I am trying now to organize a support group for women and children who get abandoned like this so if you are one of them or you know anybody please contact me at yasinpashmina@gmail.com

Hmmm, yeah I have heard of that trade in the States and Caustic alluded to it in the comments above. As I said, my hope is over the course of this blog, to help our community get to a place where we don’t need to do this.

If I may ask, how does one get a marriage partner for papers? Do they just outright ask? I am just curious as to how the process would work because I am sure it must be very uncomfortable in the beginning…..

Stick to your unique, authentic self, style and flavor.

Your difference== (you and your work) is not in your similarity to others but in your difference from others!

The only reason people fail is broken focus.
By all means, learn and grow and sharpen your edges but don’t be distracted by other voices.

Good Job on your blog.

I am not sure what you mean by,”why don’t we see more of them and their stories on television?” The topic of immigrants, particularly Latin immigrants is in the news and on the tongues of politicians all the time. If you want to incite the American people, start a topic on the Mexican/American border, gets us going everytime.

I don’t know about where you live, but here in the states there are some lawyers that take advantage of immigrants. They will charge large sums of money promising a permanent resident card which they will never receive. And what makes this so horrible is that it is usually a lawyer that is Latin, taking advantage of his own people. Stuff like this never ceases to amaze me. I think this is one of the reasons there are so many “paper” marriages, it is my understanding that anywhere from 50%-75% of all marriages between an American and an immigrant is for papers. Whether or not the American realises it. I was going to write an entry about paper marriages, but you beat me to it. I think now I will write an entry to inform Americans of all that is entailed in marrying an immigrant. So many Americans go blindly into a union and do not fathom what sort of responsibility they have taken on.

No, thank you for engaging with me. Thank you so much for your ideas and insights, what you just did is pretty much why I always say I have the best readers online……not just empty criticism, but criticism that comes with positive ideas and contributions that can make the tapestry of our collective knowledge and understanding even deeper.

If you wish to engage in dialogue outside of this blog, my inbox is always open….always open.

I totally agree on my having social responsibility no doubt about that. But I think you will agree that my blog is quite separate from other blogs and other journals written for African immigrants by African immigrants in that:

a) As a blog,it’s core reasons for existence are to serve other people and for me to someday make a living off of it: This blog doesn’t exist for me to rant about anything or everything that I feel I want to talk about, anything I want to write is viewed through the lens of my passions and interests vs will it be off use to African immigrants.

b) It’s separate from journals in that it’s written in predominantly my voice, including of course voices of people on podcasts and guest posts, which I hope to include more of as time goes by.

Now this is just for me, but one thing I don’t tend to enjoy about newspapers and journals is that they tend to discuss important, day to day issues from a place of clinical, logical attachment (if you don’t understand what I mean by this let me know). I personally feel that the most progress and “real discussion” will be had when we not only logically detach ourselves from the discussion but also take time to talk about and understand how we emotionally engage with a topic area, what are our feelings, prejudices and so on and so on about that.

Over time I have realized the quickest way to get people to think along those lines and talk about how they emotionally engage in something is for me to do it myself, plus I enjoy doing it. So, I think in me giving my emotive view points and discussing my prejudices and failings, I am fulfilling my very unique responsibility – not quite a journal/not quite a blog/not quite a radio show.

As a brief digression, I genuinely believe once people are passionately engaged in something in the right way then we can easily use our logic to get us to where we want to go. Any, digression……

Now, when I wrote the article above it was JUST about African immigrants. When I wrote it, I wasn’t thinking about traditional or modern day marriages on the African continent, or Western marriages, I only wanted to open a discussion on this sub-category of marriages called “paper marriages”.

If anyone inferred anything about other types of marriages outside of paper marriages, let me set it straight, that wasn’t my intention (hmmm, I clarify my intentions a lot lately, me thinks I will begin every article by stating my intention, I dunno……)

As for all the ideas you have let me strongly encourage you, let’s not talk about it, you are clearly an intelligent guy, be about it. I have heard many ideas, from mentorship programs, to engaging in politics and they are all fantastic in intention, but my hope is that we can put those great intentions and our huge knowledge base into action.

