Have you tried going on a cruise to the Caribbean or the Mediterranean? I haven’t tried the former but I sure did enjoy the latter.
I wasn’t able to treat my parents on my first paycheck. The first job that I got was with an insurance company in Michigan. Needless to say, I’d just be spending my whole salary for airfare alone if I went back to New York just to share my first pay with mom and dad.
I got to say thank you to them when I got my current job. I went back to New York after spending almost two years in Lansing. My present job doesn’t pay much compared to the previous one, but I’m able to save more here since I’m staying at our old house in Rego Park.
I wasn’t able to treat my parents immediately to a lovely Mediterranean cruise on my first pay check. In fact, it took me 5 months before I could save enough for that trip. It cost me a fortune, but it’s the least that I could do to show them my gratitude for their sacrifices during my college days. They even wanted me to go to law school and promised me that they’ll support me financially. Lucky for them I begged off and decided to give the corporate world a try.
We had a great time seeing Italy and Greece from our room’s balcony. Although I really wanted to stay on land longer, the brief stops were already enough to fill our photo albums to the brim (or rim).
I hope you don’t mind me reminiscing about that particular vacation of ours. I recently came across an article about two persons who fell of their room’s balcony while in a Mexican cruise. I don’t know how they could’ve fallen off from the balcony. The railings are usually high enough to prevent accidents. The report didn’t indicate if they were drunk or under the influence of prohibited drugs. I’m not comfortable leaning too heavily on the railings. I even made sure that my feet are squarely in place on the floor before losing myself at the lovely view of Italy and Greece.
I guess it’s really advisable to travel in groups or in pairs. You’re bound to be shark meal if you fall off a ship without anybody knowing that you’re a passenger thereof. Your relatives might run a people search on you thereafter, but that would already be too late.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Second Chance
I don’t know why American Presidents have a sour charisma towards the citizens of their South American neighbors. I mean, what have they done to deserve such treatment?
I guess it’s not about what they have done which earned them the ire of millions of Latin Americans. Instead, it’s more of what they haven’t done to promote the rights and welfare of those who have migrated to the United States. Latin Americans are by far the fastest growing minority in the country. It won’t be long before their number could influence things in government.
I’m one with the President in his call for a law that would regulate the entry of Latin American migrants, and protect the rights of those who already made it through American soil, whether legally or otherwise. Bush is pushing for a guest worker program that would allow migrants to acquire a limited working visa. These people would soon be granted an option to extend their visas and eventually acquire U.S. citizenship.
Majority of the members of the Senate are quite cold on the Bush’s proposal. They contend that granting illegal immigrants with working Visas is tantamount to condoning their illegal act of entering U.S. soil without going through the prescribed process.
I hope the impasse would not take years to resolve. I think they’ve already realized that penal sanctions do not and would not deter Mexicans and other Latin Americans from crossing the border with the hope of making it big in the country. I had several Latin American classmates in college who admitted that their parents crossed the border illegally to look for a better future in the United States.
I’m sure many were not as lucky as my classmates’ parents. I’ve heard stories where Mexicans tried to beat the authorities to the border, only to be caught or shot in the process. You could just imagine the shock and grief that their relatives felt after they’ve conducted a simple people search on them.
America should start drafting a comprehensive program or law which would facilitate the acceptance of immigrants from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. If the country has accommodated many similar requests for working visas from Asian and European countries, then why can’t we do the same to our closer neighbors?
I guess it’s not about what they have done which earned them the ire of millions of Latin Americans. Instead, it’s more of what they haven’t done to promote the rights and welfare of those who have migrated to the United States. Latin Americans are by far the fastest growing minority in the country. It won’t be long before their number could influence things in government.
I’m one with the President in his call for a law that would regulate the entry of Latin American migrants, and protect the rights of those who already made it through American soil, whether legally or otherwise. Bush is pushing for a guest worker program that would allow migrants to acquire a limited working visa. These people would soon be granted an option to extend their visas and eventually acquire U.S. citizenship.
Majority of the members of the Senate are quite cold on the Bush’s proposal. They contend that granting illegal immigrants with working Visas is tantamount to condoning their illegal act of entering U.S. soil without going through the prescribed process.
I hope the impasse would not take years to resolve. I think they’ve already realized that penal sanctions do not and would not deter Mexicans and other Latin Americans from crossing the border with the hope of making it big in the country. I had several Latin American classmates in college who admitted that their parents crossed the border illegally to look for a better future in the United States.
