifty dollars must be paid to be heard. Some of them can pay it. Some of them. I get called in to take over once the price is paid.  

Most of the first consultation meetings go the same; clients aren’t aware of how much information, details and evidence is required for an asylum application so the consultation is less about me receiving anything physical from them and more about me speaking to them, speaking with them, trying to understand what exactly their story is and whether there is a case in there somewhere. I have spent hours with people from across the world. I have sat opposite grown men, grown women, mere teenagers, as they’ve wept out stories of how they fled their home countries, how they’ve run to America with the hope of freedom and safety as their primary fuel.  

I am then tasked with the job and burdened with the audacity to ask them if they can prove it.

Can you prove it? Can you prove that what you’re saying isn’t just a story? You said your family home was burnt down… Do you have proof? Ah, you have a picture! Do you have anything that proves that this ruined home is actually your ruined home? A signed deed, maybe? You said you were beaten and berated by members of the military… Do you have medical reports? No? I’m afraid we need solid proof. Evidence. Yes, I see that you still have the scar on your back but there’s no knowing how you really got it. Do you have pictures of the relative that you said was killed? A video, perhaps? A death certificate? I understand that you watched your mother die, but you need to understand that that’s not enough. Here, your tears are not enough.

I met with a prospective client that was the same age as my little sister…

Their birthdays were eerily close—a mere two days off. I had to excuse myself about thirty minutes into our consultation meeting. I fled to the bathroom, pressed my forehead against the bathroom mirror in an attempt to calm myself down. I flushed the toilet, flicked the faucet and let the water run, watched it swirl down the basin. Then I returned to my task prodding at the child’s sore spots to ensure that they were there, that they were deep enough to amount to a winnable case. According to me and— more importantly, I’ve begrudgingly come to realize—according to the attorneys of the firm, they did. The bruises were there and they were plentiful. The child had his Master Hearing back in February; his Individual Hearing, the hearing where a final decision will be made, is scheduled for January next year. The child is twenty years old. My little sister is twenty years old, too. The child fled to America alone, yet he left no one behind. My little sister will always be a child to me, to the rest of my family. I don’t know if my client ever got that chance.

I had to turn away a man from my tribe…

Every day, I wear the same necklace to work. A gold chain with a gold Africa pendant attached. It’s a conversation starter for a lot of the people I speak with—it helps them place me before I even open my mouth. This man didn’t have to look at the pendant to know where I was from; all he had to do was look at the name on my contact card. “You’re Igbo,” he’d said when I walked into the consultation room, my card pinched between his fingers. “Kedu k i mere?”

Despite knowing my name, despite knowing how to pronounce it, the man continued to call me sister throughout the whole forty-minute meeting. He called me sister as he gave me his story, called me sister as I picked his story apart, called me sister as he left the office after being informed by one of the attorneys that they needed more concrete evidence, he needed more concrete evidence, before the firm could confidently represent him in his removal proceedings. As he left, I wished him a nice afternoon. He said, “you too, sister.” Here, your words aren’t enough.

I went to a bar a couple months ago and ran into a client in the bathroom…

Living out here has been lonely. I don’t know anyone outside of my family members and I can only hang out with my cousins so many times before wanting a change of pace. I met a couple of people from Bumble BFF (desperate times, desperate measures) and we all made plans to go to a local bar, book a booth, and spend a good chunk of our evening drinking and receiving free chocolates from an overly friendly waiter. Did we all look good that night, or did he just want tips? Are all acts of kindness done with the expectations of a reward?

Eventually, I needed to pee. One of the girls I was out with tagged along. The bar had two single stall toilets, both unisex but one was occupied. So, imagine my surprise when my friend pushed open the unlocked toilet to find it occupied by not just another person, but one of my most recent clients.

