I'm here!!!

[happyimmigrant 0]

I know it's been a long time coming, and I apologize for the long absence – but it's rather hard to update these things without a computer or Internet access, and I have been quite busy.

And so it began. I began packing up all of my computers and things on Friday June 16th. I had been packing clothes and other things all through the week. Holly arrived on Sunday the 18th. We spent the day packing up and getting last-minute things done. She cut my hair as it was getting long! I checked and re-checked my immigration paperwork. On the morning of Monday the 19th, we loaded up my car and headed off for Montreal.

The drive went quickly, as it always does when Holly is in the car, because we can talk, have fun and just spend time together. With only one mis-turn near the outskirts of Montreal (which we remedied quickly), we found our hotel (La Tour Centre Ville) without much problem. There were two desk clerks who appeared to be identical twins, neither of whom spoke much English. We managed to get checked in, parked my car in the (tiny, creepy, horror-film reminiscent) garage below the hotel and went to find our room.

We were not expecting much of the hotel (based on others' reports) and we got just what we were expecting. It appears that the hotel was at one time an apartment building. Our room was the smallest room available - a "studio" I believe they called it, and it had a living room, sleeping area, small kitchen and bathroom - basically a bachelor apartment. It was (mostly) clean, but certainly not what I would expect for $120 a night. I'd class it as a 2 1/2 to 3 star hotel. Well, whatever. We weren't there for the hotel.

We got settled, then headed out to find some dinner. We walked west and found a place nearby where there were three restaurants all with outdoor patios on the sidewalk. We picked the middle one, which was a pizza place. We started with a pitcher of sangria, and followed with what turned out to be a fantastic pizza.

After dinner we took a walk down through a retail area, near the Montreal Eaton Center, and stopped in a clothing store just before closing. We found a bunch of great things (mostly for me) and bought a few of them.

We returned to our room with some snacks, put a movie on, set TWO alarm clocks for the morning, and fell asleep.

Tuesday morning arrived and we got up at 6 am. A quick shower, I put on some of the new clothes we had bought, and we headed downstairs. We got a coffee and a quick bite to eat in a cafe outside the hotel (the cashier there was one of the few people we encountered that did not speak English), and headed over to the US Consulate at 7:30. There were a few people milling about outside the doors, and a couple security guards were there. The consulate itself is completely nondescript - there are no signs, and the entrance is off the side of a building - if you didn't know just where to look for it, you'd have no hope of ever finding it.

At 7:45 they opened the doors and let us in. We were amongst the first allowed inside. They checked my interview letter first, and Holly's US passport. We were sent through a metal detector, and our belongings X-rayed, just like at an airport. Some people who got in before us had things they were not allowed to have (cell phone, etc) and had to sign them in to retrieve later. As a result, we were the first ones sent through to the elevator waiting room. We sat down and waited for the elevator to open (it had a temporary barrier against it).

At 8:00, a guard came in, removed the barrier, and opened the elevator. We were the first ones in - knowing that we would be exiting out the back of the elevator, we went straight to the back - but then turned around to face the front, as one would normally do in an elevator. Everyone else that entered saw us facing the front, and did the same. The doors shut and we rode up to the 19th floor. It arrived, we turned around, and the door opened, letting us out first. Holly headed right, but I knew to turn left out of the elevator, saw Window 14, and lined up in front of it immediately. We were first in line. The woman checked my letter and gave us a ticket - C1, first one of the day. Even though our interview was not scheduled until 9:40 am, we knew that it was actually done on a first-come first-served basis. Holly heard the couple behind us muttering and complaining that they didn't get to be first in line. They got ticket C2.

Every window in the place is thick bulletproof glass, you talk to the employees through a speaker, and there is a small slot at the bottom to pass documents through.

