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Our Guangzhou Experience

David11

By David11,
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David11

David11

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My wife had her interview this morning and it could not have went any better. She was nearly the last one to be interviewed and my bladder nearly exploded because I refused to leave my post at the coffee shop outside until she was finished, but beyond that it was a great experience.

 

A big thank you to everyone at CFL. I'm relatively quiet but I've been a daily lurker for about two years and I'm grateful for all the knowledge we've picked up from this website.

 

Here is a rundown of our Guangzhou experience. Hopefully something here could prove useful to someone in the future. We applied for a CR-1 with DCF in Beijing the the process took 4 months and 8 days from submitting the application to passing the interview. Our application was "front loaded" with everything we had at the time - mostly communication evidence and pictures.

 

Day 1: Our plane arrived in GUZ about Noon. We had reservations with Yang and he told us which airport shuttle bus to take to his place but didn't know where at the airport we should go to actually catch that bus. The busses stop just outside the doors to the arrivals area and the signs say they come around every 20 minutes or so. The bus to Yangs was Bus #6, but for some reason that bus isn't listed on the sign that shows the location of the bus stops. The bus stops are numbered with 2-3 busses stopping in each area. We found bus #6 to CITIC Plaza (I think?) in the #4 area. The bus cost 20RMB/person to be paid to the conductor after the bus is on the road, had good air conditioning, very comfy seats, and took maybe an hour.

 

The bus has two stops and Yangs place is near the second stop. Mr Yang met us at the bus stop and took us to the apartment where we would be staying. After arriving he glanced over our photos, I-864, and Notary Certificates. He only spent about a minute looking over our things, but maybe the hundreds of hours spent preparing paid off and no additional review or suggestions were necessary. He does not speak any English and seemed to be in a hurry and left after that. We have not seen or heard from him since that time, likely because this is a busy time for him because of some events going on in Guangzhou.

 

After Mr Yang left he sent over someone he called his sister to collect the money. She also brought toilet paper and towels with her because the apartment came with neither and we asked Mr Yang if it would be possible to get some. The apartment has a medium sized refrigerator, couch, desk with reliable internet access, a single bed, cable tv, coffee table, and a water dispenser all in a big living room. The bedroom has a full-ish sized bed (it's actually a nice frame with a box spring and thick foam mattress pad on it) of average comfort level, wardrobe closet, and a bed side stand with a lamp with a red lamp shade that makes the room look like one of those Chinese "massage" joints when lit. The kitchen had a sink, two gas burners, cupboards, and a washing machine. The kitchen also had a pan, a mix and max selection of cups and bowls, and a few utensils, but they were of varying colors and smells so we opted to buy disposable. The bathroom is pretty standard with western style toilet, sink, mirror, and shower. The water gets nice and hot after a minute or so, but the shower sprays in the center of the bathroom so you need to remove the toilet paper and anything else you don't want wet before showering, and the shower head is positioned about 5 feet high on the wall so hair washing has to be a manual thing for anyone tall. There was an air conditioner in the living room and bedroom that worked very well.

 

The area outside the apartment windows was very nice with lots of trees and flowers, but the wet environment made for a mosquito haven even in mid April. I had about twenty bites after the first night to my wife's one, but on day two we bought mosquito repelling and it has not been much of an issue since. Across the street and to the left of the apartment complex is a big shopping mall. The highlight of the mall for me was a supermarket called JUSCO. I have lived in China for about two years and that supermarket seemed to carry a lot of "western" things that I have not seen regularly available in other places. The food they make in their deli was also reasonably good, and very cheap compared to other food in the area. There is also a KFC, Pizza Hut, and Starbucks in the same mall along with various Chinese restaurants.

 

The consulate is located less than two minutes from where we are staying. Leaving the building, we need to take a left and walk for maybe 10 seconds, another left and walk for less than a minute, then the complex with the consulate is located in an area set back in from the street on the left. There was nothing outside whatsoever that I seen to indicate that the US Consulate is located in that building. There were several travel agency signs and an advertisement for a same day results DNA testing service (lol) outside that kind of gave the hint that were in the right place, and we asked someone on the street who confirmed the consulate was indeed located in that complex.

