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| Rio de Janeiro, Brazil |  Review on June 12, 2019: |
carmel34
Rating:  | Review Topic: IR-1/CR-1 Visa
My husband and I arrived at the consulate just before 7 am for his 7:40 am appointment. We were directed to stand in the immigrant visa line and a man came by and checked us in on an iPad. At about 7:15 am we were taken in and led upstairs to the immigrant visa room where we were instructed to complete a cover sheet and to put all our documents in a certain order. We did this in 5 minutes and then took everything to a desk in the back of the room to be reviewed for accuracy, then we were told to sit in the front two chairs, we would be first called to one of the windows. After about a 10 minute wait, around 7:30 am, we were called to one of the windows where a nice lady reviewed all our documents and entered some information into a computer. Then we sat down and waited for about 20 minutes for the actual interview. Take a jacket or sweater if you get cold easily--it felt like a freezer they had the A/C set so low! At about 7:50 am my husband's name was called, to go to window 14 which is the one with a door that you close behind you when entering. I was more nervous than my husband was--we have a big age gap and my Portuguese is not great but he was very calm and confident. My husband was only asked a few questions by a very nice younger female American consulate officer. She asked him how we met, when we met, and how many times in person I had visited him in Brazil (8 times). I added, in Portuguese, that we had recently spent 11 days in Europe together, so a total of 9 trips together, plus the current one in Rio (7 days), so a total of ten face to face visits. The CO only asked me two questions, in English, my current profession, and how long I had been working in that field. After that she said everything was good, the visa was approved, and that it would arrive in about two weeks by courier service. The whole interview was maybe 5 minutes and we were done, and approved. I couldn't believe how smoothly it went. We left the room and passed all the people waiting for their interviews after us and stepped out into the stairwell where we had one of the biggest hugs ever. I started to cry, and we walked out into the glorious warm sunshine of Rio in the morning of Brazilian Valentine's Day. Life is good!
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #26413