dark faery

I'm taking 3 online classes at the college I attend this semester. I have one on campus- a foreign language class. I find having my other ones online offer me a lot more flexibility because my foreign language class takes so much time from me. I spend 5 hours a week in lectures for it, another hour in practical lab, and about 3 hours commuting. It doesn't sound like a lot, but if I took my other classes on campus I'd have to go in 4 times a week (sometimes 5) instead of 2, sometimes 3. I wouldn't have much time left to study. I'm not finding it difficult, but in high school, I took a fair few independent study courses so I am used to working by myself, in fact, I find it easier. Usually, we'll have an entire week to complete our assignments in the online classes, unlike my campus classes where I'd have 4 days at the most. Also, my professors online seem more organised and are better at laying down the assignments so you know what's coming a couple weeks from now and I can work ahead. For example, my math class only started on the 19th of this month and I've already completed week 1-4 of assignments. I also have a laptop, so I can login to my classes and do my work from anywhere I can access the internet. Makes it much easier that way.

My husband and I stayed at Travelodge for about $130 as well. It was like a 3 minute walk from the hotel to the consulate, which was our main reason for chosing it- that, and it was just for one night.

I went through the LAX POE in April with my husband (he is the immigrant). The process was fairly speedy, but our flight arrived at 6 in the morning so that might be why. However, while they were processing his paperwork, they let us go get our luggage from the bagage claim and them go back to them and collect our passports and whatnot. Saved a lot of time, really. And yes, they should let you stand in the same line with your husband- they did it with us.

At worst, they will likely spray your shoes with disinfectant.. best to tell the truth.

I think a lot of it depends on your field for work, really.

My husband is from Australia- he has a bachelors in IT for his degree, a few years experience in running his own small business, had a job at his university as a technician for computers, and most recently after he graduated uni worked for a retail store in sales for 7 months.

He put in a lot of apps online and got only one call back (that was in a 3 week period, though) for an IT distributer, in sales- went to the interview and got the job. Salary, plus comission, and good benefits. We didn't have an evaluation of his degree.. all we had was his resume listing his education and experience and a very nice reference from his manager at his sales job in Australia. This is an international company and a very large one who just opened up an office near our house so they were in need of quite a few new hires.. so it kind of just depends on where and what you're applying for. I think for some fields, it's a REALLY good idea to get your credentials evaluated, others it just doesn't seem to matter as much.

Anyway, good luck with the whole job thing!

Unfortunately, the harsh reality is people do get items stolen/missing out of their checked baggage often. I agree, do take the harddrives in your carry on. It'll be far less likely that it'll end up damaged if you do that- that's what we did. Or lost (remember, harddrives accumulate mass amounts of personal info- now a days you have to be careful who has access to such information about you). But he was worried about someone swiping the rest of his bits & pieces that we put in his checked luggage. Remeber, we disassembled his entire computer and stuck it in there (minus the hard drives). Some of it wasn't cheap or inexpensive and who knows why people steal the things they do. We didn't want to take chances- that's all, just offering advice to people here who, like my husband, didn't really want to ship his computer using using a cargo line.

My husband tore his apart and put all the pieces into his checked luggage- in those antistatic bag things (sorry for lack of technical terms, I'm not a big computer person ). Except the hard drives, he brought all four of those in his carry on, mixed between my backpack and his. He left the case/power supply in AU though and got a new one here in America, because his would not switch voltage.

We were a little worried about packing up the computer in checked luggage, but our travel insurance informed us that if anything was stolen or lost, it'd be covered up to $600 per item, I believe.. so check with your travel insurance on what they will cover.

If you can book the tickets yourself, I'd suggest doing that. My husband and I used travel agencies for our flights, and they did nothing spectacular for us- not to mention they repeadetly did a pretty decent job of messing things up for us (i.e. not sending my flight itinary to me until one day before I had to leave). The prices weren't any cheaper than what we could've gotten on orbitz.com or expedia.com, either.

The cheapest flight I got to Australia when I went once was $1,400 and that was a direct flight from LAX to Brisbane in the off season. For the days you want, you're probably looking at a pretty hefty fare. My advice is to check Air New Zeleand, though. You'd have a stopover in NZ, but whenever I'd check airfare, they seemed to have some pretty good deals and ran a couple hundred dollars cheaper than Qantas.

I just want to add- do DCF if at all possible!! My husband and I did DCF in Australia, back in December. Our case only took 2 and a half weeks to process, from start to finish. You're lucky to be able to go through one of the quickest routes, definitely take advantage of that if you can. It's better than waiting on the I-129 for what feels like an eternity and then once you enter the country and get married, having to go through adjustment of status. Make it simple on yourself and good luck!