 

Day 2: Yang's sister met us outside the apartment building at 8:30am and accompanied us by taxi (13RMB) to United Family Healthcare for my wife's medical exam. After helping my wife fill out the registration form, she gave us her card with the apartment complex's address on it so we could find our way back and she went on her way. We did not have any contact with them after that time until after the interview when we called about extending our stay. I expected a very complex procedure after looking at the medical forms I printed, the medical exam was a surprisingly simple process. After registering my wife had to put on a gown and sat in a centrally located waiting area. Around the large room are different smaller rooms for the different stages of the medical exam. Up first was a blood test, followed by a chest x-ray, followed by someone listening momentarily to her heart and lungs and having her drop trou for a crude gender verification (judging by the giggles, whispers and actions of the adolescent boys who came out of that room, the procedure is the same for everyone). She spent no more than one minute in any of the three rooms and the medical forms we printed were not collected or used, but the process still took nearly two hours due to wait times between the different phases.

 

After the medical portion of the exam finished near 11:00, the folks at United told us that vaccines would be administered at another location (the other place listed on the paperwork for acceptable exam locations in Guangzhou, I can't remember the name) and that they would shuttle everyone there by bus at 12:30pm. At 12:30pm, we met everyone back inside but unfortunately only the person going to get the shots were allowed to go, so friends and family had to wait in the United office for the ~3 hours it took to complete that process and everyone to return. By the sounds of it they usually bus people there but that day United roped in enough Taxi's to take people (and they paid for them) to and back. The medical at United cost 800RMB and the vaccinations, which included Td, MMR, Varicella (chickenpox), and Influenza cost 493.1RMB. The Td, MMR, and Varicella all require followup vaccinations. After the vaccines and a little paperwork she was given a sealed envelope and an x-ray in a rolled up envelope in a nice little tote bag. Taxi back to the apartment cost 16RMB and the driver didn't know where to go until my wife told him the Chinese name for the big IKEA located near the complex.

 

Day 3: Having read that getting there too early is of no use we arrived for document intake at around Noon for the 12:30 scheduled time. There were maybe 200-300 people outside at that time and there were two signs indicating where people should stand, one line for immigration and one for non immigrant visas. The lines were kind of Chinese style "lines" in the sense that it was basically a mob of people in the same general vicinity rather than a real line. It was 12:40pm before they started to let people inside and after my wife went in the building I went back to the apartment to wait. The immigrant lines were let in first and more guards came out to start to let in the non-immigrant folks when the immigrant line was about half way finished. To gain access to the building, she needed to show her passport and appointment letter and was given a small card. Inside she went to the 4th floor via escalator (there is an elevator located down the hall to the left of the 'up' escalator if needed) and went through an informal security stop where her card was taken away. After that pit stop she went up another escalator to the 5th floor and went through a formal security checkpoint. Cell phones and electronic devices are not allowed past this point. Upon entering the main room she surrendered her appointment letter and was given a number and took a seat in the waiting area. There were more people there than there were seats available, so while arriving early won't get you seen sooner, it might assure yourself a seat. There were a total of 15 windows open, in order from left to right there was one payment window, two fingerprint windows, ten document intake windows, and two more payment windows. Numbers were called manually in the form of "Number xxx to window xx" through microphones like bank tellers behind glass use. Some were called out in Mandarin and some in Cantonese, presumably based on the supplied birthplace/residence/etc. of the applicant. LED signs were present above all of the windows but were not used at this time. The financial and document intake staff were all visibly Asian and spoke perfect Chinese. One fingerprint agent was visibly Caucasian, and one appeared Asian but based on his spoken Chinese was likely not native Chinese.

