Pratik Karki, a Nepal-born tech professional, shared his immigration journey on X after receiving his US green card alongside his wife, describing years of uncertainty, career risks and personal sacrifices that shaped his path.Karki said his father had worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Harvard and Berkeley when he was a toddler. Following the end of his parents’ marriage, his father returned to Nepal with Karki and his brother, raising them alone in modest circumstances at their grandparents’ home.Karki said every decision he made after leaving Nepal was driven by a desire to continue what his father had started.H-1B rejection became turning pointKarki recalled being rejected from the H-1B visa lottery for a fourth time while working at Google two years ago. He said the rejection left him facing the possibility of leaving the US despite having built a life there with his partner.He said he considered moving to Canada or returning to Nepal, which would have meant living far away from the person he loved.Karki said he and his wife spent hours discussing their future at their kitchen table that night. According to him, her reassurance that they had enough savings to manage financially gave him the confidence to pursue his ambitions.He subsequently left Google, walking away from an annual compensation package of nearly $300,000 at the age of 27.Startup journey and visa approvalKarki said the months that followed were among the most demanding of his life as he explored business ideas with founders, mentors and friends in San Francisco.During that period, he identified what he described as a major opportunity in building a human data layer for frontier laboratories and enterprise AI teams. He said the idea emerged from failed AI pilot projects during his time at Google.Karki later met his co-founder, Mannat, at a founders’ event in San Francisco and discovered they were working on the same problem. Soon after, the startup secured its first data pilot and its first venture capital investment.Around the same time, Karki filed for an O-1 visa with the support of an immigration lawyer. He said he had built the foundation for the application through his work at Google, judging hackathons and publishing written work. The visa application was approved, followed later by his green card.‘The immigration journey is over’Karki said he and his wife are now both green card holders and described the moment as deeply emotional.Referring to the conversation with his wife that changed the course of his life, he said their journey reflected the determination of “two immigrants, one company, one kitchen table conversation”.He also thanked his father for the sacrifices he made while raising him and his brother in Nepal.Karki added that while his immigration journey had come to an end, his startup, Anthromind, was only beginning its journey.