We made it!

tali · August 21, 2006

Hi there everyone. Hope all is well. As the topic says, Ali and I made it through the interview, immigrations, and customs processes and are now settled in North Carolina.

For those new to the process I thought I would share my experience. This site has been so helpful to me, I hope it helps everyone else:

1. We took your suggestions and overnighted at the Kingston Hilton. We woke up early but then got delayed when we panicked thinking we would have to pay $365 for an additional application fee (it says that on the back end of the last page of the fiancee packet but it must be old). Anyway, our appointment was at 7:15 and we didn't get on line until 6:20. THe line was really long so I had to flirt my way up to the front Thank goodness it worked!

2. They direct you into the waiting room where everything happens and they tell you to drop your DS 157 into a window. Someone collected them and then called your name from there.

3. They called us to window 4 (a woman on one side of the glass, you on the other). She asked for his passport and then pushed through a large sealed manilla envelop with his xray in it. She said we would need this at the airport and not to bend it. Then she asked for our paperwork. I handed the woman a large packet with a neat cover note detailing everything they requested. She was rude - going through papers, throwing things back at us, muttering. But she seemed to have what she needed b/c she told us to sit down and wait for our name to be called.

4. After 10-15 minutes we were called to window 10. A different woman (really nice) did the actual "interview". It was pretty straight forward. The asked me: 1) when did I plan to get married, and 2) how many times I had visited Jamaica (then they asked to see my passport to verify). Then she asked him how we met. He went into this whole animated tale and then we started giggling. I think it was really obvious that we were in love so she stopped asking questions. :luv:

Then she asked us to raise our hands and swear that everying in our paperwork was true. Then she took his passport and gave us a card and a paper with diretions to Airpack so we could make arrangments for them to send us the visa.

She never said the word "approved" so I was like, "so does this mean we are approved"? She smiled and said something like "your passport will be returned with your visa information"... Don't know why she was non-committal but my fiancee took me by the hand in a way that urged me to hush up and get while the getting was good!

We walked out giddy but quiet because he was told that if you smile too much they would call you back and take away your visa. I don't know if I buy this - but I followed instructions and we waited to smile and smooch until we got to the car

5) You were all right - Airpack is very reliable. Our interview was on Tuesday the 8th and he got the visa on Monday the 12. But note that they never called us - he just said he had a feeling it was there and checked. Sure enough, it was. B)

6) We left on Thursday. The airport was a mess because of the whole bombing threat in the UK. We got there super early and it was a very good thing. But all in all, everything went smoothly.

7) When we got to JFK we got on the immigration line. The guy was nice. He asked for our packet and said the xray was for us not him. (I can't believe we lugged that thing around terrified about bending it :angry: when it was only for us).

I asked about the temporary work visa. He said they stopped doing that a week or two ago because of the whole UK thing. But he said we should ask anyway. Then he directed us to a room where they check your paperwork in detail.

We waited for about 10 minutes and then were called up. There was very little discussion and she handed us back the passport and told us we were done. I asked about the temporary work permit and she said that she had already given it to us. It was on the back of his departure paperwork. It dosen't look very clear or official but she said that is what it was for. We were relieved.

8) We sailed through customs, collected our baggage, and left to meet family. The next day we boarded a plane to NC and we've been together ever since. It has not been without its bumps (I have a 17 year old daughter so this is quite a transition), but that's another email. I just wanted to take some time and put our journey in writing. I hope it helps like everyone else's story has helped me.

T