Byline: Hosted by Tyler Currie

College students Nadia Hristova and Radi Tsenova came from their native Bulgaria to Ocean City this summer for a chance to make some good money. Instead -- like thousands of young foreigners who work in East Coast beach towns -- what they got was seven-day workweeks, piddlin' wages, greasy food and a heapin' helpin' of American culture.

Tyler Currie, whose article about the Bulgarian women's summer in Ocean City appeared in Sunday's Washington Post Magazine , was online Tuesday, Sept. 6 to field questions and comments.

Tyler Currie is a Magazine contributing writer.

____________________

Tyler Currie: Hello Magazine readers. The questions are already rolling in, so let's boogie...

_______________________

Vienna, Va.: Can you provide more detail about the J-1 temporary VISA these young visitors use? And was there a dramatic increase in Eastern European and Russian visitors to the Eastern Shore this year? If so, what prompted this increase? Did we relax our immigration quotas?

Tyler Currie: Nadia and Radi came through a State Department program called Summer Work/Travel. Here's the State Department's description of that program: http://exchanges.state.gov/education/jexchanges/private/swt.htm. You'll see that there are a number of eligibility requirements. For example, you have to be a student at a bone fide college or university-whatever that means-and you can't be a vocational student.

J-1 Visas are granted to other categories of temporary visitors: au pairs, camp counselors, physicians, air plane pilot trainees.

I don't know if there was an increase in Eastern Shore foreign workers this summer. The State Department doesn't track these numbers regionally, only the total number of students who take advantage of the Summer Work/Travel program nationwide. And the final count is only tallied once U.S. Embassies from across the globe report how many such visas were handed out, which hasn't been done yet. But there isn't a quota on the number of students who can come on J-1.

There's something called an H2B visa, which is also a temporary, non-immigrant entry permit. There is a quota for H2Bs, around 66 thousand last year, I think, and it gets filled lickedy-split.

_______________________