John in one of your replies to the comments you said: "The underlying motif here was to criticize immigration policy of United States, nothing else. Shanti was catapulted all the way to New York from Nepal when she expected the least, whereas thousands of students who were subjected to tuition and taxes for eons still look on with ambiguity." I personally do not think you and me (who came here as a student) should be criticizing immigration policies comparing ourselves to DV winners. We were the one who submitted all those financial documents at the American embassy telling them we could support ourselves during our stay in the US and would come back to Nepal after finishing studies. Whereas, people like Shanti never did make those commitments to the US government, those people are invited by US government. On the other hand, we are here fooling them with false documents to get visa in the first place, fooling them working at the desis business to get degrees under our belt, and now should we be criticizing immigration policy after done all these? I guess not, at least.Therefore we do not deserve what shanti does. "Shanti, although lacking academic qualification, beats me in every other aspect as long as living in America is concerned." - very true. And i am happy about it. Not because she lacks academic qualification, because she has not deceived US government any kind of way, unlike me and many other students. However, I do keep my spirit high the way Camoflaged said. Having said all these, i must say again, you are a good writer. above comments i made were just my thoughts on immigration policies and not on your story. Waiting to read some more.