So this comes as a universal experience for the mass of the human population facing 2020 with the usual threats of existence, survival, politics, economic safety and dealing with physical and mental health.Here's my take on what I have been thinking and experiencing so far within the year.
2020 started with the usual tones of winter, school/class activities for kids and the humdrums of work and life in general. Come February, and we had absolutely no concerns or awareness about the COVID outbreak though there was an increasing information about something growing and spreading around the world. Few of my colleagues with travel plans were anxious to go forward or postpone travel to India and back amidst the rising concerns. Come March and the level of awareness of the virus reaching Seattle and New York started to settle among us but with still no alarming sense of disrupting our daily routine. On a different note, the economic uncertainties were more or less inherent for me with anxieties about my particular team, organization and forecast for the year. From late 2019 there were worries about my job and prospects as our product was struggling and there were pressures to deliver more features and corporate cost cutting by moving work off shore.
Getting further into March, the first signs of disruption emanated from Seattle as they started advising folks to work from home or limit movement with the rising cases. We had an office there so it was a frequent concern although everyone seemed to get pass it and focusing on the their work. The threat of spreading to Atlanta and mostly carried via the international travelers started raising the anxieties to send school to kids or keep coming to work. And all of a sudden, the governor announced shutdown of all public school systems across Georgia. Few days into the kids home schooling and we also got the work notifications to stay home. I was mostly unaffected by the remote work guideline as I had been working with Seattle team though there were growing concerns about hospitality industry in general with the disruption to the global travel and impact to the businesses.
And April came with the domino effect. Covid turned out to be the nail in the coffin for our team as I was laid off on April 2nd in a hasty call with my supervisor and HR going over the severance terms and usual shenanigans. The disruption forced lot of organizations like mine to take those tough decisions of restructuring, attrition to stay afloat. Even my manager was not spared who spent last 8 years with our organization. This hasn't happened the first time to me but it was different as an experience as I had an inherent sense of understanding that everyone was impacted so we have to accept it as fate or act of God.
Nevertheless, a layoff is never pretty and the more immediate concerns started to haunt about getting a new job and the stringent immigration laws which unfortunately have been deteriorating in the Trump administration. There was relief to defer mortgage payments in the wake of the covid situation upto 90 days but the immediate existential threat was to secure my H1b within 60 days or leave the country. This is a major de-moralizer and takes a toll on your mental and physical health. With layoffs across the industries with the rising uncertainties and hiring freeze it became much more difficult to find work.
Besides, the rush to prepare for technical interviews and the increased competition from a large workforce without job caused more threats and worries. In a way, with my impending uncertainty from last few quarters and a dismal town hall from our CEO in 2019 Q4, it was an expected turn of events for me to look for a new job. Just that the timing was rapid and unannounced. It was really a race against time and to find your confidence and skills to ace the interviews and programming tests.
It opens another bag of anxieties to face the tech stack after 2-3 years as you got to keep abreast with latest skills needed, and navigate your way through the crazy asks from recruiters. Moreover, the challenges with algorithms, problem solving and thoroughness with programming problems all attack you. I lost my confidence to face big tech like Amazon, Google, Facebook as there are lot of rounds of coding/technical interviews and some of them were still advertising roles in a specific region not virtual.
I kept preparing for interviews and thankfully my last employer arranged for a month of career counseling with a professional firm to help me with my resume building, grooming, job hunting strategies which greatly benefited me in getting more insights. I had to take some programming tests and I fumbled in quite a few of them. With the clock ticking, I approached an old employer which is a consulting firm to get some contract work. It was chaotic for a while managing so many interviews, calls, emails but finally I landed a confirmed offer and accepted it in May with the brevity of time as there is lot of involved work in applying for immigration papers with an attorney.
I experienced another conflicting situation where I had to decide on another opportunity which was closer to home while still filing papers with the first offer. It was a week of confusion and eventually I goofed up on the hiring interview with the paired programming test and had resorted to the first offer. More importantly, I had to take and accept whatever came on my plate in these uncertain times.