About the tax transcripts- I did DCF in Australia for my husband and we used photo copies of the tax return that we got back from the tax agent. They were fine with that. I also had the originals with me, though, just in case they wanted to see them. So you don't have to have the ones ordered from the IRS, but it might save you a lot of photo copying....

i'm rather confused myself. if you are shipping your own stuff to yourself, how do you declare that on the customs form?

well, we put the "from" address as our names and our address in Australia and the "to" address again as our names and the address we wanted them to deliver to in America. we could have chosen to have the company put it in storage for us and keep it there for as many months as we'd like (for a price, of course) but we wanted it to our house. pretty simple.

anyway, that is what we put on the shipping and customs forms.

then, we just checked the appropriate boxes for what category our goods fell under and gave them an itemized list.

You could put on the form "used personal goods: value = $0"- that is what my husband and I did on our way back last week.

Basically, you're pretty much exempt from duty if what you're bringing into the country is your own personal and household goods (and has been for awhile) and is not for commercial use.

well, my husband and I shipped our belongings to the states before we left Australia.

the moving company told us that our goods will not be subject to duty, as long as they are "used" and for personal use. so they can't be for commercial use, nor can they be gifts for others. also, you only have one copy of each. like one copy of a video game- if you have five, they'll assume it's for commercial purposes. I think the rule is that they have to be owned by you for at least a year, but as our company told us, "how will they really know if you haven't owned every single little item for exactly a year?"

not much of a problem for us, though, because everything we shipped was over a year old. but I don't think customs has the time to go through every item in every box they recieve to verify its age. it'd make them even more inefficiant.

Update:

all right, so this evening I was sitting here thinking how could I find out what his A-number is? I did check his passport, and the so-called registration number is 8 digits; however, it does not start with a zero, eight, or nine. It actually starts with a five. Thinking I had no actual paperwork from the consulate, aside from the letter with our case number, I was getting a bit frustrated but then I remember we have the "brown envelope" that you have to take to the port of entry with you when you enter the United States packed away safely in my carry on bag for when we fly out- it's been there for months, ever since we recieved it. I remembered it had all of our case details on a sheet of paper stapled in front so I just ran into the bedroom to get it and it lists the A-Number in one of the very first fields. The A-Number is, in fact, IDENTICAL to the registration number on the visa label in his passport, minus the A. So there you are, for anyone having the same problem!!

thanks for the clarification on the red number- even if it's not th A number it's kind of good to know what number it really is.

and no, we don't have any paperwork the consulate gave us, except a letter from them informing us when our appointment date is but that just lists our case number. I guess that's the down side to the whole direct consular filing thing.

we've emailed and faxed the consulate, so now the rest is really up to them on when we get a reply but it's getting very close to the day we have to ship our stuff out so I'm going to contact the moving company in a few days and ask if the belongings can be imported without an A number.

if I had thought of this sooner, before filling out all the paperwork for importation, I would've put all of our belongings in my name instead of him- since I'm a citizen they wouldn't want the stupid number!

thank you for the help, though. I will go check the registration number on the visa and see if it starts with a zero, eight, or nine out of curiosity.

I asked this very same question a few days ago! Confusing, isn't it?? I THINK the A# is the one called "registration". I may call the consulate today and ask them. If I do, I'll post what they tell me.

Also, your husband will not get an I-94 when he enters the US as he's entering on a CR-1. I-94s are only for Non-Immigrant visa holders (K-1, K-3, etc).

thanks for the clarification on the I-94. And yes, please do post if you find out which one is the A-Number!! I emailed the Sydney consulate, but haven't heard back from them yet.

I have his passport in front of me with the visa label and there's no number starting with an A anywhere on the visa- that's the problem I'm having. We have a number to the far right, under the case number that starts with SYD (for the Sydney consulate) then under that there is an 8 digit number that is called the registration number, however, it does not start with an A. On the very bottom right row there is ANOTHER 8 digit number in red.. not titled and different from previously mentioned "registration number"

As we have not entered the U.S.A yet we do not have an I-94 to look on, unfortunately, and we have to ship these boxes out before we do enter the states. Nor do we have any NOA that have his A-Number printed because we were a DCF case and filed every bit of paperwork in one day and recieved the visa a few days later.

Thanks for the response, though.. it is appreciated, but I am still confused! Any other insight?

All right, so my husband recieved his CR-1 visa a couple months ago through direct consular filing.

We're all set to go back to America and we have most of his belongings packed, nearly ready to be shipped. We have to fill out customs forms for his belongings though, and one of the questions on the customs form asks for his alien registration number.

