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| Vancouver, Canada |  Review on July 14, 2007: |
mr_s_p
Rating:  | Review Topic: K1 Visa
Well, we had the interview last Wednesday... sorry I didn't post sooner, but was busy driving back Thursday and Friday was busy as well with errands and such, and this morning dropping my fiancee and her son off at the airport for their flight home (otherwise I wouldn't be up this early in the morning on a Saturday!!! )
Interview was on July 11th at 1PM, we were there at 12:35PM. It was very hot in Vancouver but where the consulate doors were, it was nicely shaded, so when we were told that we'd have to wait, it was no big deal. There were 2 other gentleman there, who I found out later that they were there for K1 as well.
So, we went through airport like security... I made sure the boys didn't bring their electronics and that I left the cell phone and other prohibited items (Leatherman tool) in the van or hotel. We all made it through security no problems, even my USC Fiancee's son had no problem. I expected problems here as his passport still had not come before they came up from Kansas. We were escorted to the elevator and the guard ensured that we were going up to the 20th floor. Once there, we had to go through the security routine again, the metal detector even more thorough (I had to remove my belt this time) and let in through a locked door and told to sit on the 4 blue chairs. The first booth is where they check all the paperwork for completeness and such. They were just doing the first K1, he was finished about 10 minutes after we were sitting on the blue chairs. Then they called the other gentleman where that took about 20 minutes. Then came our turn. Well, this is where I found out that the Canadian Citizenship Certificate is not the same as a Birth Certificate. However, I had a Birth Registration form from France with me where I was actually born (I was born in France by Canadian parents, my father whom was with the Canadian Forces posted to NATO).
After all the paperwork was ascertained, we were told to sit in a larger square waiting area adjoining the 4 blue chairs and that the interviews were to start at 2PM. We got to talking with the other K1 people there. It was about 2:45PM when we all were told to sit on chairs in front of another set of interview booths, and the first gentleman was called up. He was up in the booth for about 45 minutes while they were working through some problems. Then I was called up. I mentioned that there was another gentleman who was here before me, but the interviewer told me that I should come up as I would be done quicker. So other than the standard questions and asked to show some pictures of us together, which he was getting answers from a conversationalist point of view, what came out of the interview is that my fiancee needed to get a certified copy of a court order regarding a previous marriage and that, while he was ok with not having to worry about the translation of the french birth certificate, the people at the border may have issues with it not being translated. So, since I would have to get that court order from the fiancee, he might as well mandate that there would need to be a translation of the french birth certificate. At the conclusion of the interview, he gave us our passports back.
After the interview, we were told to go to the first booth and wait for our names to be called, and this is where we were told how to do the logistics of the actual submission of the abovementioned paperwork and passports to the Consulate.
So, in summary, we weren't told we were denied, and the general feeling that I get, is once this paperwork is submitted, then we'll get the passports mailed back to us via prepaid expresspost envelope with the visas in them. The boys, my 2 boys and her son, were well behaved, though all were very bored. Still, it's an exercise when there's 5 of us there as a family. There's not even a lot of reading material, like magazines and such, at all.
The people were nice in the Consulate, the interviewer was doing the conversationalist route, but I could tell that he's steering the conversation to answer the questions he was seeking the answers to...
Hope this helps.
Scott.
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #1793