Sharing a language

[KayDeeCee 4,892]

I don't have three years of tax returns, so I will need a sponsor for the AOS. My parents would be willing, so I think it should be fine.

You do not need to have filed for the last 3 years in order to file the I-864 without needing a joint sponsor. You are not even through the K-1 visa interview yet. By the time you file for AOS, your 2012 taxes will most likely be done. Only the most recent year's tax transcript is required to be sent with the form. You will provide a statement as to why you were not legally required to file in any of the other years you did not, 2010 and 2011.

If your income is over the 125% requirement, you will not need a joint sponsor. You will list your current annual income and provide a letter from your employer and most recent pay stubs to prove it. Same as you will be doing for the I-134.

Just checked your timeline and you just recently filed your I-129F petition, so yes, you will have been at your job long enough and have filed your 2012 taxes by then for sure.

Back to the topic of your post: Do you have emails or snail mails between the two of you? Take those to the interview to show how you communicate.

Edited January 10, 2013 by Jay-Kay

[duraaraa 203]

You do not need to have filed for the last 3 years in order to file the I-864 without needing a joint sponsor. You are not even through the K-1 visa interview yet. By the time you file for AOS, your 2012 taxes will most likely be done. Only the most recent year's tax transcript is required to be sent with the form. You will provide a statement as to why you were not legally required to file in any of the other years you did not, 2010 and 2011.

If your income is over the 125% requirement, you will not need a joint sponsor. You will list your current annual income and provide a letter from your employer and most recent pay stubs to prove it. Same as you will be doing for the I-134.

Just checked your timeline and you just recently filed your I-129F petition, so yes, you will have been at your job long enough and have filed your 2012 taxes by then for sure.

Back to the topic of your post: Do you have emails or snail mails between the two of you? Take those to the interview to show how you communicate.

Actually, we don't. We talk on the phone, only. Mainly because she doesn't have internet. I do plan to snail mail some things to her, but Mongolia is not a snail mail-friendly country at all. No mailboxes, only one post office, etc.

Of course I will make sure that the officer sees the phone records, and I already submitted recent phone records to USCIS when filing the I-129F form.

It's good to know that they are understanding about not having filed taxes before. Regardless, I'll have a joint sponsor as a backup plan.

[KayDeeCee 4,892]

Actually, we don't. We talk on the phone, only. Mainly because she doesn't have internet. I do plan to snail mail some things to her, but Mongolia is not a snail mail-friendly country at all. No mailboxes, only one post office, etc.

Of course I will make sure that the officer sees the phone records, and I already submitted recent phone records to USCIS when filing the I-129F form.

It's good to know that they are understanding about not having filed taxes before. Regardless, I'll have a joint sponsor as a backup plan.

Even if she only gets 1 or 2 letters from you before her interview, showing it(or them) would show the CO that you are able to communicate with her in her own language.

Yes, the I-864 requires a statement as to why you were not legally obligated to file taxes in any of the last 3 years. If you were legally required to but did not, then you would need to file the back taxes before filing the I-864. You have to list the income from the last 3 years tax returns, and provide them a copy of the most recent year.

Edited January 10, 2013 by Jay-Kay

[evelyn1140 18]

I have what might be a somewhat unique situation, where my fiancee does not speak English, but I do speak her language (I lived in Mongolia for about 1.5 years, so I can speak the language).

I have heard stories of people being denied visas because their 'communication skills' were not up to par. My fiance has absolutely zero English, as she never thought she would need it until we met. We've always used Mongolian to communicate.

Is this something that they will take my word on, considering the time I spent in Mongolia? Most Americans who live in Mongolia don't learn the language. The people at the embassy, as well, need interpreters to interview in Mongolian, so it may be considered a hard language for Americans to learn.

I am considering a few options:

1. Handwrite a letter in Mongolian to show that I can speak the language. Maybe write it in front of a notary or in another way to prove that I wrote it myself.

