With her unbridled love for Jamaica, award-winning Jamaican-American attorney, immigration, diversity and inclusion advocate Dahlia Walker Huntington seeks to project Jamaicans in the United States who are doing well there, while keeping their homeland close to their hearts.

Walker Huntington, who practises in the USA and has a weekly newspaper column in Jamaica dedicated to US Immigration matters, has conceptualised and has started to host a weekly podcast, dubbed, ‘You Only Know Half’. The podcast will each week see her in spirited and introspective conversations with different Jamaicans living in the USA.

Her guests will be interesting Jamaicans who have made and/or are making significant personal and professional strides in the US, while still keeping their strong connection to the land of their birth – Jamaica.

Walker Huntington says, “My podcast is setting out to be inspirational, entertaining even emotional as our discussions will cover my guests’ journey, trials and triumphs. Jamaicans living in America experience challenges, many of which are completely unexpected, but we rise above each in our own way. Those moments of joy, solid achievements and personal accomplishments are what we will celebrate”.

Waves of national pride sweep across the island whenever they do well abroad. Deciding to leave home is a difficult choice that many Jamaicans make in search of opportunity, but most Jamaicans take Jamaica with them to their adopted homes and celebrate their culture and country.

According to Walker Huntington, “Our Jamaican patriots on the global stage has made us proud as people engage in every facet of human development and continue to exemplify extraordinary achievements in their areas of operation. On, ‘You Only Know Half’, I will showcase some of these Jamaicans often from humble beginnings”.

Dahlia Walker Huntington’s podcast was launched June 1 on www.youonlyknowhalf.com. It will stir emotions with thought provoking matters and build a bond with her listeners through analysis, insight, and storytelling.

Ask any Jamaican living ‘a foreign’, what they miss most about Jamaica and they will answer so enthusiastically as if – what took you so long to ask and happy for the opportunity to reminisce about their childhood, Jamaican food, music, Jamaican family life, and hearing the rhythmic flow of the expressive and creative Jamaican language.

For many Jamaicans the tie to where their ‘navel string cut’ is still palpable no matter how far from home they venture. Then the question pops in your head – why leave in the first place?

The answer is simple, ‘foreign’ is perceived in Jamaica as the mecca of dreams fulfilled. This is where economic opportunity abounds, and they feel that with their burning ambition and aspirations they have a good chance of achieving their dream. Jamaicans are no different than immigrants from the world over who migrate to America.

The reality of many, however, is that life in the US is a persistent ‘pain-pleasure’ experience for which they have to conjure up everything they learned in Jamaica to survive.