We sat and waited for about 15 minutes until our ticket was called. We got called to window 8, where a woman asked for my documents in rapid fire - faster than I could produce them. She seemed to be satisfied with what I gave her, however. I did not give her any financial support information, any photographs - nothing except the official USCIS forms that they wanted, my passport, my passport pictures (2), medical packet, and the other things on the checklist they had sent in Packet 3. When she asked one question, and I answered "no" rather softly, she looked up, not having heard. Holly said to her, "he said no." She butted in, "I didn't ask YOU, I asked HIM." She was really not very nice.

She then told us to return to Window 14, pay our $100 fee, and return with the receipt to her window. She said, even if she wasn't there, just to slip the receipt through the slot. She told us not to wait for her there, because we would miss being called for our interview. We headed off to Window 14, paid our $100 (US, cash), got our receipt, and returned to Window 14. By then, there was another employee there, talking to two more clients. We stood there for about five minutes waiting for her to finish with them. I told Holly to go back to the waiting room in case our number was called for the interview. A minute later, it became obvious that the people at that window were confused and disorganized and were going to be there a long time. I butted in and asked the woman behind the window if I could put my receipt through the slot. She said, "oh, just put it through the slot in the window next to me, that will be fine." So I did, and returned to the waiting room.

We waited. And waited. Ticket C2 was called, the couple got up and went to their interview. I heard my name called, asking me to go to Window 8 again. We got up, and the original woman was there. She asked where my receipt was. I told her that I had put it through the next window, as the other woman had told me to. She very angrily said, "well that is NOT what *I* told you to do! I don't care what SHE told you to do, *I* said to put it through THIS window!" She found my receipt, and we returned to the waiting area. As we left her area, I was muttering obscenities under my breath about how this was so typical of this entire process, how you are continually told contradictory things by different people, and Holly quickly hushed me up, sensing that a year's worth of frustration with this idiotic system was about to emerge just before our interview. She was probably right.

The C2 couple emerged from their interview. They had been in there for a good 20 minutes. They did not look happy. They had looked nervous to begin with, and as they were leaving, Holly thought that the girl was blinking as if holding back tears. Not good. We were called into our interview shortly after.

The interview itself was the easiest part of this entire process. The interviewer was a kind and polite man who didn't bother with any formalities - no swearing of oaths, nothing. He immediately put us at ease. He asked us how we met, where we planned to live, and when we were going to get married. That was it! We answered together, and I think it was rather apparent that we were together and happy. He told us to come back at 2:30 the next day to get the visa, and gave us a little card that would gain us entry back into the consulate. It was 9:30 am. We walked out, and went back to the hotel!

We spent the rest of the day walking around Montreal. We started by going east, finding a bunch of coffee shops and the ever-present sex shops/strip joints offering "contact" dances, with explicit images (some in moving neon) of what was going on inside. They weren't confined to any one area, they were everywhere - we even saw one huge strip joint directly over top of a Thyme Maternity store. Juxtaposition at its best. We found a small coffee/lunch shop and had some lunch.

We then went back to the hotel and crashed for a couple of hours. We got up, headed out west, and stopped at the same pizza place we had tried the day before. More pizza, more sangria. Then off to Crescent Road, where we found lots of bars. We passed a fashion festival on the way, and were cornered by an obnoxious interviewer from the web site askmen.com, who interviewed us on camera no doubt because of our fashionable outfits. Holly hated every second, and I gave ridiculous answers (being the fashion maven that I am - NOT!), but they seemed to love it. They had us cut a "You're watching ASK MEN DOT COM" bumper for whatever TV show or webcast or whatever it is they were doing, and took our picture. Yay. I never did go see if we made it online.

We found a GREAT chocolatier near the top of Crescent Street, and bought some great chocolate treats which we consumed before we had even reached the end of the block. The shop owner was an interesting woman who was very talkative and interesting. After some more sangria, we decided that we needed some more chocolate, so back to the chocolatier, where she offered us both a job (no kidding)!

We had dinner at another nice restaurant that we found - more sangria (Montreal will be remembered for sangria!) and - yes, we had pizza again! I don't know what was up with the pizza, but it was so good! We sat on a second floor corner table with the window taken out, probably the best vantage point in Montreal for people watching - we spent almost two hours sitting there watching people as the sun went down. We headed in around 10:30 and called it a night.