2. Ask a Mongolian teacher to evaluate my Mongolian language skills. Submit the evaluation.

3. Trust that they will believe my fiancee when she tells them that I can actually speak Mongolian.

Has anyone faced a similar situation? Of course, if I had a Mongolian background/name, they would know that I can speak it, but being someone completely unrelated biologically to Mongolia and learning the language while living there shouldn't be considered fishy. I'm just concerned because I've heard that there may have been denials when the fiancee doesn't communicate in English.

I should mention that the fact that I speak Mongolian and that we use it to communicate was written in the packet I sent to USCIS. Will this make it an 'approved fact,' or am I right to worry that they won't believe me. The only other experience people I know have had with the US Embassy was a 'guilty until proven innocent' B-2 denial experience, so maybe, since the K-1 seems to be innocent until proven guilty, I'm a little too paranoid?

Thanks for any input.

you speak her language that's a plus in comparision with others couples here( including myself)

[Thatgirl2 21]

Honestly and in my personal experience, just pointing that out in the interview has been enough. Correct me if I. Wrong, but magnolia isn't a really high fraud country, so you write the cover letter for the packet 3 in Mongolian , both because well, you need a cover letter and also as a subtle hint that you speak magnolian. Or you could submit emails that prove you two can conversate. You don't want your proof to be too in their face, because they usually dig dipper in cases where they submit way more proof than they need, for all they know the petitioner or the beneficiary of those cases could be hiding something

[duraaraa 203]

Honestly and in my personal experience, just pointing that out in the interview has been enough. Correct me if I. Wrong, but magnolia isn't a really high fraud country, so you write the cover letter for the packet 3 in Mongolian , both because well, you need a cover letter and also as a subtle hint that you speak magnolian. Or you could submit emails that prove you two can conversate. You don't want your proof to be too in their face, because they usually dig dipper in cases where they submit way more proof than they need, for all they know the petitioner or the beneficiary of those cases could be hiding something

I don't think Mongolia is a high fraud country, but a lot of Mongolians do overstay tourist visas. I really have no idea with regards to how suspicious they are of K visa applications -- all of the reviews on this site seem to be positive. Every Mongolian adult I know who applied for even a B visa has been approved... although they have enough money to travel and hold decent jobs. Some of them had to apply twice.

Make no mistake, Mongolia is a developing country, but it's a country of only 3,000,000 people, and Mongolians who go to work abroad usually go to Korea or Russia... or recently, China. I'm hoping that she will be approved, but I really worry sometimes that it won't go smoothly.

[bt1 42]

I have what might be a somewhat unique situation, where my fiancee does not speak English, but I do speak her language (I lived in Mongolia for about 1.5 years, so I can speak the language).

I have heard stories of people being denied visas because their 'communication skills' were not up to par. My fiance has absolutely zero English, as she never thought she would need it until we met. We've always used Mongolian to communicate.

Is this something that they will take my word on, considering the time I spent in Mongolia? Most Americans who live in Mongolia don't learn the language. The people at the embassy, as well, need interpreters to interview in Mongolian, so it may be considered a hard language for Americans to learn.

I am considering a few options:

1. Handwrite a letter in Mongolian to show that I can speak the language. Maybe write it in front of a notary or in another way to prove that I wrote it myself.

2. Ask a Mongolian teacher to evaluate my Mongolian language skills. Submit the evaluation.

3. Trust that they will believe my fiancee when she tells them that I can actually speak Mongolian.

Has anyone faced a similar situation? Of course, if I had a Mongolian background/name, they would know that I can speak it, but being someone completely unrelated biologically to Mongolia and learning the language while living there shouldn't be considered fishy. I'm just concerned because I've heard that there may have been denials when the fiancee doesn't communicate in English.

I should mention that the fact that I speak Mongolian and that we use it to communicate was written in the packet I sent to USCIS. Will this make it an 'approved fact,' or am I right to worry that they won't believe me. The only other experience people I know have had with the US Embassy was a 'guilty until proven innocent' B-2 denial experience, so maybe, since the K-1 seems to be innocent until proven guilty, I'm a little too paranoid?

Thanks for any input.

I don't think you need to go as far as that proving you can speak the language: if you provide them with a few e-mails you sent one another, there is your proof!!!