 

The document intake agent at the window was friendly. She looked at my wife's passport and requested the contents of the sealed medical exam envelope, all of her notarized booklets, my I-864 and tax returns for the past three years, my joint sponsors I-864, three years of tax returns, and accepted his W-2, pay stubs, and employment letter. She refused a copy of his birth certificate, my birth certificate, and my domicile evidence that I had attached with the other financial documents. Having considered that the document acceptance worker may be unsure what my purpose my domicile information served I had prepared my wife with that to say in the event that it was not accepted initially, but after the explanation the agent just said that if the VO wants it they will ask for it at the interview. She was asked here if this was the first marriage for both of us (second for her, first for me) and if she is a CCP member (no). After handing over the documents she was given an invoice and went to pay. This is the only mildly unpleasant experience she had involving the consular office. The cashier was mildly snooty, seemed inconvenienced to have to accept payment in RMB instead of USD (Tip: Embassies and consulates "accept" payment in local currency but offer a lower exchange rate than banks. It may be peanuts to some, but had we paid her interview fee in USD we would have saved more than $10. The delivery fee still must be paid in RMB however.), was unwilling to verbally state how much the amount owed was in RMB when my wife was unable to clearly read the LED cash register sign located behind the scratched glass window, and got upset that my wife counted her change to make sure she was given the correct amount. For fingerprinting my wife was called to the window with the Caucasian woman, who she described as having blonde hair and who looked to be around 30 years old. She was very friendly, and spoke decent Mandarin. Somewhere in the last couple steps of the process she was given her appointment letter back with a stamp on it instructing her to return at 7:30am the following day for her interview.

 

Day 4: We arrived outside the consulate complex at about 6:50am and there seemed to be less people present than there had been the day before. This time there were neat orderly lines and a guy shouting in a megaphone to make sure they stayed that way. We were right about in the middle of the line by the time people were let in, which was a few minutes after 7:30. Getting inside was the same process as the previous day with her having to show her passport and appointment letter and going through the various security points. I did not have to show anything to gain access to the building but knew I could not go past the 4th floor and did not attempt to. On the previous day they were given a stern warning not to bring mobile phones with them despite them having an area designed to store them (they don't have space for 300) so my wife obliged and I kept her phone but it seemed like most others didn't listen.

 

After separating at the checkpoint on the 4th floor I went out in search of the coffee shop I had read about on CFL. After exiting the 'up' escalator on the 4th floor and making a right the checkpoint is there on the right, but if you keep going down the hall the coffee shop is just ahead also on the right. It was dark and unattended until about 8:00am but it's kind of in the open and not walled in so I sat there waiting before it opened up (sit on the side opposite of where you'll enter for the best view of people coming out after their interviews). The menu has maybe 8-10 beverages listed - three kinds of coffee, milk tea, wanglaoji canned tea, Heineken beer, bottled water, canned coconut juice, and dole orange juice. Prices for all choices ranged from 49RMB-60RMB, and additional bottles/cans/cups of the same thing were 5-10RMB each. Along with my beverage, I was given a small pack of "tomato crackers" and a bag of sunflower seeds. There was no food available on the menu. The staff of the coffee shop also seem to work at the travel and ticket booking agencies situated around the coffee shop and a website on the wall of the coffee shop directs to a Chinese travel agent. They tried to give everyone coming out of the consulate a brochure and ask if they needed to book a flight to the USA but didn't hound anybody about it too much. The coffee shop had about 16 tables, each with 4 chairs of a tolerable comfort level for the wait. Anyone not a paying customer is given the boot out of the seating area and is forced to stand in a designated waiting area.

 

The waiting room for interviewees was the same room used for document intake the day prior, the only noticeable difference was that this time the LED signboards above each interview window were being used to show who was serving which number. Again today there were not enough seats for everyone and some had to stand inside for well over an hour before enough opened up for everyone. Interviews ranged in length from 3-30 minutes and she thinks everyone who was there with family having more than one person interview together were interviewed first. All of the VO's today appeared to be Caucasian and 8 of the 10 were male. Some VO's sat alone while others had a translator with them. The translators backed away from the interview window when not needed. Most people there were nervous and little groups of people sitting together tried to comfort each other.

