|
|
| Montreal, Canada |  Review on June 5, 2012: |
sheeshkabelle
Rating:  | Review Topic: General Review
It was a cold rainy morning, but we hoofed it the 10 minute walk to the Consulate. I did not sleep well the night before, my stomach was in knots and I felt like I was going to throw up all night, and that morning.
We made it about a quarter to six and waited... Two more Visa Journey members showed up shortly after we did. I didn't get their names but they were both there for K-1 interviews. It would be really nice if they put benches out there!!
We all huddled by the door to stay out of the rain. More showed up about seven and lots had bags, cell phones etc that we knew they couldn't get in with. They finally let us in at 7:30 and we were first! The little guy at the door asking for our appointment letter and courier confirmation. At first we couldn't understand what he was asking for, it sounded like he was saying Career, not Courier. But we got it figured out.
We got through security and the two other ladies sat by the elevator with us, we were all wondering what happened to everyone else. It seems they were turned away because they either had the banned items on them, or they did not sign up for the DHL/Loomis service.
A group of five of us were let on the elevator and we got C-1! (Everyone was awesome about not trying to shove people out of the way, we all went in in the order we arrived) We found seats and chatted until they started calling numbers.
First they called C-4 and we all looked at each other confused. They went backwards from arrival numbers at the document intake windows.
We were called up fourth but our document intake was fast. I had everything organised and ready. (What I did was put all the original documents I knew they would need in a separate folder, and then all the other stuff was in a big accordion folder.)The document intake lady asked for the AOS documents and as I handed her the things for our joint sponsor she kept handing it back to me saying she had it. I know she didn't, she took mine, and the I-864a for my brother in law but not the I-864 for my sister.
We took our seats and I told Mr. Sheeshka I'd give it to the person doing our interview. After a five or so minute wait we were called up. We had a very nice blonde lady that immediately made us feel at ease.
She swore us in, then took a look at our folder of stuff. I saw our original I-130 package and it made me smile, it was a long time since I had seen that stuff! The CO was having issues with getting the finger print scanner to work on her computer so she had us move to another window. Then she said she was going to get prints from the other people waiting because she wanted to get it done while the software was working. We had to wait about 15 minutes for her to get that done.
While we stood there she had a stack of papers on her desk, and Mr. Sheeshka was trying to read the top papers, I had to poke him in the ribs to stop because it wasn't our paperwork!!
Finally the CO comes back and says "Ok tell me how a lady from Russellville, TN meets, falls in love and marries a guy from Calgary." So we told her the story, and Mr. Sheeshka was brilliant. She then basically went over the questions from the DS-260, then asks how many marriages it was for both of us. First for him, third for me, so she asks to see my original divorce decrees, good thing I had that big ol' folder with us!! Then she asked Mr. Sheeshka, "Why did you marry a woman who had been divorced twice with four kids" His answered melted my heart, "Because I love her, I love the kids, I knew she was the person I wanted to be with for the rest of my life, you can't help who you fall in love with" She smiled at that, then asked how well he gets along with the kids and liked that he and the youngest are so close (Mr. Sheeshka's been around since he was 5 months old)
She then said she could hold his passport until after June 12th and a IR-1 visa would be issued, or she could issue a CR-1 that day and we could enter on an IR-1. Then she said "wait, let me find out what would be better" she left for about 5 minutes then came back and said, "I'm worried he'll fall through the cracks and somewhere along the line he's going to be misplaced. I'm going to issue the CR-1 today and put a letter on top of the file that says if you enter after June 12, 2012 then you are to be issued an IR-1 permanent resident card" She then said congratulations and slid the Welcome to The United States letter under the window. We thanked her. As I walked through the waiting room I showed the fellow VJ members still waiting our letter and a thumbs up.
It was about 9:00 when we got on the elevator, when the doors closed I burst into tears. Mr. Sheeshka hugged and kissed me, I think he was near tears himself. When we got off the elevator, people looked at me funny, I'm sure they thought we were denied.
As we walked back to the hotel we met up with Saylin at the corner of St. Urbain and St. Rene Levesque. She walked with us to the hotel so we could put our folder up and I changed into my awesome Canadian Wives of VJ t-shirt so Saylin and I matched  We went to Tims across the street and had donuts coffee and hot chocolate. And we chatted about everything.
After breakfast we went back to our hotel and I crashed until 530pm lol
| |
|
Consulate / USCIS Member Review #9780