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| France |  Review on August 31, 2013: |
Nico+Lori
Rating:  | Review Topic: K1 Visa
Hi everybody, I had my interview yesterday and wanted to share the love.
For some reason I didn’t double check my interview time and I was convinced that the interview was at 2. I arrived at the embassy at 1:30. The guard at the entrance told me that all K1 interviews were scheduled at 1. I can’t believe I didn’t double check! I thought my heart was stopping.
I rushed through security and got a ticket as fast as I could. I got A 110: I was the last in line. In itself it is no real worry, and I do not think that being late to the interview really should be very much of a concern, but in my case it added quite a bit of stress to my experience.
So I went to sit down with everybody else, started to read. After a short while A100 was called (A means that the file is being reviewed by the immigration services). I thought that it was a good sing, things moving and everything. And so I took a book and tried to wait patiently.
After 1 hour they had just called in A103 for the first time. After 2 hours, they were dealing with A106. At that point I was still relatively calm, though cold (they use ventilators inside and it’s quite chilly, might be a good idea to take a light sweater). That’s when a security person showed up and started asking the few remaining persons sitting in the waiting room what they were waiting for. I told him I was waiting for a fiancé visa; he started to turn away. I asked him if he knew the closing time of the embassy and he answered 5.
That’s when I really started stressing out. I hadn’t been called, was nowhere near being called, the desks were closing one after the other and the embassy was closing in an hour and a half.
I went up to a random desk. They didn’t deal with immigration but told me not to worry. I tried that approach for a while, but at 4, I started waiting in line right after A108, who was being dealt with at the desk number 5.
Just as the hostess finished dealing with him I got called. I went up to the desk and waited to be given oral instructions of something. The woman behind he desk was waiting for me to say something so I said that I was fiancé visa.
Still getting no reaction I told her that I hadn’t been called of the afternoon.
She started to look quite stressed out herself and started dealing with my case quite busily. I heard her colleague ask her why a K1 visa was being dealt with so late. She answered that I had been forgotten.
Besides that she was really efficient and quite nice. She joked about my native region. It took some of the stress out. She asked for my passport, reviewed the case for the embassy and then took my DS156, DS 156K and DS 157. She then only needed my co sponsor I134 and didn’t ask for my JAPD certificate.
She said she had everything she needed, that the consular officer would call me before long.
I went back to sitting down, waited for like half an hour and then I was called at desk number 11. By then I was the last one in the embassy.
The consular officer spoke in French, with a heavy American accent. She was civil and quite nice. She made me swear to tell the truth. She then looked at my files and asked a few questions about how my fiancée and I met. She was a little bit suspicious about us meeting at the International House in Berkeley (“Why did an American citizen live in an International House”) but overall the interview went well. She even smiled when she looked at the picture of my fiancée because she found her pretty.
She frowned when she saw my departure days (exactly 10 days after the interview) and reminded me to not buy plane tickets before I had my visa in hand. I then answered that it was already done and asked if there would be any chance to have the visa in time. I said that I saw online that some people had put a rush on theirs. She told me that she would try, but since Monday is a holiday I might have to move my tickets.
She then concluded that the interview went well and that I would receive my visa in 7 to 10 days (fingers crossed).
Anyways yeah! We got our visa ☺
Ps: The most frustrating thing about this embassy is that there is no satisfying way of getting in touch of them. Though you can email them they rarely reply, and their overpriced phone number is not helpful and can only give general information.
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #12687