Ananya Joshi moved to America in 2022 to pursue her master’s degree. She got the job but her employer could not sponsor her H-1B visa and she eventually had to leave the US. But now after working in Germany, Joshi is hesitant about returning to the US as uncertainty still remains. Instead, she wants to go back to India and start something of her own. In an interview with Business Insider, Joshi explained how dear the American Dream was to him. She grew up seeing a small souvenir of the Statue of Liberty. His father saved for years to finance his American degree, as it was initially his dream that he could not fulfill.In 2022, Ananya moved to Illinois to pursue a master’s degree in Biotechnology at Northwestern University; He graduated in 2024, worked on F1 OPT for a while and then had to quit his $75,000 a year job.“My company, which initially promised to help me apply for an H-1B visa, realized that it could not keep its promise. The company said that it could not complete the Federal Employment Verification System E-Verify. My OPT was scheduled to end in July 2025, and I was not able to devote time to looking for a job due to my heavy workload. In May 2025, I told the company that I would like to resign or work part-time. I would like to because I need the last two months to understand things. I was let go the next day,” Joshi said.“I started applying for jobs in cities around the world, focusing primarily on the US but also in Europe, Canada, and Australia. Even after giving about 20 interviews and getting to the fourth round several times, I was still not getting a job. This happened between May and July 2025, when immigration unrest in the US was starting to increase.”“I got two job offers, one from a company in Germany and the other from Canada. People around me talked a lot about the stability of Germany and all its labor laws, and after going through so much, I realized I needed that stability. So, in January this year, I moved to Rostock, a small city about three hours north of Berlin, to work on another lab-grown meat startup,” Joshi said.Life in a small town in Germany compared to New Delhi and ChicagoJoshi said life never felt slow in New Delhi and Chicago and hence adjusting to a small town in Germany has been difficult. But Rostock is much cleaner and safer because of walkable roads, beautiful beaches and the Wilderness Train. “But it’s a small place, and there’s not that much to do. The language barrier is also a problem; English is spoken at work, but everything outside is in German. I’ve started taking German classes.”“It’s also not the best place for connectivity. The nearest airports are Hamburg and Berlin, both more than three hours away. As an immigrant, being able to travel easily means a lot to me, especially if I need to catch a flight quickly.”
From American Dream to Make in India
Joshi’s boyfriend is in America and she said she is very confused about the future. Part of her wants to go back to the US, but “I can’t forget what I’ve been through. It doesn’t make sense to go back unless things look more promising”, she said. So instead of following the prescribed path from H-1B to green card, she is now considering a future in India – in Mumbai or Bangalore. He said, “India is close to America in terms of opportunities and there is a lot of scope to further my career there.”