 

My wife was interviewed near the end of the group that day and her VO was a woman who looked to be in her mid 30's and according to my wife looked like Marcia Cross in Desperate Housewives. She seen that most of the unsuccessful interviewees were very apprehensive and passive and most offered no indication that they spoke a word of English unless asked directly, so she tried to take the opposite approach. When called she walked up to the window with a big smile and offered a "good morning" before spoken to. The VO reacted very positively and responded with a smile and a "Good morning! How are you?" before getting down to business. Originally my wife also planned to only demonstrate her English when called on it, but after seeing the struggles of others who took that approach she opted to try to use English from start to finish despite her admittedly average level of English, and she seemingly got through the whole interview in only English flawlessly.

 

The actual interview breaks down as follows:

[Greeting]

VO asked for my wife's passport

VO asked for my name

VO asked how we met (Skype)

Wife offered chat evidence (this was all already submitted to Beijing with initial petition), VO declined

VO asked when I first came to China (two years ago. wife offered pictures, VO accepted and scanned through a few)

VO asked if she had ever applied for a US visa before (no)

VO asked if I can speak Chinese

Wife answered no and mocked my inability to speak much Chinese despite two years here, VO laughed

Wife offered my domicile evidence as I have lived in China for the last two years and am still here, VO declined

VO asked how my wife knows her joint sponsor (my father)

Wife offered letter from my father about how he's very happy for us, excited to meet her, etc. VO accepted and kept letter

VO asked my wife to name everyone in a screenshot of us talking with my family on Skype (my sister, father, and nephew)

VO asked my wife if she was CCP (no)

VO told my wife congratulations and gave her the peach/pinkish/orange paper

 

Wife went to post office area to fill out form for picking up her passport later. The line there took about 30 minutes and the fee was 20RMB.

 

She estimated that her interview took 3-5 minutes but she wasn't out until 11:00am. Domicile seems to be stressed for DCF applicants but the VO declined to even look at my domicile information (maybe because I listed my address as my US address?). The VO also did not request any relationship evidence, though we did front load, and my wife offered a few things which were accepted.

 

Overall the experience was as close to painless as we could have hoped for. The interview process went perfect and the Yang's, while our contact with them was minimal, were helpful and the apartment a much more comfortable experience than a hotel room and in a perfect location. The only downside at all was running into some dumb luck with the timing of the interview coinciding with the start of the Canton Fair which considerably raises the price of all accommodation (and maybe everything else) in the city.

 

This was typed up over the course of several hours and very much not proofread, so apologies for the grammatical errors and incomplete thoughts posted in some parts!

Edited by David11 (see edit history)
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David11

David11

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thanks for the write up.

mentioned about 200-300 people on the 1st day.

how many on the 2nd day approx ?

 

 

Maybe 140-180 with an estimate of 130 people being interviewed. A surprisingly high (wife estimates at over 10%) number of people were screened out and refused an interview because they lacked the sufficient documents at the document intake session. Also on the morning of the interview, there were a lot less friends and family tagging along with folks than there had been the day prior, likely because they learned they can't actually go inside with them anyway. When everyone first went inside I was the only person in the coffee shop and up until 9:00am I didn't see anyone other than the staff of the travel agencies. I was actually worried that I may have been in the wrong place. Once people started to come out of their interviews, small (never more than about 10 at a time) groups of friends and family started to arrive to wait in the waiting area beside the coffee shop. I may have actually been the only person waiting in the coffee shop that morning. Most of the other patrons were people who just finished their interviews.

 

When my wife was handed her pink paper after the interview she was also given back all of the photos we had submitted with the I-130 in Beijing. Along with her passport and the brown envelope, today inside the package at the post office they also returned all of the relationship and communication evidence I had submitted and my wife's notarial documents that were given to Beijing. They kept the copies that were given to GUZ on the day of the document intake, as well as a few pieces of evidence my wife offered the VO during the interview. Getting additional copies of the notarial papers was a huge pain in the ass, and surely they have to be aware of how difficult it can be in China. Surely it could be worked into a more logical process than giving the notarial documents to BJ, BJ giving it to GUZ, the applicant giving another copy to GUZ, then GUZ giving the applicant back Beijing's copy.

