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AWESOME!!!!!!!! THANKS

Greetings my fellow life travelers!

I was counting on using Dr. Arnold to do a I693 (Vaccination Supplement) for my wife before our AOS Interview..........but his phone number has been disconnected and another number gives you the message that he is no longer in practice! So, all the postings on here about depending on him/her as our fall back for the vaccination supplement are now out-of-date.

My wife had her physical in Moscow before her embassy interview and it included the chest x-ray. She had some vaccinations in Moscow and the rest she had here after her arrival. Now we have a date for her interview at the end of this month. The doctor in Moscow gave her a I-693 when she had her physical but not in a sealed envelope. The way he completed the form (with a big wavy line through everything) it appears that he approved her current immunizations....so I used it when we sent the materials for AOS. Four months later now we have no RFE on anything and an interview scheduled for November 30. The instructions say to bring I-693 with us in a sealed envelope. So..........I called Dr. Arnold and now you know the whole story.

What do you think will happen if we do no more than rely on the Doctor's approval from Moscow? Or should we still cover all our bases and find a civil surgeon who will do ONLY the vaccination supplement? And........if this is the advice you give.......please, anyone, tell me of another civil surgeon who will do only the supplement!!!!! All of the ones here that I have called will only do the ENTIRE physical over and include the supplement!! Of course they want between $250. and $300. for this!!!

As always I thank you in advance and remain in your debt for your help!!

Mike

OK.....so I am trying to cover all my bases here....and still wondering about final approval of my fiancee's visa in her interview in Moscow, May 25. IF she is not given a visa as the result of the first interview do we go to the "end of the line" and start over again? Or can we reschedule within a week?

Of course I am very curious but also it greatly affects my airline tickets and my Russian visa!!

If you can help, I would be most appreciative!!

Well, we have already considered the lost passport route.......but.........if you lose your passport in Russia you have to wait 90 to apply for a new one. A damaged passport (eg. run through the washing machine) will take 30 days to replace. HOWEVER, she has her interview in about 35 days AND she must have her physical in 28 days.....and both require her to present her foreign passport!! So, after reading all of these replies, I think it is wiser and better to keep the current passport and go through the interview as nonchalantly as is possible.

Wow! Less than 24 hours and look at the responses you good people have sent in!!! Thank you, thank you.

To clarify one unknown I did not include in my original post: she was never in Norway for longer than 90 days...so I think the police certificate is also a non-issue.

Well, I have a very unique situation with my fiancee. And I really would like some advise from the more experienced members of this web site, please!

My fiancee certainly is not a part of any fraud involving American visas......she has never had one. We have done the steps leading up to the interview in Moscow on May 25. She has been trying to get through to me on a question she has had about her previous visas to Western Europe--on the shengen visas. Here's the deal....two years ago she was dating a Russian businessman who routinely went to Norway where apparently he had some business connections. He wanted her to travel with him.....so he paid a middle man four times to secure the shengen visa for my fiancee. As part of the process to obtain the shengen visa each time, she was told to sign a letter that she was traveling for business AND that she would work while she was there. She never really worked and never had business and never had any funds of her own. She was traveling as this man's girlfriend. (Don't ask me any questions about all this!! I have enough trouble already!) She never over stayed her visa which was a Visa 3-long term, meaning it was good for a year.This is typically used in the EU as their business visa.

So, now the question: When she signed this letter claiming she was a business person and would be working in the EU, it was obviously a lie. She has all the stamps of entry and exit from Norway still in her passport. On one of the forms from the Embassy she is required to put down all the places she has worked! So here is the dilemma, if she claims she worked in Norway on the employment form she worries that it will lead investigators to her EU visa, and then to the question of what kind of work and for how long.........which she can never report because this was a lie! She is very worried that the consular official will uncover this issue from two years ago and the fraudulent letter that she signed for the shengen visa.

So, I have done searches around this issue and all of the results seem to be about fraudulent use of American visas. I also have read that the US is not interested in enforcing other countries visa/passport laws.

We could use a little advise her on how she should proceed. First I told her there would never be a problem with prior visa trips as long as she did not overstay her visa.....but that was before I understood about this letter.

If you will think about this question and maybe give me an answer, I would deeply appreciate it. She speaks English much better than my Russian but still not good enough to ask a question here!!!!!!!!

I am not sure why I am being so lucky but I wanted to post here to tell everyone that we received the first NOA on February 1......and on March 3 the I-797 was issued to us! According to everything I have read this typically takes from three to five months! I didn't even bribe anyone but this is such good news for us. Now we need to prepare her for the interview at the embassy (Moscow). I have tried to log onto the US Embassy web site for the forms to download but it will not open.....any suggestions?

Greetings to all!

Some of you have read my posts in the past and have provided some very good information and insight and I thank all of you again. My fiancee have been making significant progress on compiling all the papers we need for the K-1 visa. Now, I have another question, please.