Mrs. B wasn’t just in the bathroom. No. She was cleaning it. She noticed my friend first, asked her to wait outside for a moment while she finished up but then, she noticed me. I remember the way her face split into a grin. I remember her hefty casefile. In fact, as I type this, I can see it sitting fat and orange on the far-left corner of my desk. I remember how she sobbed during our first consultation meeting, how we had to cut the meeting short because she was, understandably, too distraught to continue. I remember how my questions were helping the case but hurting her, no matter how softly I spoke.

My new friend ended up using the bathroom first. During the time it took for her to pee, Mrs. B—her fingers damp with soap but tight about my hand—led me towards the end of the hallway, through a curtain that led into the kitchen.

“I work here,'" she told me once we stood amongst the ovens. She sent me a secretive smile. “I know I’m not supposed to work but the owner is kind, and he doesn’t care.”

She told me that the owner is the man that she came into the office with, the man who was kind enough to pay for all her legal fees. I got introduced to her daughter next because, yes, her daughter was there too. Her nose was deep in her tablet. She didn’t spare me a glance when her mother told her to say hello. Still, I smiled down at the top of the young girl’s head. I’m almost glad that she didn’t smile back. I don’t think I would’ve been able to handle it if she did.

“You must be great at your job,” my friend commented after we’d both finished using the bathroom and begun our drunken descent back down the stairs, back towards the bar’s main floor where our drinks and chocolates and night of careless behaviour awaited us.

I don’t know what prompted her to make that comment. I don’t remember what I said in response.

Mrs. B’s court date has not yet been scheduled with the Immigration Court.

I want to lay down, but these countries are like uncles who touch you when you're young and asleep. Look at all these borders foaming at the mouth with bodies broken and desperate...I spent days and nights in the stomach of the truck; I did not come out the same.

— Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth (2011)

Guilt. Every single day that I’ve stepped into this office, I have been faced with immense guilt. In many ways, I play the role of the firm’s sieve. What cases make it through? Which ones get turned away at the door? It doesn’t matter how much I soften my voice or dance around the subject—I am tasked with evaluating whether someone’s suffering is worthy enough to be represented by the firm. I’ve tried to ease this guilt by telling myself that turning someone away isn’t always the worst thing. Wouldn’t it be worse for them to pay the legal fees for a case that won’t go anywhere? That line of reasoning is flimsy against the force of my guilt. It does nothing for me, does nothing for them. It does fucking nothing. There are times where I have been able to persuade my boss and/or the other attorneys to take on a client at a heavily discounted price but, even then, that’s not enough. Getting legal representation is only the first obstacle when applying for asylum and making your way through removal proceedings. The next obstacle is, of course, the government. 

There’s one client I have been working closely with since August last year…

I helped him get a discount on his legal fees, helped him submit his asylum application, and then began helping him apply for Employment Authorization (EAD) and Temporary Protected Status (TPS).

I could bore you with what each of these things mean but that’s not the point I’m trying to make here. What I want you to understand is that these applications (like almost all other Immigration applications) cost money. The TPS application costs $80. The EAD application costs $520. My client couldn’t pay this. But thank God, we could fill out a fee waiver on his behalf! Surely, by explaining on this fee waiver application that my client has no income because his status makes it not just impossible but illegal for him to work, they will be willing to waive the fee and accept his application! Surely!

The government agency rejected the fee waiver application.

I’m paraphrasing but, essentially, the rejection notice said this: to prove the lack of income, you must provide proof of insufficient income. Simply saying you don’t have any money isn’t substantial proof of having insufficient income. Here, your words aren’t enough. We need evidence. We need solid proof.

I had to relay this message to the client, heard his breath catch over the phone at the sound of bad news. How do you prove the existence of nothing?

Guilt. I have sampled it in excess while sitting at this desk. It’ll follow me long after I leave this job. I think about my blackness, my queerness, my low-income background often. How could I not when the world around me shoves it back in my face every chance it gets? I think about how all these aspects of my identity come together to dis-enfranchise me in the West, but working this job has made me confront all the ways that I am, for lack of a better word, better-off. I left the United Kingdom, came to America and took on this job with only a visa interview as my hurdle to jump, yet I’ve spoken to prospective clients that are tasked with doing the impossible to even qualify for the chance of building a life here. Guilt. Eleven months of this work has left its mark.

