I want to go to America. I’ll have a better life there. I want to go to Texas, because I have family there. It’s just my father and I here, because my mother died when I was young.  But I have uncles and cousins in America. My father wants to go too, to be with his siblings and parents. I talk to them over the phone sometimes. They tell me that life is good there, and they invite my father and I to come. Their lives are very different from mine. Here, there’s too much dust, but it’s clean in the U.S. There are more health facilities and good living standards there, but here there’s not enough to eat… 

I’ve applied for resettlement, but I haven’t heard back yet. I think I’ll be able to resettle, though. After I resettle, I want to continue my studies. My goals are to study and to make my future bright. The more education you get, the better job you can get. I’ll do whatever work I can do in America.I’ll be American then. 

I live here in Nepal now and I follow the cultural traditions here. After I resettle though, I’ll do things according to that environment. I want to do what others are doing there. Now I’m Bhutanese, but after I resettle I’ll be a citizen of that country, and I’ll do those things. I’ll study and get a good job. I’ll be happy.

You want to know about my religion? Well, I don’t follow one. I want to be Christian after I resettle, though. All of my relatives in the U.S. are Christian. Some were Christian when they lived here in Nepal, and some became Christian after they went to America. Sometimes I talk to them about it. They tell me that I should convert. They tell me to become Christian too. Nothing happens when you convert, but I think my future will be better if I’m Christian too. My father is Hindu, but I think he’ll also be Christian after we resettle. We talk about it sometimes.

I don’t talk about religion much with my friends though. Some of them are Hindu and some are Buddhist. I think that all religions get along here. Mostly we just talk about our studies and about resettlement. We all go to school together. I spend most of my time with them. I think we’ll still be friends after we resettle. They all want to go to America too, but I think to different states.

If I could, I’d want to come back to Nepal and also to Bhutan after I resettle. I mean, I’ve never been to Bhutan and my father didn’t tell me much about it, but I know people here think about it a lot. Right now, though, I want to go to America. 

If my life were a book, my title would be “The Story of My Life.”