The immigrants that make the lifts go round

Early Monday morning, Camila Arena leaves her Kings Beach home with her 13 other roommates, eager to start their work day at Palisades ski resort.

The Lake Tahoe region of Northern California holds some of the world’s top skiing, but little is known about the many foreigners that work behind the scenes at these first-rate resorts.

There are an array of different accents from across the globe that can be heard at Tahoe resorts, many of which come from J-1 visa holders. This work and holiday visa allows people from all across the world to work in the United States for a maximum of six months.

While this visa is a great opportunity for young adults from around the world to travel and work during their holidays or extended breaks, there are also many difficulties that J-1 visa workers face, including obtaining the visa in the first place.

23-year-old Camila Arena is a J-1 visa holder from Argentina. She is currently working at Palisades Tahoe Ski Resort during her holiday from university, where she studies criminalistics.

“It’s our summer in Argentina so we don’t have college, so we do the work and travel program to make a little bit of money and to be here in the snow,” said Arena.

Arena lives in King Beach, an outlying neighborhood, with 13 other J-1s, which provides a home-away-from-home for these young travelers.

While this is her second winter working at the resort, Arena has found the visa process hasn’t got any easier.

As a university student like herself, Arena says that there are many hoops to jump through in order to obtain a J-1 visa.

“You feel like they are going to deny the visa and you have already paid for everything to work there and if they deny it you lose all your money,” said Arena.

Arena said last year she got into some trouble for not arriving back to Argentina in time for her when her classes started.

“I arrived only a few days after my classes started and I was warned to be careful next time otherwise they will deny the visa,” she said.

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“It’s really different here, firstly the food is different, the culture is different and we are more friendly in Argentina,” said Arena.

She said the differences between Argentina and Americans she has found are Americans are nice but are more reserved and keep to themselves. She also said Americans don’t party as hard as Argentinians do.

Being away from home can be difficult for many J1 visa workers. Arena finds she misses her family, the food, her friends, and her pets the most.

The Palisades ski resort rentals shop where many foreigners are working inside. Photo: Hannah Truby

With not having the pressure of student life and with the majority of her responsibilities waiting for her back in Argentina, Arena loves spending her holidays working here.

She has found one of the main benefits of the program has been the improvement of her English. Although she has been studying English since she was six years old, Arena has found her pronunciation has improved significantly since working at Palisades.

“Back in Argentina, the first language you learn is English because it is considered essential whereby all education institutions ask for student English levels”, she said.

At Blue Bird where Arena works, she serves her American customers with an effortless smile along with her Argentinian friendliness.

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