Green card interview experience for AOS from F1 through Marriage - Case Approved

tindera · November 23, 2016

My appointment was at 10:30 am. My husband and I arrived 20 minutes early. After going through security we went in and the receptionist was asking people to give her their info pass and then next she asked anyone with interview notice to approach her and submit it to her. Once I gave my notice to her, she instructed me to sit in the opposite side of the room. We waited until my name was called which took about half an hour or so…there was no clock in the room as my husband pointed out to me and we didn’t bring our phones.

Our interviewer was an older gentleman. He greeted us and then invited us to his office. Before we can sit down he asked us to first swear in. Once we were seated he asked for my passport and ID, just ID for my husband. The first question he asked was how we met, he directed this question to me. As I was telling the story he would ask a question or so and he didn’t mind that my husband would chime in during this time. I think at this point I showed him some photos and this pleased him as he said “Good, I love looking at photos” which both my husband and I laughed at…we were nervous and also he said it in a quirky way. He wanted to know who the people were in the photos. He would point at someone and ask who they are and their relation to us. He then asked my husband how and when he proposed and then asked me follow-up questions for confirmation. He was writing all of this down.

Afterwards he started flipping through our file and would ask us to confirm the information on it. He would put a check on the info after we have confirmed and answer his questions. He asked me what my husband’s birthday is and he then proceeded to asked my husband what mine is. There was also the issue of my name. I’ve posted about it here before. I have two passports from different countries but I’ve applied using the name in my birth certificate which is also the same name as 1st passport but I came in here on my second passport and all my visas are in the 2nd one too. He questioned me about this and I tried to explain as best as I could and how the different cultures and translation affected this the spelling and the middle name. He finally found the letter explaining my name issue that I sent with the package and he took a minute to read it. He seemed satisfied since he didn’t ask anymore questions about my names.

Then in the middle of the interview he told us he would submit our case for approval and continued to go through our file. Finally he got to the “Are you a member of the communist party? “Do you have military training” “Are you a terrorist?” questions. Then after asking us to confirm our signature, he then proceeded to instruct us on the temporary greencard/conditional permanent residence and how we need to have this lifted in 21 months. He then instructed us to collect more files to show proof of our shared life and then he stated how we probably only have so little now because there are limited things we can do when I don’t have a social. He seemed very understanding about. My husband then mentioned we have a renter’s insurance and a joint bank account, and again this seemed to make him happy and he said something along the lines of “This is good so when any one else look at your file they won’t be confused as to why I’ve approved you and you may not need to come in for a second interview” the last part kind of confused me but I assumed he was referring to the CPR since he already approved us. He told us to expect my green card in 10 days to 2 weeks and that if I received my EAD just to cut it since I won’t need it anyway.

He was a really nice man. I feel like we were very lucky as I’ve read some horror stories in here. After exchanging pleasantries, my husband and I walked out of there. I was smiling so wide that I saw other people looking at me weird but I didn’t care coz I’VE BEEN APPROVED FOR A GREEN CARD!!! :dancing: :joy: