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| Vancouver, Canada |  Review on January 16, 2012: |
Cyteen
Rating:  | Review Topic: K1 Visa
Overall, an excellent experience. We arrived before 9 for a 10 o'clock appointment. The line up was not too long and was being well managed by the very courteous staff. I will just add here what others didn't observe in their reports as my experience was very similar in most respects.
First, whoever got into the building with their electronics and had the security staff keep them experienced a very lucky day! We elected to arrive without our devices. Nonetheless, we were instructed to remove EVERYTHING from our pockets. Only a Canadian in the winter can really appreciate what this means. We saw one family group come outside twice to sort through their tray of stuff and re-enter. It was a real WTF? moment till we got to the head of the line. After your pockets are emptied, they go over your outer garments... coats and sweaters very thoroughly. They found a book of matches in one of my sweater pockets which I told them they could have, but I was directed to a trash can in front of another building about half a block away. I was let right back into the building. It would not have been a nice fate for a new iphone or something, so, I'd advise taking no chances. Just your document cases. We were taken upstairs and directed to attend Window B and turn on the light switch. Window B is inhabited by an utterly professional, super empathetic and knowledgeable woman who helped me put my documents in a slightly different order. She assured me their was no problem with already having glued my photos to the forms. She then told us to have a seat in the waiting room and to watch for our number, but to wait for the second time it appeared. We went to window 6, I believe and spent a couple of minutes with a young woman who then asked my fiancee to have a seat in the waiting area again. On with the interview! it wasn't so much an interview as a casual office chat while she stamped and initialed documents and lobbed a very few softball questions from our I-29F file which she had open in front of her along with my medical report. We have both been married twice previously. She divorced once and widowed once, me widowed twice. We interpreted the requirement for original marriage documents to mean proof we were both free to marry as our prior marriages had ended AND to provide a path and timeline of Fiancee's name changes. So I did not order my original marriage certificates, only original death certificates. Not needing them might have been more good luck than good management. I'm not sure. I was asked for the original of her divorce decree which was promptly copied and returned to me although I offered a copy as well. I got the impression this was to judge preparation more than anything else. More chit chat and stamping, a question about a benign eye condition I'd disclosed to the Doc at the clinic on Wednesday. She asked about marriage plans and I told her that we'd been moving very fast since NOA2 and didn't have it nailed quite yet. She then said she would approve the visa and directed me back to window B. She said a couple of other things that were lost in the ringing of my ears and said again that I was approved and explained DHL might be a few extra days because of the holiday. and then told me again that I was approved. It might have been the blank look on my face or that she heard the ringing too that took her a bit off script!
I wasn't asked for a single scrap of evidence. All of the travel documents, emails, call logs, photos, cards and letters stayed in my document case without a question or a glance
from there, it was back to Window B. The same wonderful woman told us again that my visa was approved and explained how DHL might be delayed a little bit due to the US holiday on the 16th. She also volunteered something remarkable which I'll start another thread on. She told us that a K-1 visa holder can still go to the US as a visitor, so long as they point out in advance that there is a K-1 visa in their passport that they don't want to activate just yet. The wheels started turning when I realized how this might really simplify our logistics.
So, all in all, a relatively painless experience with a group of pleasant, professional people. The work -up to the interview was much worse than the experience itself, but I don't regret being as prepared as I possibly could be.
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #9012