 

After filling out the paperwork to pick up her passport with visa in Guangzhou she was given a map showing the location of the Junyuan Post Office, but be warned that if you are not familiar with the area the map may not be of great help. The map is not very detailed and entirely in Chinese and my SO isn't...let's say..good with maps, so we had no idea where to go. I got a good idea of where to go from Google Maps but it looked like a decent hike so we grabbed a taxi. The driver had never heard of the street, which is a small side street (single lane of traffic if I recall), but found it with the help of the map that pointed out that it ran parallel between two better known streets. The post office opens at 9AM and we expected a line but there was only one other couple there ahead of us when we arrived right at 9:00. Her Chinese ID was required to pick up the package, which again contained her passport with visa, brown immigration envelope, and all notarial documents and evidence submitted with our DCF application.

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diamondeve21

diamondeve21

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My wife had her interview this morning and it could not have went any better. She was nearly the last one to be interviewed and my bladder nearly exploded because I refused to leave my post at the coffee shop outside until she was finished, but beyond that it was a great experience.

 

A big thank you to everyone at CFL. I'm relatively quiet but I've been a daily lurker for about two years and I'm grateful for all the knowledge we've picked up from this website.

 

Here is a rundown of our Guangzhou experience. Hopefully something here could prove useful to someone in the future. We applied for a CR-1 with DCF in Beijing the the process took 4 months and 8 days from submitting the application to passing the interview. Our application was "front loaded" with everything we had at the time - mostly communication evidence and pictures.

 

Day 1: Our plane arrived in GUZ about Noon. We had reservations with Yang and he told us which airport shuttle bus to take to his place but didn't know where at the airport we should go to actually catch that bus. The busses stop just outside the doors to the arrivals area and the signs say they come around every 20 minutes or so. The bus to Yangs was Bus #6, but for some reason that bus isn't listed on the sign that shows the location of the bus stops. The bus stops are numbered with 2-3 busses stopping in each area. We found bus #6 to CITIC Plaza (I think?) in the #4 area. The bus cost 20RMB/person to be paid to the conductor after the bus is on the road, had good air conditioning, very comfy seats, and took maybe an hour.

 

The bus has two stops and Yangs place is near the second stop. Mr Yang met us at the bus stop and took us to the apartment where we would be staying. After arriving he glanced over our photos, I-864, and Notary Certificates. He only spent about a minute looking over our things, but maybe the hundreds of hours spent preparing paid off and no additional review or suggestions were necessary. He does not speak any English and seemed to be in a hurry and left after that. We have not seen or heard from him since that time, likely because this is a busy time for him because of some events going on in Guangzhou.

 

After Mr Yang left he sent over someone he called his sister to collect the money. She also brought toilet paper and towels with her because the apartment came with neither and we asked Mr Yang if it would be possible to get some. The apartment has a medium sized refrigerator, couch, desk with reliable internet access, a single bed, cable tv, coffee table, and a water dispenser all in a big living room. The bedroom has a full-ish sized bed (it's actually a nice frame with a box spring and thick foam mattress pad on it) of average comfort level, wardrobe closet, and a bed side stand with a lamp with a red lamp shade that makes the room look like one of those Chinese "massage" joints when lit. The kitchen had a sink, two gas burners, cupboards, and a washing machine. The kitchen also had a pan, a mix and max selection of cups and bowls, and a few utensils, but they were of varying colors and smells so we opted to buy disposable. The bathroom is pretty standard with western style toilet, sink, mirror, and shower. The water gets nice and hot after a minute or so, but the shower sprays in the center of the bathroom so you need to remove the toilet paper and anything else you don't want wet before showering, and the shower head is positioned about 5 feet high on the wall so hair washing has to be a manual thing for anyone tall. There was an air conditioner in the living room and bedroom that worked very well.

