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| Naples, Italy |  Review on August 5, 2011: |
luisarsema
Rating:  | Review Topic: IR-1/CR-1 Visa
After we have calmed down a little about our interview and subsequent visa approval we are posting our experience.
We arrived in Napoli Monday in the afternoon after a two and half hour train trip from Roma. Tuesday early morning 8Am we had an appointment at institutto varelli. If you have a hotel in the city you will have to take a cab. Please make sure you pay whatever it reads in the meter because those cab drivers will try to take advantage of you.
We arrived at the instituto around 7:45 and headed for the reception. There is a paper in the wall that instructs all embassy appointments to turn in the passports and sit in the yeallow chairs in the right side of the reception. We waited a few minutes and someone called us. They were all very professional. After a coupole of hours of some tests and waiting we were done. However, they told us we had to be at the US consulate at 2pm to do fingerprints.
At 1:50 we were at the consulate together with all the Visa candidates we had seen earlier in the morning. We were given a number at the entrance and were called in order of arrival. This was an easy process and it didn't take any time at all. By the way, please remember to take 1 picture to instituto varelli and two pictures to the consulate for the interview.
The following day were told to be at the consulate at 7:30 am. We arrived at 7:15 and there were two people already in front of us. A few minutes after 7:30 the guards asked for the passports and assigned us numbers. We went in and went up to the second floor to the same room where had been the previous day to do the fingerprints. A nice lady asked everyone to go up to the window to make sure we had all the necessary paperwork. Since we already had sent the paperwork to the NVC they checked prior to calling us. There was only one issue with our paperwork. Arsema's . We needed the police certificate generale, we had sent in the police certificate criminale. The lady mentioned that the consul would give us instructions as to what to do to obtain the correct paperwork during the interview. We went back to our seats and were a little anxious as we saw the people in front of us being interviewed through the glass window by the consul. From what we saw prior to our own interview the consul as nice and polite and everyone that went in front of us was approved. Our name was finally called and we walked up to the window. The consul asked Arsema if she would like to do the interview in English or in Italian. Arsema said it would not matter so the consul felt more confortable doing it in English. He started by asking how did we meet, he then asked when we started dating. He asked how many times Arsema had asked for a tourist visa. She answered once (which was denied). He then asked if she had a sister, where she lived, how old she was, and when she was born. We thought it was a bit strange he was asking about that information. Meanwhile as Arsema answered the questions the consul was typing in the computer. At last he said we would have to get the police certificate generale from the Procura di Napoli and he also requested for Arsema's sister to email in a copy of the biographical page of the passport. If we were able to accomplish this before 12 noon they would stull be able to issue the visa the same day. Naturally after this we rushed out of the embassy to go get the generale... and called Arsema's sister to email a copy of her passport. We were intrigued why they would ask for that info. The only explanation we could come up was they wanted to make sure her sister actually existed. Somehow someway we were able to rush the process at the procura di Napoli and returned to the consulate 2 minutes before 12. We told the guards we had information requested from the consul. The guards called the consul and he asked if the email had been sent. He confirmed by checking the email and the guards kept Arsema's passport and told us we could pick it up at 5pm at mailboxes etc. At this point we were still kind of in doubt and had a contained "happiness". The hours seemed to pass very slowly and 5 pm finally came. We were at mailboxes etc and the courier was late. After a few minutes he came in with all the paperwork. Arsema went up and got the sealed envelope and her passport. She quickly opened the passport and the visa was there... it was a moment of joy, we hugged each other and thought about the three previous years of constant trips, skype, phone calls, frustrations, etc. :D :D
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #8065