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	Opinion: Undocumented migrants in Ireland face tough choices</p>
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	This is the hardest moment of my life. Three weeks ago, my father passed away suddenly, during a routine operation. The last time I saw him was in 2004, when I left the Philippines to come to Ireland for work. Since then, my parents have cared for my three children while I support them by working in Ireland.</p>
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	When I first left, my youngest was five. He kept asking when I was coming back, and if I would bring him chocolate. Then he just wanted me to promise I would be home for Christmas. It&rsquo;s been 10 years now and he&rsquo;s stopped asking. He says, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t make promises, dad; just come back&rdquo;.</p>
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	He&rsquo;s 16 now. One day last year he asked me, &ldquo;dad, do I know you&rdquo;? That was hard to hear. He said, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know what it feels like to have a father&rdquo;. He dreams of bonding with me. Every Father&rsquo;s Day his school has father-son games; he&rsquo;s good at sports, he wants us to race together.</p>
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	Good life<br />
	Back in 2004, I looked at my children and asked myself, can I give them a good life, or will they be the same as me: working hard but getting nowhere? As a father, you want to give your children a good future. So I left the Philippines and came here.</p>
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	I worked in a bank in the Philippines, but it wasn&rsquo;t enough to provide for my family. For my first six years in Ireland, I worked in maintenance &ndash; cleaning, painting, even unblocking septic tanks with my bare hands. A 3D job we call it: dirty, difficult and dangerous. I wasn&rsquo;t paid much but the employer promised me a work permit so I stayed. It wasn&rsquo;t until I came to the Migrant Rights Centre for advice that I discovered there had never been any chance of me getting a work permit.</p>
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	With the money I earn here, my two daughters have gone to college. One has a degree in IT, the other in midwifery. I put my sister-in-law through college and supported my parents when my father&rsquo;s poor health stopped him working.</p>
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	My youngest wants to be a pilot. The training is expensive, so my daughters told me they would help to pay for his course. My eldest daughter is like a little mother; they support each other. I&rsquo;ve missed them growing up, and now I&rsquo;m afraid I&rsquo;ll miss even more of their lives when they get married and have children.</p>
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	I don&rsquo;t know where my home is now. My family is in the Philippines, but it&rsquo;s 10 years since I left; I&rsquo;m a foreigner there. If I leave Ireland, I&rsquo;ll never be able to come back. That would break my heart.</p>
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	This is where I live and work, I have friends here; it is safe and peaceful, but because I am undocumented I can&rsquo;t participate fully. I&rsquo;m the same as the Irish undocumented in the US. My story is their story. I just want to regularise my immigration status, to be recognised as part of the community. We&rsquo;re campaigning for a reasonable solution.</p>
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	Paying taxes<br />
	Undocumented people would earn status through working, paying taxes and being involved in the community. We could pay a fine and be assessed on a case-by-case basis. It would be transparent, straightforward and fair.</p>
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	More than ever now, my children want me to come home. They are afraid something will happen to me and we&rsquo;ll never see each other again. They wanted me back for the funeral.<br />
	&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll eat rice,&rdquo; they said, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll live on nothing, we just want our dad.&rdquo; But as my mother says, if you come back, what about your kids&rsquo; future? What then? So I watched my father&rsquo;s funeral on Skype, and then went back to my job here as a carer for an elderly man.</p>
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	Jayson Montenegro is an undocumented migrant in Ireland. Through Justice for the Undocumented, a group supported by Migrant Rights Centre Ireland, he is campaigning for the introduction of an earned regularisation scheme for the estimated 26,000- 30,000 undocumented migrants in Ireland.</p>
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	http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/torn-between-two-worlds-1.1729822</p>