My fiancee lives in Moscow. She has a registered apartment address on the edge of Moscow far from the city center. She has currently rented this apartment to another tenant. But, she and her mother and daughter rent another flat near the city center and their work but is not registered there. I don't quite understand all the significance of being "registered" to live in a certain place. I guess it is part of the old Soviet system of housing?

She wanted to use the address where she is registered and I think she should use the address where she will receive her mail. Opinions? Any contact from the embassy will be made by mail, if I am not mistaken, and she will not receive any of this at the registered apartment.

Please tell us what to do here. All of the necessary documents are prepared. Some still need to make their way across the Atlantic so we will have original signatures! Other than the address issue I am ready to file my petition on the I-129F!

I thank all of you in advance.

Mike

She should use her real residence. The US consulate couldn't possibly care less about Russia's registration of residences and do not "tattle-tale" on anyone.

Greetings to all!

Some of you have read my posts in the past and have provided some very good information and insight and I thank all of you again. My fiancee have been making significant progress on compiling all the papers we need for the K-1 visa. Now, I have another question, please.

My fiancee lives in Moscow. She has a registered apartment address on the edge of Moscow far from the city center. She has currently rented this apartment to another tenant. But, she and her mother and daughter rent another flat near the city center and their work but is not registered there. I don't quite understand all the significance of being "registered" to live in a certain place. I guess it is part of the old Soviet system of housing?

She wanted to use the address where she is registered and I think she should use the address where she will receive her mail. Opinions? Any contact from the embassy will be made by mail, if I am not mistaken, and she will not receive any of this at the registered apartment.

Please tell us what to do here. All of the necessary documents are prepared. Some still need to make their way across the Atlantic so we will have original signatures! Other than the address issue I am ready to file my petition on the I-129F!

I thank all of you in advance.

Mike

She should use her real residence. The US consulate couldn't possibly care less about Russia's registration of residences and do not "tattle-tale" on anyone.

Thank you very much..............Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and whatever else !!

Mike

Greetings to all!

Some of you have read my posts in the past and have provided some very good information and insight and I thank all of you again. My fiancee have been making significant progress on compiling all the papers we need for the K-1 visa. Now, I have another question, please.

My fiancee lives in Moscow. She has a registered apartment address on the edge of Moscow far from the city center. She has currently rented this apartment to another tenant. But, she and her mother and daughter rent another flat near the city center and their work but is not registered there. I don't quite understand all the significance of being "registered" to live in a certain place. I guess it is part of the old Soviet system of housing?

She wanted to use the address where she is registered and I think she should use the address where she will receive her mail. Opinions? Any contact from the embassy will be made by mail, if I am not mistaken, and she will not receive any of this at the registered apartment.

Please tell us what to do here. All of the necessary documents are prepared. Some still need to make their way across the Atlantic so we will have original signatures! Other than the address issue I am ready to file my petition on the I-129F!

I thank all of you in advance.

Mike

My friends,

Thank you to each of you who have taken such an interest in this post!  Wow.   Some of you have a greater attention to and tolerance for details than most folks! More unfolds daily.  Yes, on a personal level, I have been very concerned about the gaps and holes in the story.  My decision has been to pursue the truth at risk of ending the relationship.  I certainly have had my own concerns even before my initial post here.  She is 49 yrs. and I am 60.  Please understand, as I do, that there are no legal, moral, or certainly sexual "virgins" at our ages!  When you get my age you more fully understand that all of us have "stories" that we would rather not share with others.  I believe it is not the existence of these "stories" that is hazardous to our future but the way we choose to live with these "stories".  We can go into denial and build a protective barriers around our past so that it never comes up.......or we can selectively reveal these things to trustworthy people and thus build trust and acceptance.  We all make these choices.  Certainly I have things in my past that are difficult to reveal as maybe some of you do also.  My interest in another person's past, I believe, should be limited to the risk/concern/possibility such things may occur again with her in the future. And she has a similar reason to be interested in my past.  For me, I look for evidence that objectionable behaviors in a woman's past (according to my value system) have been examined and mistakes acknowleged and amends made where wrong..... She has the same right to question me in this regard, IMO. If we discover such differences we cannot accept, then the relationship should be terminated.

Now, that all said, we have had some long serious discussions on msn chat site about all this and I have pressed her repeatedly for more details. Now I will tell you some of the important ones.

In Azerbijan, Armenian Christians are hated fiercely. Armenians have been persecuted for centuries--almost as much as the Jews. My financee is Armenian. Her first husband was Azerbijani. He was working in Baku in the petroleum development in the Caspian Sea. During the rebellion, hundreds of Armenians were killed by mobs. The Soviet army went into to restore order. Russians are hated there only after Armenians. Her husband was attacked and beaten for having an Armenian wife. He was threatened with death if he did not divorce her. He lost his job because of this. They lived in constant fear for their lives. At her insistence, they divorced and she left for Moscow with their child. Later he followed and they lived together in Moscow.