[bigdog 376]

Thanks for your reply. I will try to prove every facet of our relationship to the best of my ability. In our case, we met in person, I lived in her country, we spent nine months living together, and the last picture I took in Mongolia was the two of us at the airport. I think I have a pretty solid case. She doesn't even know what facebook is, doesn't have the internet, but we still talk on the phone and I can prove that. I think worrying is just the way that I can make the time pass and feel like I'm doing something while I wait for the people I love to join me. So long as the CO is willing to look at the case as any normal person would, there's nothing I can think of that would lead them to consider it a sham.

As for the money situation, my current salary is more than 125% of the poverty limit. However, I have not had this job for over a year, and my taxes will show much less (I was living in Mongolia, after all.) Therefore, I'll show pay stubs and a letter from my employer. I don't think it will be a problem.

The only issue is that our relationship could be viewed as unconventional. She is older than I am by 11.5 years and has four children. She doesn't speak English. I'm from an upper-middle class family and she is from a poor district in Ulaanbaatar. These are some of the things which made me love her, though, as it has turned her into a very mature, kind, drama-free, understanding person. I'd like to write such things so that the officer can understand why I would fall in love with this person as opposed to someone younger and well-educated, as most of the Americans who I know who had relationships with Mongolians do. I hope they have an open mind enough to realize that everyone looks for different things in a partner.

Good Luck, she will have to make her case and you have to me.

[BeauteDLaVie 3]

I am in a similiar situation. Close to 6years knowing my fiance, I never really thought of communicating with him entirely in English so that he can learn...he only knows a few basic words...I guess that there is still time for him to learn and for me to learn his mother language (Berber/Arabic). We both communicate in French

[Holman come down 10]

I am in a similiar situation. Close to 6years knowing my fiance, I never really thought of communicating with him entirely in English so that he can learn...he only knows a few basic words...I guess that there is still time for him to learn and for me to learn his mother language (Berber/Arabic). We both communicate in French

That's really cool. When I was leaving my job in Japan last month, the girl who was replacing me was Californian and her husband is Japanese. They only communicate in French. I can't imagine both parties using a second language to communicate, pretty wild.

[duraaraa 203]

That's really cool. When I was leaving my job in Japan last month, the girl who was replacing me was Californian and her husband is Japanese. They only communicate in French. I can't imagine both parties using a second language to communicate, pretty wild.

Actually, this is quite common! Before I learned Mongolian, there were many Mongolians who I communicated with in Japanese. Then, even wilder, there were some Mongolians who could speak Chinese who I communicated with by writing Kanji.

[Holman come down 10]

Actually, this is quite common! Before I learned Mongolian, there were many Mongolians who I communicated with in Japanese. Then, even wilder, there were some Mongolians who could speak Chinese who I communicated with by writing Kanji.

Cool, I learned the 2000 common use Kanji too while in Japan. I never thought about using them to communicate with Chinese people. It would be very bare-bones way to communicate, like me writing someone "food 6 time together go"

[duraaraa 203]

Cool, I learned the 2000 common use Kanji too while in Japan. I never thought about using them to communicate with Chinese people. It would be very bare-bones way to communicate, like me writing someone "food 6 time together go"

I had to fly through Beijing to get to Mongolia. A lot of people wanted to talk to me, but we didn't share a language. Kanji is super useful for communicating not only with Chinese, but with Koreans as well. Vietnamese people also have, I think, some knowledge of Kanji.

The only problem is that the grammatical order is totally different, and the pronouns are different. Probably, you know Japanese 'wareware' 我々 for 'us.' The chinese will just use the first ware for 'I' reading it wo... so I would try something like 我中国語不可 (ware chuugokugo fuka) and they would understand

[BeauteDLaVie 3]

That's really cool. When I was leaving my job in Japan last month, the girl who was replacing me was Californian and her husband is Japanese. They only communicate in French. I can't imagine both parties using a second language to communicate, pretty wild.

[BeauteDLaVie 3]

but sometimes, we may not communicate in full complete or correct sentences but we still manage to understand each other...I guess we know each other