 

The area outside the apartment windows was very nice with lots of trees and flowers, but the wet environment made for a mosquito haven even in mid April. I had about twenty bites after the first night to my wife's one, but on day two we bought mosquito repelling and it has not been much of an issue since. Across the street and to the left of the apartment complex is a big shopping mall. The highlight of the mall for me was a supermarket called JUSCO. I have lived in China for about two years and that supermarket seemed to carry a lot of "western" things that I have not seen regularly available in other places. The food they make in their deli was also reasonably good, and very cheap compared to other food in the area. There is also a KFC, Pizza Hut, and Starbucks in the same mall along with various Chinese restaurants.

 

The consulate is located less than two minutes from where we are staying. Leaving the building, we need to take a left and walk for maybe 10 seconds, another left and walk for less than a minute, then the complex with the consulate is located in an area set back in from the street on the left. There was nothing outside whatsoever that I seen to indicate that the US Consulate is located in that building. There were several travel agency signs and an advertisement for a same day results DNA testing service (lol) outside that kind of gave the hint that were in the right place, and we asked someone on the street who confirmed the consulate was indeed located in that complex.

 

Day 2: Yang's sister met us outside the apartment building at 8:30am and accompanied us by taxi (13RMB) to United Family Healthcare for my wife's medical exam. After helping my wife fill out the registration form, she gave us her card with the apartment complex's address on it so we could find our way back and she went on her way. We did not have any contact with them after that time until after the interview when we called about extending our stay. I expected a very complex procedure after looking at the medical forms I printed, the medical exam was a surprisingly simple process. After registering my wife had to put on a gown and sat in a centrally located waiting area. Around the large room are different smaller rooms for the different stages of the medical exam. Up first was a blood test, followed by a chest x-ray, followed by someone listening momentarily to her heart and lungs and having her drop trou for a crude gender verification (judging by the giggles, whispers and actions of the adolescent boys who came out of that room, the procedure is the same for everyone). She spent no more than one minute in any of the three rooms and the medical forms we printed were not collected or used, but the process still took nearly two hours due to wait times between the different phases.

 

After the medical portion of the exam finished near 11:00, the folks at United told us that vaccines would be administered at another location (the other place listed on the paperwork for acceptable exam locations in Guangzhou, I can't remember the name) and that they would shuttle everyone there by bus at 12:30pm. At 12:30pm, we met everyone back inside but unfortunately only the person going to get the shots were allowed to go, so friends and family had to wait in the United office for the ~3 hours it took to complete that process and everyone to return. By the sounds of it they usually bus people there but that day United roped in enough Taxi's to take people (and they paid for them) to and back. The medical at United cost 800RMB and the vaccinations, which included Td, MMR, Varicella (chickenpox), and Influenza cost 493.1RMB. The Td, MMR, and Varicella all require followup vaccinations. After the vaccines and a little paperwork she was given a sealed envelope and an x-ray in a rolled up envelope in a nice little tote bag. Taxi back to the apartment cost 16RMB and the driver didn't know where to go until my wife told him the Chinese name for the big IKEA located near the complex.

 