What exactly IS his alien registration number? Is it one of the numbers on the actual visa in his passport? I see a line on the passport that says "Registration number" and I'm guessing that'd be it, but it doesn't specifically say ALIEN registration number so I thought I'd ask.

thanks to anyone who can clarify this for me.

I just don't want to risk slowing down the long period before he gets his belongings again. I'm more concerned about his stuff than he is.

The Sydney consulate is so quick when it comes to processing dcf cases, I want to know why anyone would even do something as risky as this?

Just to give you an idea, my husband and I mailed our forms for preprocessing of our case in the last week of November, requesting any date before the second week in January. Two days after the consulate recieved our forms in the mail, we got a call for them saying they scheduled us for an interview on the 9th of December, only SIX days after our wedding. Our entire case took about two and a half weeks to process.

okay, so you'll have to be apart for a bit if you can't stay an extended period in AU like I've been. but I know what the seperation is like, I had to be apart from my husband for about five months before we got married. It was painful, but I would've rathered that then one of us overstaying one of our visas. It'll only cause more problems in the long run. It's just not worth it, in my opinion.

you're very fortunate to be going through one of the fastest consulates- maybe if you were going to go through a slower consulate and/or pursuing the visa another route I could be a bit more sympathetic (yet not condoning). but my advice is to play it a bit safer and be thankful that you're case is likely to go quicker than most people who encounter the immigration process.

I hope you feel better soon and I hope the visa issue is straightened out. I'm sure once you provide those documents, you'll get your visa in no time. I don't think I've ever heard of anyone being denied from Sydney (not saying it doesn't happen, just kind of rare) but I have heard of this happening a fair few times and it generally works out nicely in the end. :]

We mailed our I-864 along with the DS=230 and DS-2001 forms and it was there waiting for us the day we arrived at the consulate for our interview, in our file folder. I'm sure they would have kept yours and put it in your file- they're pretty with it at the Sydney consulate. We brought a photo copy of ours just in case, even though it wasn't the original, just to show we did have it and tell them we did submit it ahead of time. Good luck on the interview. :]

For my husband (the AU citizen), they took 5 passport photos, all together. The doctor requires 3 when they perform your medical and the consulate requires 2. For myself (the US) citizen, they only took one at the consulate.

Allocate about 4 hours or a little bit more, especially if flying Qantas, I'd say. I've flown Qantas a total of four times so far (usually Brisbane to LAX) and every flight I've had with them has been late for take off anywhere from a half hour to two hours. One time, they even misplaced my baggage and half of the baggage of everyone else on that flight (at LAX, no less) and it took about an hour to sort that mess out. Coupling that with a delay in take off, it kind of adds up. Not to mention he'll have immigration and customs to clear and the distance to the international terminal is not close to the domestic terminals.

I have a friend who actually works for them and flies them quite often due to staff priced flights and her flights are quite often late, as well.

When my husband first came to America to visit me, his flights were from Brisbane to Sydney on Qantas and from Sydney to LAX on United. Well, Qantas got him at Sydney too late for him to check in for his United flight and needless to say, he was stuck in Sydney overnight and it delayed our very first meeting by a whole day, LOL. It's kind of funny now, but at the time, neither one of us were amused and I think I'd be pretty angry if it happened again.

They're not a bad company to fly with, so long as you don't mind delays now and then- and as much as I don't like them, a one or two hour delay isn't that awful for an international flight, IMO. I guess that's because I go to the airport extraordinarly early, expecting a very long journey. Too bad Australia is so darned far from America.

Anway, just a heads up.. expect delays and prepare for them. If they don't happen, it's fantastic, but I think waiting around an extra hour or two is really worth it to not miss a flight.

As for the medical, I haven't had a chance yet to ring them as yet, heard the receptionist there isn't a real nice person and not very helpful, refers ppl to the website mostly, which states you need some letter of authority from the consulate for them to rip you off on the medicals. But if I can make the appointment for in a few weeks, once I get a chance to ring, I 'should' have the packet 3 here by then.

14 weeks today, hopefully, til we touch again, for the rest of our lives.

All 3 of the women in the medical office in Brisbane are nasty creatures. Shockingingly rude to both my husband and I. You would think for how much they charge you, they'd be a bit nicer. Anyway, in order to have my husband's medical done, we had to bring in the actual packet of medical forms from the consulate.

Ugh, good luck dealing with those beasts. On the bright side, at least the staff at the actual consulate is more cheerful.

The visa will be valid for six months past the issue date-- so your husband will have to present himself to the POE before that time frame otherwise it will expire.