Wednesday morning we got up, I got some breakfast & coffee from the cafe downstairs, and I cut Holly's hair (believe it or not!) I can't believe she trusted me with it, even though it was a simple clipper job. It looked pretty decent, not bad for my first haircut ever.

Noon arrived, we checked out of the hotel, loaded the bags into my car (which we left in the hotel garage) and we headed back out towards Crescent Street again. We stopped at a few stores and shops on the way. We had lunch at a different restaurant (oh my god, pizza again), and walked the long way back towards the Consulate. We got there almost exactly at 2:30, which was good - we were both tired of walking. I went inside (Holly was not allowed) and within 15 minutes had my passport with its newly minted K-1 visa in hand. A woman who was sitting next to me said that her appointment was at 9:30 the previous day, and that she arrived there at 9:15 - and didn't get out until almost 3:00 pm. We got there at 7:30, were let in at 8:00, and were out by 9:30.

We went to the hotel, got in my car, and left Montreal. Holly fell asleep for the first hour and a half, until I blew through one of the multitude of speed traps on the 401 that day, and had to do some rather tricky maneuvering into a rest area to avoid being ticketed. She was not impressed when I told her why she had been woken up. Getting into Toronto, we were faced with a huge traffic jam because of a major accident, so we stopped at the large movie theater complex at 400 & 7, and watched X Men 3. We got home at around 11:30, and headed to bed.

Thursday morning we got up reasonably early, went to pick up some furniture from a friend, got in her car, and drove up to Orangeville, where we picked up my massive (33 foot) U-Haul truck. Friends and family arrived, and we spent the rest of the day loading all of my belongings from the storage facility they had been in for the past year, into the truck. Thankfully the weather was clear and (a bit) hot. Holly's car went onto a dolly towed behind the U-Haul, then we took friends and family to a local Boston Pizza for pizza (what else?) and beer. Home and to bed, we were exhausted.

Friday we loaded up Melly (my dog) into the truck, hopped in, and set off for Ohio. Of course, first there was the border crossing in Buffalo, which was the part that I was most nervous about, being that they had been very nasty to me and had denied me from entering almost a year ago. We got to the border, and were sent over to the awful immigration room. We waited about an hour before being seen, and the typically incompetent border guard spent a good 30-45 minutes asking me the same questions over and over. It was quite obvious that he had no idea how to process a K-1 visa. Irrelevant questions such as "where do you work?" "How long will you be staying?" "Where are you going to be working?" "So, what company do you work for now?" over and over again. He couldn't have cared less about me entering on the visa, couldn't have cared less about the contents of our truck (he took one cursory glance at the itemized list of contents I gave him before handing it back), all he wanted to know about was where I was working, and where I was going to work. Once he finally gave me the I-94 and took my $6 fee, he told me to make sure I didn't lose it, because I would need it if I left the US and wanted to re-enter. Never mind the fact that K-1 visas are only good for a single entry!! Typical idiocy and incompetency. The USCIS quite obviously puts the bottom-feeders on border duty.

We were across!! After a quick rest stop and a bite to eat, Holly tried driving the truck for an hour (at the rest stop, a truck driver in the semi next to us pointed to her and motioned the words, "you driving THAT?" When Holly nodded yes, he gave her the thumbs up and said, "cool!!" - which then gave her the idea that she DID want to try driving it!). We got home around 8:00 pm, undid her car, and parked the truck for the night. We had dinner at her parents, went home, and fell into bed.

Saturday was clear and warm, and her family came over to help unload the truck. We finished unloading the hundreds of boxes, furniture and everything else by mid afternoon, absolutely filling our house.

Every day since then has been spent unpacking, sorting, arranging and re-arranging. I've also fixed a lot of the broken things that have gone unrepaired for the past year - toilet, refrigerator, air conditioning, dishwasher. My muscles have been sore for days, my body is covered in bruises and cuts, but I am HAPPY, and we're finally here at home!! Almost exactly a YEAR has gone by since I was here last, and I'm finally back.