Now, as the blog goes along, my intention(has been for a while) is to get a lot more podcast interviews on how folks can leverage immigration law to their benefit and on the immigration process, visa acquring process, as well as how to achieve material and relationship success…..and I am working hard on that behind the scenes…..once you bring any one of your visions to light, I will gladly gladly promote them and help out any way I can.

And as a quick final note, I think people take something very important from granted some times, I have been here since my teens and I am writing this as a young adult, as this blog goes along I will actually, I kinda have through podcast interviews, cover the entire spectrum of the experience regardless of age. The good (passion of the youth, experience of older adults), the bad (the condescending nature of older adults, sexual immaturity of younger people) and the ugly.

Interesting feedback, while I may suggest we take this dialog off your blog so that others don’t feel like these are personal attacks. I think your reply was broad enough so its probably okay to have others read this dialog. I appreciate the prompt reply and seemingly upbeat enthusiastic optimistic outlook on how your website works/should work.

As a blogger, or as a publisher you have a social responsibility, especially because your audience is very niche oriented. Its fair for me (us) in the diaspora to demand a level of social responsibility because your visions, processes, ideals, and perceptions sort of shape up who we are as a community and as a culture. Its a heavy burden to carry, but its the position you put yourself in when you decided to start this blog, and when you decided to channel your thoughts and opinions towards immigrants (immigration, lifestyles or cultures, communities and other related focus based categories that go with your site).

Ideally this blog makes you vulnerable to many things, but the point is not to embrace vulnerability as a point of reference for your ideas, but to use vulnerability to establish accurate journalism. The web today has allowed anyone to carry a voice, you now share a % of the voice that many media companies are screaming for. It is your responsibility and duty to ensure that when you post items you at least give them due diligence or mind share they deserve in order to engage intelligent conversation, meaningful talk and most importantly constant feedback (to get that traffic you are looking for)

Online advertising is not failing because there is lack of traffic, online advertising fails because of lack of context (relevancy). And not that I am saying that’s your objective, but it would be/ could be if you focused more on relevancy, maturity, and mindfulness.

There are many contributors to this blog who are my friends, up and including Linda whom you interviewed. I dont have to share the same views with her on her journeys – but I think there are general skews to your direction that alienate a lot of people who could or would rather have made this such a huge breakthrough blog where people come to learn and get tips on how to survive and how to get by in foreign countries.

I can envision database of lawyers to help people tackle this very issue readily available as opposed to the approach you took. I can envision a group of scholars gainfully engaged in directional thought processes and conversations to answer to your rhetoric and ultimately a blog that once was a voice/ free for all. Becomes an authority, a mediator, a transitional voice for any African who is about to leave his country to learn about the experiences and challenges and journey with discovering a new home, far away from home. I can envision a database of key people through out the globe readily provide their contact info to assist any Kenyan in need of assistance settling.

Anyway am rambling and digressing right now. My point is you have a social responsibility. Please find the right balance for your content or posts in order to get the best outcome or responses without insulting the very same community you hope to serve. For instance this article is just not ethically correct on many levels which I cant describe, however if I had the option to write this piece I probably would have talked about the challenges people forgo that make them opt in to planned marriages. Your assumption here is that other communities don’t do it, your assumption here is changing the context of marriage for many people. In the US couples marry for economical reasons, for convenience for friendship, for love… This wouldn’t be a point of discussion really because your definition of marriage would be conflicted. I live in San Francisco, where the City just passed a law that allows Gay couples to legally get married. (although not Federally approved or recognized) Why do you think Gay people have been fighting so hard to gain equal marital rights.. Anyway again this is such a broad topic.. that you could have approached differently… but then again that would be the Leo approach.. and it wouldn’t authenticate your blog.

Thanks none the less its been an engaging dialog.