He changed his friend’s life thanks to his hidden past: the story of two inseparable New York drifters

It would not be strange that in a few years we see a fiction film or a Netflix documentary that tells the story tin chin Y Mo Lin. It would be like those friendship stories from the Green Book. For the whole family and, depending on who keeps it, much more moving than the 2019 Oscar.

The protagonists would be two actors who play Messrs Chin and Lin and the screenwriter could be Sam Dolnick, the reporter who broke the story on July 8, 2022 in the New York Times. The key point of the plot, the one that completely overturns the story, that of the night when Lin receives a terrible beating in his sleep. They should prevent the result from being a low blow.

I: Two tramps in New York

The film, which will navigate between past and present, could begin with a scene depicting the protagonists’ first meeting at the Barbara Kleinman Residence for the homeless.

The story began in East Williamsburg, New York, United States, in 2012. Chin first saw Lin in the distance and decided to speak to her only because she was Chinese like him. The only Chinese in the place.

Chin couldn’t believe how he, a graduate and civil servant, lived in a place like this. Even so, being on the canvas itself, I believed the undocumented Lin was much worse.

Conversation goes, conversation comes, Chin and Lin became close friends. They spent so much time together that in the residence they were known as “the brothers”.

Over time, Chin has established himself as the leader of the duo. Lin, who had been a cook for a while in New York, was still so lost in a country that he didn’t know that Chin next to him looked like a tour guide.

Homeless friends used to go out together to walk around the city. They visited all the iconic places in the Big Apple: they ate hot dogs in Coney Island, they took the ferry to Staten Island and they saw the Statue of Liberty up close, they had lunch at gas stations, they went to the MET, they visited Central Park, were dazzled by tigers at the Bronx Zoo and even took a picture with Santa.

In turn, Chin, who had more experience in everything, gifted Lin his knowledge of the culture. Along with Chin, Lin used the Internet for the first time, watching films he never imagined seeing – or even knew they existed – and reading books he would never find in China.

Their friendship story peaked in August 2014 when Lin was sleeping soundly one night and a resident of a hostel with a criminal record rushed at him and beat him in the face..

That day Chin, instead of helping him, he was satisfied. “Lin! This is a once-in-a-hundred-year opportunity! That’s all!” she said aloud.

II: The customs officer

Flashbacks would be the order of the day in Chin and Lin’s film. Especially since Chin hides a dark past.

In the nineties, until they put him in jailChin was an immigration officer at John F. Kennedy Airport. He worked by interviewing desperate Chinese like Lin who were seeking asylum in the United States.

In 1993, federal agents found $ 1,700 in his pocket and discovered that the money came from a Chinese businessman he had extorted. Chin had told the man that if he didn’t pay him what he asked for, he would send him back to his country. Consequence: one year of imprisonment.

Ten years later, in 2003, an investigation revealed that Chin was the leader of an international conspiracy to defraud Chinese immigrants. They claimed that they had taken their life savings from poor compatriots.

According to prosecutors, Chin had set up fake offices all over New York, where in exchange for exorbitant fees he promised Chinese immigrants that they could take their relatives to the United States and obtain visas. Consequence: nine years of imprisonment.

Chin has always denied the second of his crimes. She accused the first of his crimes – and only for him – of conditioning him.

III: The U visa

The moment of revelation should be filmed very well. It should be emotional yes or yes.

Chin got excited when Lin was beaten because He recalled that in the United States there was a U visa, a visa created in 2000 to protect immigrant victims of crime.

As soon as the light went on, he spoke to an immigration attorney, TJ Mills, to investigate whether the U visa could be effective for Lin. He wanted his friend to leave his residence once and for all and settle in the United States as a citizen.

When Mills looked into the case, he agreed with Lin: U visa might work. Chin acted as an intermediary between the attorney and Lin and helped the attorney collect police records of the assault, hospital records of Lin’s injuries, and many other paperwork.

Finally, after four years of work, thanks to Chin’s dedication and Mills’ experience, Lin got U visa. It was April 2, 2019, 28 years after Lin first entered the United States.

When Chin received the document, he was with Lin in a park in Chinatown. She didn’t take long to break the news and focused on keeping his friend’s expressions of emotion forever in memory: “Mo had the sweetest smile I’ve ever seen on his face in all these years. He kept asking me to read each line over and over again.

Sometime later, Lin would ask Chin how he managed to get it for him. He would find out about his friend’s true past, get mad at him, and be friends again in a few days.

With the visa, Lin could go to the dentist, leave the hostel and take his wife from China after thirty years.

IV: Have lunch alone

Unfortunately, Lin could not fulfill more than these three requests. At this point in history we have the devastating low blow to avoid.

In 2020, when the pandemic hit, Lin was one of the first victims of the coronavirus. I was 53 years old.

At 65, Chin lives outside the shelter alone in a Brooklyn apartment, amidst hundreds of papers and boxes, many of them filled with things belonging to Lin. She constantly goes to Chinatown and volunteers at a food pantry. Dolnick claims to be obsessed with his belief.

And don’t forget Lin.

On the anniversary of Mo’s death, Chin went to Bellevue and sat on a park bench as he did when he walked with Lin.

He lit some incense, prepared a picnic with his friend’s favorite food, took Lin’s dentures out of his pocket (he had taken them from his colleague at his funeral) and placed them next to the food. It was a way to eat together again. He said Lin’s name three times and ate the sandwich.