I’m sure many were not as lucky as my classmates’ parents. I’ve heard stories where Mexicans tried to beat the authorities to the border, only to be caught or shot in the process. You could just imagine the shock and grief that their relatives felt after they’ve conducted a simple people search on them.
America should start drafting a comprehensive program or law which would facilitate the acceptance of immigrants from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. If the country has accommodated many similar requests for working visas from Asian and European countries, then why can’t we do the same to our closer neighbors?
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Seeing Double
I’ve been conducting background checks and people searches for almost a decade now. I’m not exactly sure if it’s a profession. Technically speaking, a profession involves a job which requires certification from a government body. But, then again, a profession may also refer to a vocation or an activity which one habitually does for a living.
I guess I could safely say that I’m already really good at what I do. Although you may contend that doing a people search on the Internet is a no-brainer, there are some tricks that are known only to professionals that could really speed up the process.
As good as I think I am, I committed a blunder recently when a client asked me to look for a particular person in Alaska. I can’t give you the person’s name, so I’ll just concoct a fictional one. Let’s call that guy Michael Doe. Michael Doe is my client’s stepbrother. They haven’t seen each other for 22 years. They were separated by their grandparents when they were just 2 years old.
I thought that the assignment was an easy one. The population density in Alaska is so thin that I think I would be able to find him even if I’ll go there and do the search personally. Of course, that’s impractical. So the next best thing (actually the best) to do is to search for him on the Internet.
I immediately found his name on the database. However, there were two Michael Does on the list. To make the situation more complicated, the photo attached to each of the two person’s file is the same. I thought that it was just an error. I called the site’s administrator and asked if they might have inadvertently duplicated Doe’s records. The person managing the site said that the files are different and that I’m actually looking at two different persons.
The guy on the phone was right. I should’ve read the records thoroughly. They’re really two different persons. The photographs are not identical either. Hmm I guess you already have an idea on why two different persons have, ostensibly, the same photo in their respective files.
They’re twins! Silly me. I didn’t read the entire request form of the client. If I just read a few lines more, I would’ve known that Michael Doe has a twin. They bear the same names, too, albeit the first one is Michael Doe II and his brother is Michael Doe III.
Talk about being very good at what I do. That twin twist really got me. This is the first time that I got a people search request where the person to be searched has a twin. I guess I have to be more careful and attentive next time. I’m sure this is not going to be the last time that I’ll be looking for a person who has a twin brother or sister. I just read a report on Yahoo! that twins are becoming more common.
I guess I could safely say that I’m already really good at what I do. Although you may contend that doing a people search on the Internet is a no-brainer, there are some tricks that are known only to professionals that could really speed up the process.
As good as I think I am, I committed a blunder recently when a client asked me to look for a particular person in Alaska. I can’t give you the person’s name, so I’ll just concoct a fictional one. Let’s call that guy Michael Doe. Michael Doe is my client’s stepbrother. They haven’t seen each other for 22 years. They were separated by their grandparents when they were just 2 years old.
I thought that the assignment was an easy one. The population density in Alaska is so thin that I think I would be able to find him even if I’ll go there and do the search personally. Of course, that’s impractical. So the next best thing (actually the best) to do is to search for him on the Internet.
I immediately found his name on the database. However, there were two Michael Does on the list. To make the situation more complicated, the photo attached to each of the two person’s file is the same. I thought that it was just an error. I called the site’s administrator and asked if they might have inadvertently duplicated Doe’s records. The person managing the site said that the files are different and that I’m actually looking at two different persons.
The guy on the phone was right. I should’ve read the records thoroughly. They’re really two different persons. The photographs are not identical either. Hmm I guess you already have an idea on why two different persons have, ostensibly, the same photo in their respective files.
They’re twins! Silly me. I didn’t read the entire request form of the client. If I just read a few lines more, I would’ve known that Michael Doe has a twin. They bear the same names, too, albeit the first one is Michael Doe II and his brother is Michael Doe III.
Talk about being very good at what I do. That twin twist really got me. This is the first time that I got a people search request where the person to be searched has a twin. I guess I have to be more careful and attentive next time. I’m sure this is not going to be the last time that I’ll be looking for a person who has a twin brother or sister. I just read a report on Yahoo! that twins are becoming more common.
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