Day 3: Having read that getting there too early is of no use we arrived for document intake at around Noon for the 12:30 scheduled time. There were maybe 200-300 people outside at that time and there were two signs indicating where people should stand, one line for immigration and one for non immigrant visas. The lines were kind of Chinese style "lines" in the sense that it was basically a mob of people in the same general vicinity rather than a real line. It was 12:40pm before they started to let people inside and after my wife went in the building I went back to the apartment to wait. The immigrant lines were let in first and more guards came out to start to let in the non-immigrant folks when the immigrant line was about half way finished. To gain access to the building, she needed to show her passport and appointment letter and was given a small card. Inside she went to the 4th floor via escalator (there is an elevator located down the hall to the left of the 'up' escalator if needed) and went through an informal security stop where her card was taken away. After that pit stop she went up another escalator to the 5th floor and went through a formal security checkpoint. Cell phones and electronic devices are not allowed past this point. Upon entering the main room she surrendered her appointment letter and was given a number and took a seat in the waiting area. There were more people there than there were seats available, so while arriving early won't get you seen sooner, it might assure yourself a seat. There were a total of 15 windows open, in order from left to right there was one payment window, two fingerprint windows, ten document intake windows, and two more payment windows. Numbers were called manually in the form of "Number xxx to window xx" through microphones like bank tellers behind glass use. Some were called out in Mandarin and some in Cantonese, presumably based on the supplied birthplace/residence/etc. of the applicant. LED signs were present above all of the windows but were not used at this time. The financial and document intake staff were all visibly Asian and spoke perfect Chinese. One fingerprint agent was visibly Caucasian, and one appeared Asian but based on his spoken Chinese was likely not native Chinese.

 

The document intake agent at the window was friendly. She looked at my wife's passport and requested the contents of the sealed medical exam envelope, all of her notarized booklets, my I-864 and tax returns for the past three years, my joint sponsors I-864, three years of tax returns, and accepted his W-2, pay stubs, and employment letter. She refused a copy of his birth certificate, my birth certificate, and my domicile evidence that I had attached with the other financial documents. Having considered that the document acceptance worker may be unsure what my purpose my domicile information served I had prepared my wife with that to say in the event that it was not accepted initially, but after the explanation the agent just said that if the VO wants it they will ask for it at the interview. She was asked here if this was the first marriage for both of us (second for her, first for me) and if she is a CCP member (no). After handing over the documents she was given an invoice and went to pay. This is the only mildly unpleasant experience she had involving the consular office. The cashier was mildly snooty, seemed inconvenienced to have to accept payment in RMB instead of USD (Tip: Embassies and consulates "accept" payment in local currency but offer a lower exchange rate than banks. It may be peanuts to some, but had we paid her interview fee in USD we would have saved more than $10. The delivery fee still must be paid in RMB however.), was unwilling to verbally state how much the amount owed was in RMB when my wife was unable to clearly read the LED cash register sign located behind the scratched glass window, and got upset that my wife counted her change to make sure she was given the correct amount. For fingerprinting my wife was called to the window with the Caucasian woman, who she described as having blonde hair and who looked to be around 30 years old. She was very friendly, and spoke decent Mandarin. Somewhere in the last couple steps of the process she was given her appointment letter back with a stamp on it instructing her to return at 7:30am the following day for her interview.

 

Day 4: We arrived outside the consulate complex at about 6:50am and there seemed to be less people present than there had been the day before. This time there were neat orderly lines and a guy shouting in a megaphone to make sure they stayed that way. We were right about in the middle of the line by the time people were let in, which was a few minutes after 7:30. Getting inside was the same process as the previous day with her having to show her passport and appointment letter and going through the various security points. I did not have to show anything to gain access to the building but knew I could not go past the 4th floor and did not attempt to. On the previous day they were given a stern warning not to bring mobile phones with them despite them having an area designed to store them (they don't have space for 300) so my wife obliged and I kept her phone but it seemed like most others didn't listen.

 

After separating at the checkpoint on the 4th floor I went out in search of the coffee shop I had read about on CFL. After exiting the 'up' escalator on the 4th floor and making a right the checkpoint is there on the right, but if you keep going down the hall the coffee shop is just ahead also on the right. It was dark and unattended until about 8:00am but it's kind of in the open and not walled in so I sat there waiting before it opened up (sit on the side opposite of where you'll enter for the best view of people coming out after their interviews). The menu has maybe 8-10 beverages listed - three kinds of coffee, milk tea, wanglaoji canned tea, Heineken beer, bottled water, canned coconut juice, and dole orange juice. Prices for all choices ranged from 49RMB-60RMB, and additional bottles/cans/cups of the same thing were 5-10RMB each. Along with my beverage, I was given a small pack of "tomato crackers" and a bag of sunflower seeds. There was no food available on the menu. The staff of the coffee shop also seem to work at the travel and ticket booking agencies situated around the coffee shop and a website on the wall of the coffee shop directs to a Chinese travel agent. They tried to give everyone coming out of the consulate a brochure and ask if they needed to book a flight to the USA but didn't hound anybody about it too much. The coffee shop had about 16 tables, each with 4 chairs of a tolerable comfort level for the wait. Anyone not a paying customer is given the boot out of the seating area and is forced to stand in a designated waiting area.

