Lol I didn’t “flee”, my parents have a relative in the US that filed a petition for family based immigration. One of the major reasons was because of economic issues which was exacerbated by the Hukou system, which means My parents and I were essentially treated like immigrants within our own country. We were from a rural village, and even though my parents were able to save up for an apartment in the city and got a job, they still weren’t considered an actual resident. No free public school for kids, no any sort of benefits from the city. They had to pay for me to go to a private school which had worse education than the public ones (even though the “patriotic education” element of it was essentially on the same intensity). So when I was around age 7 and second grade in China, the immigration petition got approved and we got immigration visas, family of four, Father, Mother, Older Brother, and me. Oh did I mention I was the second born during the One-Child Policy, yea my parents bribed a government official to turn a blind eye about her second pregnancy. She eventually had to be sterilized after my birth so the government can ensure she doesn’t give birth to a third child.

So anyways, after a connection flight in Seoul, we arrived in JFK Airport. So here we are, in the US, and got naturalized a little more than 5 years after arrival.

Did you know how long the visa petition wait list was? More than 13 years! That’s longer than the time I’ve been here! (I’ve been here about 12 years approaching 13 years.) The immigration petition was filed before I was even born!