Here is where she fibbed on the story to me.............her now ex-husband worked an under-the-table deal with a distant relative to buy an apartment. Remember it was still the Soviet Union. You didn't really buy an apartment. You were assigned rooms within a flat based upon the number in your family! His relative evidently had enough numbers that they were able to get an apartment for themselves. BUT....this relative had a price he wanted. He had a friend who wanted a "paper marriage" with a woman to get himself more rooms in his building. So this distant relative insisted that his "price" was for my fiancee to marry this man!!! Her first husband ordered her to do this. She went to ZAGS and married him. She divorced him five weeks later on her own. She saw him only once at the marriage.

She admits to me that this was a mistake but also says she always did what her husband told her to do.

I also discovered that one of the other reasons she was so reluctant to tell me these things is that she believed that the contents of IM chat were monitored by either or both of our governments. She still fears reprisals in Russia and, of course, a denial of our visa application. I lied maybe when I assured her that my government does not collect information this way. And I told her truly that she has a new government now and I think they would never be interested in such things from 20 years ago. So, she told me all of the above. Damn. After she said I was right and that she felt better having told me. I told her I understood and thanked her. But I also told her plainly that I would never, never have done what her husband did with her! Part of her reluctance to tell me the whole story is because of her shame for having done this. She wanted this secret to die with her husband.

I have completed the I-129F Petition with all marriages and divorces reported with her agreement.

If I understand correctly, she will need a copy of all marriage and divorce certificates, and birth certificate for the interview? She says the marriage papers were taken at the time of the divorces? Copies may be available but here is another problem. She needs an official copy of her birth certificate, which is in Baku. Also one marriage and one divorce occurred in Baku. And she tells me that it is virtually impossible to receive these from their government??? She has talked to a lawyer in Moscow for advise as to how to handle this request.

So, I'm still very open to advice but, I will tell you, unless something else is revealed, I fully intend to move forward with this woman. There are a hell of a lot of other attributes about her that more than make up for this mistake. At 60 years of age I certainly am a big boy!

Finally, does anyone think it would be wise to hire an immigration lawyer? American firm with a branch in Russia?

Some of you have followed this thread intently and I felt a need to tell you the story straight, as I have it. I'm sorry this is so long!! Thanks for your interest and support.

Mike

Clarification/Update

Yes, I meant K-1

After her re-marriage to husband #1, they remained married until he died five years ago.

I know that the I-129F is for me to complete but she must provide me with some of the information such as dates marriages ended and names of spouses. This form does not ask for dates of marriages--only dates the marriage ended. I know that divorce documents are required to be attached but marriage documents? She found her divorce documents, so she has the name and date of the divorce, at least. I know ZAGS will have these records and if necessary she will have to ask for official copies of these. Looking at our immigration for 129F, it only asks for date the marriage ended...........?????

On a personal level now.......I know this appears radical to our American mindset as a "scam". But one must also remember that under communism the only way to accomplish many things was to scam the government. And everyone in the Soviet Union in those days participated in many scams--unless they were high in the party. Scamming the Soviet government in those days meant survival. I don't think it belongs under the heading of scam as we know it today. Frankly, I have no negative judgement about scamming the Soviet system.....my difficulty is using the institution of marriage to accomplish this. But we have discussed this and I have expressed myself to her honestly. I could never have encouraged my wife to divorce me and marry another man....but I was not living under her conditions either.

Hello to all!

My name is Mike and I am new here. I have recently returned from Moscow after spending 30 days with a delightful lady with whom I have been corresponding for several months. I have asked her to marry me and she has accepted. I have already started the V1 application process with the assistance of the information on this web site (which is fantastic). I am completing what I can on the forms and then sending the rest to her to do as an attachment. The first one I sent, of course, is the I-129F. Now the question!!

She and her first husband were evacuated from Baku in Azerbijan during the breakup of the Soviet Union. Hundreds of Armenians were being persecuted and murdered by the majority Muslim population. They went to Moscow like thousands of others. Soviet law, at that time did not allow non-residents to buy homes or apartments. So, to circumvent the law, she and her husband divorced. She married a stranger in a "paper marriage" to gain residency by virtue of his residency. Then she and husband #1 bought a house in her name. Then she and husband #2 divorced after three months. She only saw him twice. Then she and husband #2 remarried and then they both had residency status. OK so far? I know, it is bizare by our standards.

Now, she tells me she does not remember the name of husband #2, the date of the marriage or the divorce and doesn't want to list it on the form because she says it was "no real marriage!" After reading many posts on here I am telling her that the only thing that matters to our Immigration Service is honesty. They don't care how many times you were married or even why you married.....but a non-disclosure could delay the approval process.

So, I am asking for the help and advise of so many of you who have been down this road before me! Tell me what you think, please. I thank you in advance for any replies!