neophi

I'm getting kind of antsy. I'm always the optimistic and faithful one, but at this point I can almost imagine myself booking a flight the week before Christmas, in order to spend the holiday week in Bogotá with my wife and baby.

Fine, if they aren't giving any more December interviews then why not just schedule it for January already. Sheesh. Why keep people at the edge of their seat not knowing what to plan for.

PS: Good luck to all that have upcoming interviews.

The packet the Embassy sent my wife in Colombia was Spanish.

However, I have yet to receive an English version myself.

I concur. I was also about to add the same question.

Several of us have been waiting quite a couple of days for an interview after Packet 3 was sent. DOS representatives ensure me everything thing is fine and beneficiary is eligible for interview, but we are just in queue.

Why the sudden delay? Will packet 3's received by the Embassy on or before the 16th get a December interview?

Thanks.

El aguinaldo también es cuando uno va a Cartagena y el taxista, además de cobrarle bien caro a uno por ser turista, dice "Son 8 mil pesos, mas 2 mil pesitos del aguinaldo."

Galeria Cafe y Libro... Funny you mention that place. My wife was just there last Wednesday (night before Thanksgiving) because her sister was launching her new DVD. She's the lead singer and face of Maria Mulata, if you've heard of the group. If you any of you saw the Miss Colombia pageant, she did the musical presentation when all the "reinas" came out and did their dance.

Is there a current tally of how many official questions we have so far, and what these questions are?

I agree with Bill y Bella's questions. On the other hand, some of the other questions could easily be answered by our own VJ members by creating new threads.

I walked by that TGI Friday's all the time while we were there. That Gran Estación shopping mall is pretty cool too, very good food.

Diana

I definitely never go to TGI Friday's when I'm in Bogotá, unless my family really wants to. I mean with so many great restaurants why go to an American restaurant, when you've probably been to TGIF plenty of times?

I much rather go to El Corral Gourmet, La Luna, Crepes & Waffles, La Cigale... I mean I could go on and on.

I guess the only good thing about Friday's is that it's probably the only place in Bogotá where there are free refills.

That's a good point, Scott. It took a lot shorter than what users were reporting recently as to USCIS -> NVC time frame. I took 2 weeks or less for CSC to forward my case to the NVC, yet it took 6 weeks in your case... wow. Then you got the interview within 2 days, and now it's been two weeks since I faxed/mailed packet 3 and still no interview.

I was aware about the thread for the Colombian Consul and saw a lot of questions that were just a waste of space on that thread.

These things seem to change because Yenifer faxed packet 3 at noon on wednesday...I called at 2:00 that same day and they had allready input it and 2 days later we were given an interview date.

Wow. For MV-JR it's already been 2 weeks and no interview date.

I was so busy today to call the embassy and I even forgot to tell my wife to do it. Damn. Oh well, I doubt they are willing to give me any more information than the DOS can.

Awesome! Congratulations!!

Apparently the embassy is taking some time to schedule the appointments or maybe we just have bad luck with this process!! As I told you last Wednesday I emailed the embassy (since they weren’t taking calls, and got our case November 7th, faxed page 3 on the 14th and haven’t received ANYTHING on the mail yet) and today I got the following answer:

The embassy have received your case on the 7th as well as your fax on the 14th but no appointment has been schedule neither any information has been sent to your home.

That is it!!! So my boyfriend call to the DOS and the told him that the case is pending at the embassy

SO I hope that the other couples waiting have better luck.

Yeah I don't know what's going on. No interview date yet for me either.

Packet 3 should have detailed instructions on what to send first. In the case of the Colombian Embassy, you just send Part I of DS-230 and OF-169 so that they can schedule an interview. The rest of the stuff you take to the interview.

You give them what they ask for whether you're still Catholic or not. We were married at a Notaría (civil marriage) and we still had to show his baptism certificate where it says he hasn't been married in the church. It's silly but like I said, give them what they want to avoid any issues.

Diana

Interesting, thanks. At least my wife has a baptism certificate to show. I don't, for example.

That's why I believe baptism at birth is meaningless. (No offense to any Catholics.)

I totally understand...I'm living it right now!!!

Byron make sure that you have the correct Baptism Certificate (Fe de bautismo con notas marginales. Fotocopia autenticada)

Yenifer caught this earlier on thank God and we got the correct one with the margin notes...I don't know what the embassy would have said but I don't think it's a good idea to chance it at this point.

Hi Scott,

My wife went to get her Baptism Certificate, but she brought up a good point. She was baptized as a Catholic, but she is Christian now and we got married by a Christian pastor (evangelical, to be precise). Thus, regarding the "notas marginales," there are none! The whole point of the baptism certificate (as far as we can tell) is because when you get married by the Catholic church, that is added to the certificate.

Am I right in that, that really is the purpose of the baptism certificate? If so, in our case should we get a letter from our Pastor stating he married us? Kind of like a "religious marriage certificate," if you may? What about people who only get legally married?

