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|  Review on January 11, 2012: |
Phil & Alla
Rating:  | Review Topic: General Review
Prior to the interview I had several questions about some of the documents required and what Alla actually had along with some conflicting information from the check list and their website. I emailed the Public Liaison Unit, Consular Section and they returned my emails in 24 hours and were very helpful to me, actually giving me answers to questions.
Alla’s appointment was at 9:30 AM and she arrived very early, at 8:30 AM and there was a long line to get in. At about ( ) there were about 40 people still in line, she approached a guard and asked about the length of time it would take her to get in. He inquired as to the type of visa she had the interview for and her appointment time, after telling him, she was let inside.
Once inside the guards teased her by asking if she had anything in her pockets, when she said no they told her with the amount of papers she had, it would have been even funnier to them if she had anything else with her. I provided her with the proof of ongoing relationship and other financial documents that under the highest scrutiny, no one could say we did not have an ongoing relationship.
She was then directed to the woman who reviewed the documents and they wanted a DS 156 in her daughter’s name. Alla was provided the form and filled it out there. For the financial portion she only wanted the I-134, she did not want my tax returns, W2’s, pay stubs or a letter from my employer. She was then fingerprinted and then sat down waiting for the interview. She waited from 9:30 to 11:45 before being interviewed.
Just before her interview a girl was denied and ran out crying, so this concerned Alla a little, making her more nervous. She went to the window and the in interviewer was a male. I think at this time, not sure, but she did have to take an oath to tell the truth. She said she was trying to be nice and smile, but the interviewer never smiled at her and kept a very straight face, so she did the same. He asked her when the last time I was there (I had been there three times) so she gave him the dates. He asked where I worked, which in her words, if he read the papers he knew that I was retired, but she answered him. He then saw a picture we had taken at her parent’s house with her family and her asked who all the people were in the photo. He looked at a photo of her daughter, who is 10, and asked her twice if her daughter was sixteen years old, which seemed odd to her (her daughter looks 10 in all the photos to me). She was asked to wait a moment and he typed into a computer for a few minutes and told her she was approved. She wished him a good day, and he said nothing back to her. This was her feeling of the interviewer “just to me his way seemed like I was nothing not more than a mouse ...very unpleasant feeling... he was looking like a robot and at the end of conversation ..nothing to answer - it seemed rude to me.
To me the bottom line is it went well, she was approved with no problems and her biggest complaint was the wait time, but as I told her we waited 7 months to get there, so a few hours was nothing. My only complaint was that from the beginning I knew proof of an ongoing relationship was needed. I painstakingly kept Skype logs, Skype screen shots, copied phone bills, bank statements and it was not even looked at. But my feeling was that it was better to send her with too much than not enough.
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #8992