All My Friends Are Immigrants
A limited series podcast featuring interviews and spoken-word essays from my friends who are immigrants, just like me.
I didn’t realize it until I was much older, but my closest friends were just like me. Each of them came from somewhere else. They spoke a language other than English, they had a unique culture, and they were all looking for their own place in the world.
I started All My Friends Are Immigrants for two reasons.
On a personal level, I wanted to get to know my friends again purely through the lens of immigration; to see where our experiences overlapped and where they diverged.
Additionally, I wanted to humanize the idea that we have always moved from place to place. Some of this is an answer to much of the political rhetoric around the world, some is putting a face (or a voice) to the idea of immigration.
Some of these are compelling, while others are average; just two people who have unique perspectives on human movement talking to each other.
You can find All My Friends Are Immigrants on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, and Anchor.
Listen to the trailer here.
Listen up.
The latest episode of All My Friends Are Immigrants.
Episode Nine: Katia Nicolas
Born in Paris, and raised in Japan and San Francisco, Katia made her way to Southeast Asia and now resides in Amsterdam with her partner. Katia is a successful entrepreneur; having started and scaled a sustainable fashion brand from the ground up.
Get to know Katia in the 9th episode of the podcast, where we discuss her winding path to Amsterdam, the philosophy behind her business, and what being third-culture has meant to her.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Eight: Jihan Aziz
My guest today is Jihan Aziz, or Jiji. We’re former colleagues and current LinkedIn friends. Along with her parents and older sister, Jihan immigrated to Toronto, Canada, from Baghdad in Iraq.
I talked to her about her experiences growing up Iraqi in Toronto, representations of Arabs in the media and how she’s perceived by Canadians, and whether she feels connected to her homeland and the region.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Seven: US Voting Rights
Single women and Black men voting in New Jersey's elections until 1807. Scandinavian immigrants favoring literacy tests to prevent Italian immigrants from registering to vote.
Welcome to the complicated history of voting rights in the United States!
No guest this time, but I talk about the brief history of US voting rights, immigration, and the immigration platforms of the presidential candidates in 2020.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Six: Yama Rongomas
Immigration is a multigenerational story. While Yama is not an immigrant herself, she is the daughter of immigrants from Kenya and The Gambia who met in New York.
It’s important to hear from the children of immigrants for several reasons.
A report from the OECD showed that over 25% of children in the US under the age of 18 have at least one immigrant parent. In Canada, the number is 37.5%.
The same report showed that two thirds of kids in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and The Hague schools come from immigrant homes.
The children of immigrants will undoubtedly change the ways that our society functions. Our workforce, cuisines, laws - even social contracts; everything will change over time, in ways that I think will be for the greater benefit of all people who call our multi-cultural countries home.
I’ll let you hear directly from Yama on the ways that being a child of immigrants impacted her life, her movement around the country and the world, if she is proud to call herself American, and how she feels about immigration in the US today.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Five: Isabel Mejia
My guest today is Isabel Mejia and this episode is a bit different. For the first time, I gave my guest a preview of parts of the episode with the final right of refusal on what is being published.
I felt as if Isabel needed more room to have a say in the final product because she has lived in New York City for five years as an Asylee with a pending asylum application before the US government.
I talked to Isabel about her experiences moving to the US, applying for Asylum, being apart from her husband (something that my spouse and I also went through in our immigration process), and finding community in New York.
This episode will also help raise money for the City Bar Justice Center and its Immigrant Justice Project which assists asylum seekers fleeing persecution in their home countries, survivors of violent crimes and trafficking here in the United States, and individuals seeking humanitarian protection and other forms of relief.
I'll be donating $1 for every play that this episode receives between today and November 3, 2020, up to $500 plus all ad revenue from every episode of All My Friends Are Immigrants.
Please share this episode with your friends and families to help get me to my goal. If you want to support the City Bar Justice Center directly, you can donate on their website at www.citybarjusticecenter.org/donate.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Four: Nakita Austin
Nakita was born in New York to immigrant parents, one from Haiti and the other from the Philippines. From there, she moved to the South of the US, a move that could be considered immigration for the stark difference in cultures alone, and eventually made her way to her current home in London, UK.
I talked to Nakita about her experiences in both worlds as a Black woman and child of immigrants, how this affects her at work and in her travels, and the life she plans to give to her daughter.
Before our conversation, I spend a bit of time talking about my own immigration experience, procedurally and remind everyone that the upcoming US election is, in many ways, important to the millions of immigrants who call the country their home, along with their families who feel like they are a world away.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Three: Gleb Nam
I've known Gleb since freshman year of high school. That's nearly 20 years for those doing the math (something we were never very good at).
Like me, Gleb immigrated to Canada from a former Soviet nation. In my case, it was Russia, and in his, it was Kazakhstan.
By the time Gleb arrived in Toronto, I had already become a fully-fledged "Canadian;" he even described me as his Canadian friend, which is a perspective I never even considered. After all, in my mind, I'm a Russian immigrant. Canadians are the other people who lived around me.
I talked to Gleb about his experiences moving to Canada as a teen and then picking up and moving several more times. Whether for school and work, or love and family, Gleb was never a one-directional migrant.
Listen to him tell his story, in his own words.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode Two: Caleb Williams
Caleb and I are former colleagues and our paths crossed only a handful of times. Once when we were both in New York City and another time when we were both in Bengaluru, India.
Caleb is not an immigrant, but he is part of the immigrant story. Since his childhood, Caleb has been grappling with what his heritage means to him, how he stays connected to it, and how he will pass it on to his kids who are now three generations removed from his family's story of immigration.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.
Episode One: Charlie Lim
I met Charlie while we were both living and working in South Korea. For an entire year, we navigated the country’s culture and values together, but in different ways.
Charlie was born in South Korea and immigrated to the United States when he was little. I spoke to him about what growing up Korean in the US was like and how he felt going back.
Also available on iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Pocket Casts.