ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) — On a recent weekend afternoon, at a Chinese comedy show in northern Virginia, the host asked the audience, “What food do you like?” The loudest answer echoed through the hall: “Chick-fil-A!”
“You still haven’t gotten your H-1B lottery, ha?” quipped the host, citing the most popular work visa among Chinese students.
It's an easy-to-get joke in the Chinese student community, where those eager for U.S. visas believe their chances
at success might hinge upon something unexpected: an American chicken sandwich and the company behind it.
Chick-fil-A has no branches in China. But the brand has enticed Chinese students in the U.S. for a simple reason: “Chick-fil-A” sounds like “check files.” In a culture that puts great stock in soundalike words and numbers, it is believed to bring good luck to those with complicated visa applications.
“It feels like I am one step closer to the green card after having a Chick-fil-A meal,” says Zhou Yilu, an AI software engineer in his late 30s who lives in Wilmington, Delaware.
Since arriving in the United States as a student 14 years ago, Zhou has had a roller-coaster experience with his visa status. He was repeatedly asked to add paperwork while switching among four types of visas, one of which was approved days ahead of its expiration. That was when Zhou turned to the popular poultry purveyor.
No one can say who originally had the idea, but it has been kicking around the Chinese student community for years, especially for visa applications such as the H-1B, which is based on a lottery system and has become harder to secure.
Some 3D-print the Chick-fil-A logo on coasters. Some embroider the logo into a small cross-stitch pendant for key chains. Others set Chick-fil-A’s logo as their profile picture on social media, sometimes converting it from red to green — as in green card.
Chick-fil-A didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.
Chinese people, particularly younger ones, have long been enthusiastic about wordplay.
On the night before Christmas, for example, eating apples — “pingguo” in Mandarin — flourishes because the word echoes “ping’an ye,” which means Christmas Eve. Brides carry lettuce bouquets because lettuce — “shengcai” — sounds like “getting rich.” Who doesn’t like catching that at a wedding? A much older use of wordplay lies in Chinese people’s aversion to the number four, which sounds like the word for death in Mandarin.
The Chick-fil-A superstition reflects how difficult it is for immigrants to overcome the obstacles to work legally in the U.S., even for those with prestigious educational backgrounds and high-level job titles.
More than 46,000 Chinese students and workers were approved for H-1B visas in 2024. Approved Chinese applicants account for 11.7%, the second-largest group by country, after India at 70%.
Fan Wu, a data scientist living in Indianapolis, didn't win his H-1B lottery despite changing his social media profile picture to the fast-food chain’s red logo and traveling to Hawaii to pray at a Japanese Taoist temple.
“I was forced to turn to these mysteries,” he says. “The lottery itself is a matter of chance. It depends on luck, and we need another mystery to echo it.”
It goes beyond chicken. The need for better fortune in visa lotteries has given rise to a new profession — agents who pray in temples across the Pacific on behalf of others.
When the students reach out to 24-year-old Meng Yanqing in Beijing, across the world, through the social media platform Xiaohongshu, Meng lines up to enter and pray at the popular Lama Temple, holding a paper between his palms that expresses his wish for an H-1B visa. That involves “precise positioning” with their personal information, such as passport numbers and birthdays.
“I respect them, they have their demands, and I offer the service,” says Meng, who also helps his clients buy consecrated bracelets from the temple and send them across the Pacific to the U.S. “I truly hope the best for them.”
The Trump administration’s abrupt decision to impose a $100,000 fee on H-1B visas a few months ago stunned Chinese students and workers, created chaos and fostered a more chilling atmosphere. It was later explained that it only applied to the new visas. But the roller-coaster experience added anxiousness to a landscape for Chinese students that already includes language and cultural barriers and a tight job market.
Some experts believe employers’ sponsorship of green cards through visas like H-1B is why the United States can attract some of the best and brightest.
“A real talent pipeline,” says Juliet Gelatt, associate director of U.S. Program under Migration Policy Institute based in Washington, “we’ve really benefited as a country and as an economy from bringing in smart young people from all around the world, including from China.”
The air of suspicion surrounding Chinese immigrants, especially in high-tech industries, makes it even harder. Experts warn that it reduces the U.S.’s ability to attract international talent.
One manager at a new energy company in his late 20s finally changed his profile picture to the chicken logo after months of waiting for his visa. Like many Chinese, he would give only his surname, Yang, and otherwise spoke anonymously, fearing trouble with his visa status. Of his status in the United States, he says, “It feels like living under someone else’s roof.”
The United States limits participation in the H-1B visa lottery. STEM majors are eligible for three years of optional practical training under their F-1 student visa, while other majors are eligible for one year. After that, they turn to Chick-fil-A while seeking a work visa to continue their work in the United States.
For Harriet Peng, a data analyst living in northern Virginia, eating a chicken sandwich and having the company's T-shirt on the back of her chair weren't enough. After losing the lottery repeatedly, she went to a temple in upstate New York to pray in person — or, as she puts it, to “make some efforts using scientific materialist methods in metaphysics.”
The temple contains many sculptures of gods, each representing a particular aspect of life, such as fortune or childbirth. There is, she says, no god for visas.
Nevertheless, Peng jokes, “I knelt in front of almost every god and prayed, in case they all know each other.”
