My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant - Jose Antonio Vargas

Jose Antonio Vargas, an undocumented immigrant from the Philippines who went on to become a Pulitzer prize winning author, has written a moving account of his personal experience in an attempt to influence immigration policy in Washington, D.C.

A brief excerpt:

I’ve tried. Over the past 14 years, I’ve graduated from high school and college and built a career as a journalist, interviewing some of the most famous people in the country. On the surface, I’ve created a good life. I’ve lived the American dream.

But I am still an undocumented immigrant. And that means living a different kind of reality. It means going about my day in fear of being found out. It means rarely trusting people, even those closest to me, with who I really am. It means keeping my family photos in a shoebox rather than displaying them on shelves in my home, so friends don’t ask about them. It means reluctantly, even painfully, doing things I know are wrong and unlawful. And it has meant relying on a sort of 21st-century underground railroad of supporters, people who took an interest in my future and took risks for me.

The complete article:

My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant - NYTimes.com