The first part of this post was written on Monday 27, May. I’ve been sitting on it for a while; posts that mean a lot to me, that expose a lot, are always a little harder to let go of. Still, since you’re reading this, I have clearly posted it and, as I always do, I have media recommendations. Movie recommendations. Chi Chit Chat was birthed on the back of me interacting with media that mirrors or hovers a magnifying glass over reality, and I have movies that I’ve watched that have done just that. Movies that look at the lives of asylum/refuge seekers, undocumented immigrants, and the tension that their displacement causes.

Limbo (2020) dir. Ben Sharrock

Omar has sent out his asylum application and now he’s awaiting the result of his claim. Residing in a remote Scottish island—an island he can’t leave until he knows his application’s verdict—Omar is forced into a period of inescapable waiting. He walks about the bare terrain of the island, interacts with its natives, interacts with the other refugees also biding their time, and as he moves around, he lugs a large wooden case about with him. This isn’t a suitcase, though. No. It’s his oud—a Middle Eastern string instrument gifted to him by his grandfather. When he was back in Syria, Omar was hailed as a talented musician, well-versed in playing the instrument, however, now he is miles away from home, seemingly injured, and he can’t find it in himself to even open the instrument’s case.

You know they put us out here, in the middle of nowhere, to try and break us?

This movie is aptly named. Omar is forced to exist in a constant space of unknowing, a space of not truly belonging or having the permission to properly settle down. This unknowing isn’t only about his own situation in Scotland but it also extends to the family he’s had to leave behind. We don’t see any of these family members. Instead—like Omar—we get snippets of them through phone-booth calls interspliced throughout the whole film. The only thing from home that he does have on his person is, in fact, the oud that he spends most of the film refusing (read: unable) to play. The oud is, therefore, a symbol of his home, the weight of which he must carry always, its existence bringing him equal-parts joy and sorrow.

Despite how bleak the overall look and feel of the film is, it still manages to be funny. I was both surprised and impressed by how well the film steered clear from making the main refugee cast the butt of the jokes. Not once is Omar or his situation mocked. Instead, the humour is gentle, and empathetic but the movie doesn’t let you forget the reality of the situation that Omar and the rest of the refugees are dealing with—the looming presence of a potential rejection letter.  

Nanny (2022) dir. Nikyatu Jusu

Aisha is trying to earn enough money to move her six-year-old son and her cousin out of Senegal and into the United States. Being an undocumented immigrant in New York City makes this an especially difficult task; none of the work she finds is stable or well-paying, resulting in her being separated from her family for a whole year. However, things start to look up for her when she is hired to babysit the daughter of Amy and Adam Hav, a wealthy White American couple.

This psychological horror infused with West African folklore explores several aspects of the immigrant experience. It explores displacement, exploitation and the tension created by living approximate to privilege all while having no real access to it for yourself. The wealthy couple that Aisha works for often bring her into the fold. They invite her to dinner and invite her to stay the night when she works late, but each one of these kindnesses are shrouded with the expectations of her compliance. She does all this to then be paid late, gas-lit by the wife and preyed upon by the husband. She’s vulnerable because of how desperately she needs the job. Saying no isn’t as simple as saying no.

How do you use your rage? Is it your superpower, or is it your kryptonite?

There’s an anger that thrums throughout this film. As Aisha longs for her own child, her circumstances have forced her to care for the child of another and the irony of the situation doesn’t leave her unaffected. There are scenes where she’s interacting with the child and she just stares at her blankly, so devoid of emotion that you’re left asking if she truly cares enough for the child to be trusted to properly babysit her. It’s an ugly anger that Aisha, herself, fears.