Next: Our wedding. 3 1/2 weeks from now! Panic mode has not yet set in, but I'm sure it will soon!

[JenT 0]

Thanks so much for posting such detail Scott. Tears came to my eyes as I read your account... I could read the emotion between the lines and look so forward to the day when David and I can have that same joy.

Congratulations and welcome to the USA!!!

Jen

[KiminON 0]

Scott!!! i am so happy that you are finally where you belong!

i'm starting to get very nervous about next week. i do hope i don't get the crabby lady you got. LOL

have fun planning the wedding. it sure sounds like you have a lot to keep you busy for a while.

btw...with respect to mellie, did you just have the vaccination informtion from your vet for her? someone recently told me that dogs need to be licensed as well. i've not ever licenced my hounds as they have return to sender chips.

take care

k

[jen&darcy 0]

Welcome to the USA and Ohio! Glad your both home....neighbors!

[Flames9_RN 358]

glad it went well!! If your a VJ'er one is aware of what is fully required which makes the process soo much easier. Best of luck

[Cygnet 0]

Congratulations, Scott! Really happy for both of you.

[laura428 0]

Thanks so much for posting this - so helpful!

Now, take it from someone who has been through the insane mess of doing immigration and a wedding at the same time (married one week before finalizing my immigration to Canada five years ago). Take some down time, when you can find it, and relish in the life you two are going to have together. Just breathe...

Congratulations!!

[MarieAnastasia 0]

Congratulations!!! Your interview sounds very close to mine (check it out in the USCIS Reviews)..........we also stayed at the La Tour Centreville..............we couldn't park in the creepy underground thank God because our truck was too high but the clerk sent us down there anyway without us knowing how low it was....................we ended up parking in their upper parking lot on the side of the hotel after a close call with losing the truck roof!!. It was cheaper back in March..............$75 a night plus $20 parking and we went by their directions on their website and ended up being lost for 3 hours!!!

But my Interview was totally hassle free! It was at 9:30 and we were out of there by 9:25 due to like you going early!! I wasn't lucky enough to go site seeing because I ended up with a stomach bug!!!!!

We married May 16 and now I'm going through AOS and AP ...Madness, I say......Good luck to you and ours on the rest of your journey..............{{{{{HUGS}}}}}

Edited June 28, 2006 by MarieAnastasia

[Jersey Girl 2]

Great story with a happy ending. You're just in time to celebrate Canada Day and the Fourth of July. How about a pizza?

[Leafgal 3]

Well done Scott and Holly, I am happy to hear all is well and your together. Best of luck with the wedding plans, which I am sure will go just as smooth.

[happyimmigrant 0]

Scott!!! i am so happy that you are finally where you belong!

i'm starting to get very nervous about next week. i do hope i don't get the crabby lady you got. LOL

have fun planning the wedding. it sure sounds like you have a lot to keep you busy for a while.

btw...with respect to mellie, did you just have the vaccination informtion from your vet for her? someone recently told me that dogs need to be licensed as well. i've not ever licenced my hounds as they have return to sender chips.

take care

k

I've only ever been asked about Melly once during crossing, and that was a long time ago. I had her vaccination information, and that's all they need - no requirement for licensing. I know where I lived in Ontario you had to have your dogs licensed every year, or face a fine if found without one. You also had the option of paying extra for a "lifetime" license. Melly (and Nero, when he was alive) is chipped as well.

This time they never even asked about dogs, and I didn't bother telling them that I had her in the truck. They didn't seem interested in anything else I had in the truck. I could have been hauling half a ton of cocaine and they couldn't have cared less.

What really made me aware that the border guard didn't have a clue was that at the end, he asked ME: "so, what do I do with this now? Do I send it to Cleveland, I guess?"

Not confidence-inspiring.