Thanks.

Hey guys,

I took the liberty and created a new wiki page with the Guides & Tips from this thread. Just go to the Wiki and search for "Colombia" and you should find it. It's a lot easier than having to go through this thread and finding the information.

http://www.visajourney.com/wiki/index.php/..._Guide_%26_Tips

Pretty much all I did was copy & paste Scott's latest version and convert to HTML for formatting/readability purposes. Any corrections/additions, feel free to edit it.

it took us 252 days to file to interview date...way too long

CONGRATULATIONS !!!!

Best of luck to you

Merry Christmas and God Bless !!!

Brian and Yenys

Yeah it's been 253 days since I sent the I-130 package, and still counting...

No interview date yet and it's been over a week since we sent packet 3.

Good luck on your interview, and Merry Christmas to you, too!

I'm not sure if he's trying to be funny. But a forum mod should handle this.

This process is making us crazy, as you know from my last post our case arrived to Bogota November 7th (according to the NVC and the embassy) and faxed package 3 on the 14 but we haven’t received anything on the mail yet (package 3 or 4). Since the lady at the embassy could not confirm last Wednesday (November 14) if the got our fax I tried to call yesterday but, as Scott mentioned, they were closed for thanksgiving. The DOS does not have news either so by now we are going nuts!!! We were expecting a December interview so he could come for Christmas and the interview now we have to chose . So I really hope you guys are right about December list not been accurate

Send an email. IVBogota@state.gov They responded to one that I sent. Also, you should be calling DOS. If an appointment has been made they will have the information. Scott has prepared the latest list of instructions. You can find the DOS info there.

Wow MV-JR, I'm in the same exact boat as you. Embassy received the package on Nov. 7th but I didn't find out until a week later. We faxed on the 14th and I think it arrived through Servientrega on the 16th. We definitely should have made the cut for December interviews. I am keeping my faith that she will be here by Christmas.

I've called DOS every day this week, and still no scheduled appointment. I'm glad the December list posted on the Embassy website is only partial, as our case is not on there, either.

Let's hang in there, MV! Remember: God is control.

Yeah, as I had suspected. Here's from the Colombia Club thread:

Hello everyone. I am not sure if anyone has responded to this yet, I am a bit behind of the forum happenings. Lina and I actually went to her interview today. I will post up more details when I get home in about a week. The quick and dirty version is that we showed up about 6am and went straight for line number three as per instructions here on the board. Waited for a while inside the embassy...take a jacket it is cold. The interview itself was done by a male CO and lasted maybe five minutes (no that is not an exaggeration). He only spoke to Lina and didn't ask to see any of our pictures or emails. In response to what you wrote Diana, yes picking up is no longer an option. The service cost 50 000 COP and takes about eight days (or so they said) to get to whatever city you want to have it sent to. I don't think things would have gone so well had it not been for the help I got here and I hope this can help somebody else. Good luck to everyone waiting, and thanks to everyone that helped out.

If this is the case, the Embassy will probably use Domesa to send the visa to the beneficiary. If you're in Bogotá, that could take up to a week.

This is only speculation on my side, because I went to the Embassy in September to get my son his American passport. We had the option to either pick it up or have it mailed. There is a Domesa stand in the visa waiting area where you have to give your receipt number, name, cédula, and address. You pay about COP$25,000 for the service.

My wife waited about two weeks to get the passport in the mail. However, according to lady who issued the passport, the first week was additional processing at the Embassy or wherever, and the other week was the time it would take for the mail to arrive. My wife tells me that usually all other visa types are sent by mail (i.e. tourist visa, etc.) to begin with so she was not surprised. I guess spousal visas are/were the only ones available for pickup?

We'll see what happens.

Oh ok... I figured that was what I might be. Thanks.

She tried the fax again and it went through. I'll be calling the DOS on Monday and then the embassy again on Wednesdays as well.

Oh I see. I have tried it a couple of times since like two days ago and it would still not work.

My wife is mailing packet 3 as we speak via Servientrega, so they should have it tomorrow. Hopefully we'll make the cut and get a December interview. For some reason she couldn't fax it, as if they had run out of paper at the embassy or something lol. She's going try sending it by fax as well later today, or if not early tomorrow even though she sent through servientrega.

By the way, I just noticed in your timeline that you called the embassy last week to confirm if they had gotten the fax. What number did you dial? The same number of the fax? Or where did you call?

But there are some pre-requisites. For example, in Colombia I had to show proof that I had been living in the U.S. for at least 5 years, among other things.

Look on your embassy's website for more information for the requisites the father needs to transfer citizenship to the child.

Yeah, I think it pretty much boils down to convincing the officer that your intention is to actually come back to your country. If there aren't enough strong ties, plus having relatives in the U.S., there's probably not enough reason for the office to believe that your colleague won't stay in the U.S.