So I secured my job and my work status but it brings back the frustrations of a broken immigration system of this country where I have to keep going back to an existential threat even after staying 16 years and getting my Masters education in a STEM field. People from India and China are screwed with the Green Card backlogs stuck in 2009 and no hope of getting ours in our lifetime. I do feel stupid, vulnerable and helpless as we have been going along with our lives, settled down, bought homes, raising kids and can't suddenly dismantle everything and head back to our home country. There could be an improving situation in India with more vibrant sectors in economy, but there is lot of anxieties about gelling into the culture, making ends meet and getting kids and wife to adjust.
I don't have much choice with the environmental factors. If my time has come to return to my country I will gladly accept it but it is a major hit to sell home, dispose of everything and start again (literally). I am not alone, millions are in the same boat like me with one leg here and another craving to set foot. We keep hearing of people migrating to Canada but that also seems implausible now with my age and their point based merit system. Being in my 40s its not worth it now to move to Canada with family.
Well talking about how things impacted me so far there is this realization that a bigger movement shaped up recently and I ponder how do we connect to it. The Black Lives Matter movement garnered lot of steam with the Minneapolis incident and the widespread outrage among the communities across the country. I am very well aware about the racial past of this country and the broken promises and sufferings faced by the Black community. However, I feel invisible and inert to this movement as I don't know how to show my support or concerns about the civilian matters which hardly much rights entitled to us as non-immigrants.
I can sound selfish and mean but honestly, with the amount of surveillance, draconian policies rampant in this government, it is a threat to protest publicly. How some crazy psychopaths react and attack us and if any risks to our immigration status, will make me a very meek and timid person to show any resistance or protest. Also, I don't agree with all of the things happening in terms of looting, advantageous thefts, vandalism of public property, small businesses in the garb of these protests. What benefit do you get by burning shops, cars or robbing a store. Are you sending a message to the authorities that we won't let you run business as usual unless you bring a change to civil rights. I do agree with that. A change is badly needed but it has gotten better to where we were in the 60's in southern US. And the police force badly needs reform with their unaccountable brutal conduct. A life lost is gone forever and no one has the right to kill someone. I also understand people are frustrated with the covid thing and all are venting out there anger to things at large.
I ponder back to the question, what can I do to show my support. Can I give money? Well I have been and I would love to donate money to good causes like hunger, poverty, support to victims. But to donate money to a political cause, I cannot do as I dont have a political visibility. It is a matter of civil rights for me too as I own a home, pay taxes, the circle of economy runs coz of tax paying people like me and yet I dont have any right to vote or show my public position on the challenges this nation faces.
When it comes to immigration, all the limelight and bad news is taken up by cross border illegal immigration. That deserves attention but look at how badly that has been handled by this administration. People do exploit lame immigration laws. But there is a reason so many of the families are migrating on foot to enter the US. And its a well known fact the engine of economy depends on the labor force whic is supplemented with undocumented workers who work on petty wages. There are cases where they are a threat to US workers. But lot of US workers dont want to do those jobs. So why not give a work permit to anyone entering the US border and make sure they can get the right wages and are visible to the administration. That ways, they pay taxes and complete the economic equation.
Coming back to the chaos of legal immigration, like me millions are stuck in the work status situation as there is no stability, peace of mind without proper immigration status. I am a knowledge and skill worker. I dont take away job from another deserving American. Its a free market. A match of a skill and the industry is always random and fair. Lot of the tech industry report lack of workforce with right skills. I didn't come in this country to loot or exploit its resources. I did my part. Went to college. Paid the tuition fees and have been paying taxes last 15-16 years. I buy insurance of all kinds (health, auto, home, life) so I participate in the pillars of this economy. Then why the injustice and marginalization for us?
Its a civil rights movement for us too. America is not just black or white. It is brown and lot of other colors too.
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