[Flames9_RN 358]

imilar thing happened when I went through MAine to activate my cr-1, they had no clue, but luckily they got on thr phone and found out!!

[KiminON 0]

Scott!!! i am so happy that you are finally where you belong!

i'm starting to get very nervous about next week. i do hope i don't get the crabby lady you got. LOL

have fun planning the wedding. it sure sounds like you have a lot to keep you busy for a while.

btw...with respect to mellie, did you just have the vaccination informtion from your vet for her? someone recently told me that dogs need to be licensed as well. i've not ever licenced my hounds as they have return to sender chips.

take care

k

I've only ever been asked about Melly once during crossing, and that was a long time ago. I had her vaccination information, and that's all they need - no requirement for licensing. I know where I lived in Ontario you had to have your dogs licensed every year, or face a fine if found without one. You also had the option of paying extra for a "lifetime" license. Melly (and Nero, when he was alive) is chipped as well.

This time they never even asked about dogs, and I didn't bother telling them that I had her in the truck. They didn't seem interested in anything else I had in the truck. I could have been hauling half a ton of cocaine and they couldn't have cared less.

What really made me aware that the border guard didn't have a clue was that at the end, he asked ME: "so, what do I do with this now? Do I send it to Cleveland, I guess?"

Not confidence-inspiring.

well at least they didn't hassle you the contents of the truck or the dog as well. i think most border agents stationed in buffalo are cranks. but wouldn't you be if you had to live in buffalo? which bridge did you cross at, peace, rainbow or lewiston? by the sounds of things, i'd rather cross at another. mind you, i think detroit is the more direct route for me.

k

[evilcanuck 0]

I crossed at ft erie/buffalo and they didnt know what to do with my stuff either. When I handed the pkg that said 'do not open' He goes 'wahts this?' and ripped into it. I was like OMFG WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!!

Then he had to call someone else over ask them and he told him to stamp it in a couple different spots and then forward it to the immigration centre (which one he didnt specify). I had to ask if they wanted to see my list of things i was bringing...after they wre all finished and he handed me my passport and stuff back. He didnt even look at the list let alone the uhaul or truck....sheesh

I cross Monday with my son, he is activating his visa for the first time....should be interesting.

Totally off topic....but any of you canucks or canuck-by-marriage dont have any plans on Saturday, come on up to the Maple Grove Tavern, in Maple Heights (cleveland) (www.maplegrovebar.com). Come upstairs, I will be bartending...I wanted to have a Canada day party but my idea was ummm well it wasn't acceptable I guess....who knows, but here is the deal.....since it is Canada day....anyone with Canadian ID....I will buy them a drink! Hows that?

[MarieAnastasia 0]

I crossed at ft erie/buffalo and they didnt know what to do with my stuff either. When I handed the pkg that said 'do not open' He goes 'wahts this?' and ripped into it. I was like OMFG WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!!

Then he had to call someone else over ask them and he told him to stamp it in a couple different spots and then forward it to the immigration centre (which one he didnt specify). I had to ask if they wanted to see my list of things i was bringing...after they wre all finished and he handed me my passport and stuff back. He didnt even look at the list let alone the uhaul or truck....sheesh

I cross Monday with my son, he is activating his visa for the first time....should be interesting.

Totally off topic....but any of you canucks or canuck-by-marriage dont have any plans on Saturday, come on up to the Maple Grove Tavern, in Maple Heights (cleveland) (www.maplegrovebar.com). Come upstairs, I will be bartending...I wanted to have a Canada day party but my idea was ummm well it wasn't acceptable I guess....who knows, but here is the deal.....since it is Canada day....anyone with Canadian ID....I will buy them a drink! Hows that?

EvilCanuck I sure wish I was close enough to Cleveland......................I'd show up in my reds and whites and take you up on that offer of a drink .....Nothing Canadian happening around here that I know of..............If anybody knows of anything in Maine...........PLEASE let me know...........even though we're only an hour and a half from the border..............I don't have my Advance Parole yet

Have a good one.....................{{{{{HUGS}}}}}