 

The waiting room for interviewees was the same room used for document intake the day prior, the only noticeable difference was that this time the LED signboards above each interview window were being used to show who was serving which number. Again today there were not enough seats for everyone and some had to stand inside for well over an hour before enough opened up for everyone. Interviews ranged in length from 3-30 minutes and she thinks everyone who was there with family having more than one person interview together were interviewed first. All of the VO's today appeared to be Caucasian and 8 of the 10 were male. Some VO's sat alone while others had a translator with them. The translators backed away from the interview window when not needed. Most people there were nervous and little groups of people sitting together tried to comfort each other.

 

My wife was interviewed near the end of the group that day and her VO was a woman who looked to be in her mid 30's and according to my wife looked like Marcia Cross in Desperate Housewives. She seen that most of the unsuccessful interviewees were very apprehensive and passive and most offered no indication that they spoke a word of English unless asked directly, so she tried to take the opposite approach. When called she walked up to the window with a big smile and offered a "good morning" before spoken to. The VO reacted very positively and responded with a smile and a "Good morning! How are you?" before getting down to business. Originally my wife also planned to only demonstrate her English when called on it, but after seeing the struggles of others who took that approach she opted to try to use English from start to finish despite her admittedly average level of English, and she seemingly got through the whole interview in only English flawlessly.

 

The actual interview breaks down as follows:

[Greeting]

VO asked for my wife's passport

VO asked for my name

VO asked how we met (Skype)

Wife offered chat evidence (this was all already submitted to Beijing with initial petition), VO declined

VO asked when I first came to China (two years ago. wife offered pictures, VO accepted and scanned through a few)

VO asked if she had ever applied for a US visa before (no)

VO asked if I can speak Chinese

Wife answered no and mocked my inability to speak much Chinese despite two years here, VO laughed

Wife offered my domicile evidence as I have lived in China for the last two years and am still here, VO declined

VO asked how my wife knows her joint sponsor (my father)

Wife offered letter from my father about how he's very happy for us, excited to meet her, etc. VO accepted and kept letter

VO asked my wife to name everyone in a screenshot of us talking with my family on Skype (my sister, father, and nephew)

VO asked my wife if she was CCP (no)

VO told my wife congratulations and gave her the peach/pinkish/orange paper

 

Wife went to post office area to fill out form for picking up her passport later. The line there took about 30 minutes and the fee was 20RMB.

 

She estimated that her interview took 3-5 minutes but she wasn't out until 11:00am. Domicile seems to be stressed for DCF applicants but the VO declined to even look at my domicile information (maybe because I listed my address as my US address?). The VO also did not request any relationship evidence, though we did front load, and my wife offered a few things which were accepted.

 

Overall the experience was as close to painless as we could have hoped for. The interview process went perfect and the Yang's, while our contact with them was minimal, were helpful and the apartment a much more comfortable experience than a hotel room and in a perfect location. The only downside at all was running into some dumb luck with the timing of the interview coinciding with the start of the Canton Fair which considerably raises the price of all accommodation (and maybe everything else) in the city.

 

This was typed up over the course of several hours and very much not proofread, so apologies for the grammatical errors and incomplete thoughts posted in some parts!

 

 

Hi, I have a quick question. You mentioned that you needed to pay some fees? I was wondering what additional fees are there? Are you talking about the visa fee? If I already paid the visa fee and the security fee with the I130, do we need to pay anymore fees inside the embassy?

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