It would’ve been easy for the director to use the fantastical, folklore elements to exacerbate Aisha’s anger but, instead, Jusu does the opposite. The presence of Anansi, the trickster God, and Mami Wata, are used to assuage Aisha’s anger and her distance from home. In the same way Omar’s carrying of his oud kept him tethered to his home-country despite his change of location, these African deities play the same role for Aisha. Sure, they are used for scares, but they are more than the vengeful deities that they are normally depicted as in media. Anansi is her caretaker, reminding her that she must remain resilient in the face of the difficulties (emotional and otherwise) she’s facing while in the United States. Mami Wata works as her messenger. Despite the ocean separating Aisha from Senegal, Mami Wata and her connection to the water are used a visual motif to symbolise that Aisha is and will always be connected to Africa in some way—distance be damned.  

Fremont (2023) dir. Babak Jalali

Twenty-something year old Donya used to be a translator for the United States military in Afghanistan. Lucky enough to snag a seat on a flight, Donya now finds herself in Fremont, San Francisco. We meet her as she’s in the process of trying to build a life for herself while a dead-end job in a Chinese fortune cookie factory. Unfortunately, she’s struggling. She can’t sleep. She’s troubled by her “luck” and how it has taken her away from her home-country, her family. She deals with being labelled a traitor amongst those in her native home and amongst the other Afghans living in her Fremont neighbourhood.

A lot like Limbo (2020), this movie is focused on highlighting the stillness, the feeling of stagnancy, that often is experienced by immigrants who move and are made to carve out a life for themselves in a society not entirely willing to embrace them. This is not only seen in the stylistic black and white that the movie maintains throughout, but it’s also seen in the actual work that Donya does. She spends hours of her day working with fortune cookies, writing up messages that are meant to inspire change, all while she continues the monotonous work of living pay cheque to pay cheque, having no real life outside of her commute to and from work. How can you write about hope for others when you have so little for yourself? Donya is dealing with an immense amount of survivor’s guilt that intensifies when she starts wanting more. She feels that it’s wrong to try and seek out joy, seek out love, when her own family members are still living in a country plagued by conflict.

This film is tender in two senses. Tender in the sense that Donya is bruised by her past, bruised by her decision to leave Afghanistan as soon as she got the chance. This bruise makes it hard for her to sleep, hard for her to connect, hard for her to look forward into the future without pain. Tender in the sense that amongst all this bleakness, Donya still finds support and a shoulder to lean on in a colleague, a therapist willing to give her free sessions, and a potential romantic partner she stumbles upon when she least expects it. Amongst the bleakness, she comes to realise that there might, indeed, be life left for her to live. Life that she’s worthy of living.

So… what’s the conclusion? That’s always the question when I’m writing something. How do I draw what I’ve said to a neat end, an end with a moral, with a final, lasting thought for the reader to take away? I’m struggling with that. How can I conclude something that… hasn’t ended? Even in the movies listed above, each story is left with an open, ambiguous ending. Each director refuses to placate the viewer with a Happily Ever After. In real life, sure, I’m not working at the office anymore but almost all of the people that I’ve worked with that are seeking asylum still have pending claims and as long as Global North continues to suck the Global South of its resources, as long as governments see human bodies as acceptable sacrifices for the expansion of empire, people will continue having to flee their homes in an attempt to access their right to live, somewhat, peacefully. And what of the people who don’t leave their home-countries? What of the people who simply can’t, either because of funds or because the ability to move across borders is a privilege in and of itself? 

So, if there’s no conclusion yet… what then? What does one do in the meantime? What does one do with their own privlege, their own guilt? 

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Donation Links:

Stand Against Modern Slavery

Friends of Congo

UK Sudanese Students Societies Collaboration — a group of university Sudanese Societies in the United Kingdom, raising funds to send emergency medical aid into Sudan.

Sudanese Amercian Physicians Association (SAPA)

eSims for Gaza

Feminine Hygiene Kits for Gaza