shyaushu

Good to see you here, too. Yes, we are fine, but this Removal of Conditions is yet another drag for us (as it is for all). How I wish we'd have stayed in China until we had been married for two years . . . besides saving $545, it would have simplified things a great deal. I really don't see a big problem for us in this, but the USCIS seems to pay attention to the wrong things a lot of the time. My previous wife clearly and obviously married me in bad faith: she threatened to kill me just a few months after arriving here; she abandoned me, and she told everyone (her Chinese "Hua Ren" friends) that she had only married me to get a green card and come to the US. Her Removal of Conditions? No problem! Meanwhile, Daoqun and I are as tight as you-know-what (I'll leave it to your immagination) and yet I wonder what road blocks they will throw at us. We have joint ownership of lots of stuff so we should have no problem.

Many thanks, WB. I know that is their concern (a "real" marriage) and that we have. But they are so paranoid about everything, and there is the concern they will see our living apart one or two days a week as something other than a regular thing, and thus, not a real marriage. Is your advice to not reveal our rented apartment? I know that would be the obvious way to avoid difficulties ~ just say we simply always live together on the farm ~ but that is not the case and aside from the potential penalties, I feel it would be wrong to not tell the truth. Anyway, there is nothing "wrong" with our living arrangements and we would surely just dispense with the apartment if we could make it work our. But my wife is determined to work here, and that is the only way we can make it work. Of course we'll get testimonials from friends and neighbors but for now I plan to tell them we both live together in two different locations because of my wife's work. Do you (or anyone else) see any problem with that?

My wife (here since 8/08) is up for her Removal of Conditions process. All is fine (even great) with us but I am leary that our living arrangements may cause problems. Dao doesn't drive and she works about 40 miles from our home in rural WV. I drove her back-and-forth for a few months ~ about 1,000 miles a week! ~ and we decided to rent a small apt. in town. I stay there with her about 2 days a week; we stay together on our farm about three days a week, and she is there alone 2 or 3 days a weeks (it varies). I know USCIS wants to see a clear, unambiguous relationship, with both folks living 100% of the time in the same place. But it's just not practical for us right now, and it is lonesome at times for both of us. What to do? Just skip the complication and say we live full time on the farm, commuting to Charleston for her work? Or explain it all to them and hope they don't get into their ultra paranoid thing. I know truthfulness is always best, and there ARE heavy fines for false material statements. But a part of me smells problems with them if we tell them we live apart some of the time. We would definitely not do it this way if we could avoid it. Dao and I are as solid as solid gets and her having to return to China would mean I would definitely leave this country too. Any advice?

Thanks for the info. It all seems pretty clear now. We obviously have plenty of time to get things together and we should have the $545 by then if we save a couple of dollars a day from now on. The "proof of a bona fide marriage" could mean a lot of things. I suppose presenting a joint bank account and utility bills in both of our names would suffice?

Hi, you all. Long time no write but starting our new lives here in the US has been time-consuming, to say the least. Getting hepatitis the second week I was here ~ a parting gift from the P.R. ? ~ definitely didn't help. Daoqun and I know we will have to complete an Adjustment of Status sometime, perhaps soon. We will have been married two years this May, 15, and the "two year" thing seems critical. But the stuff we got from Immigration when we arrived talked about two years after the Conditional Permanent Resident status was conferred. That would make June, 2010, or 90 days prior to that date the critical date. Which date is correct? Also, how do you go about doing that and how much does it cost? I heard a figure of $1,000 bantied about. If you have advice, direction or just a comment please write to my e-mail, OK? No Internet access at home . . . A Merry Christmas to all . . . Wally & Daoqun

This advice seems awfully good. Especially the part about you and your wife talking about what the potential issue(s) might be. There may be something you don't know about. I was in the same boat (a slow one to China?) until a few weeks ago when we were waiting for the result of our blue card after the interview. Fortunately for us they finally issued the visa ~ but not before some real agony ~ and we are headed back to the US on August 10. Right now my daughter is visiting from the US and we are on a tour of South China. She's having a ball and her (Chinese) sister is enjoying teaching her Chinese. Hang in there!

I have an official marriage certificate and it it outrageous for a VO to hold us hostage while they try to prove that it is not a couterfeit marriage certificate. If I am looking for a fiancee visa, the VO can have a subjective view point as to whether the relationsip is bonafide or not. Once you are married and have an official marriage certificate, the VO has no wiggling room for a subjective view point! Ken88 I can certainly understand your point-of-view, and I can understand the logic that says if you have an actual (certified) marriage certificate that should be both necessary & sufficient to prove a bona fide relationship. But logic is not the operative tool in visa roulette. If I were a dishonest, down-and-out guy who was contacted by a youngish Chinese woman who offered me say, $10,000 or $20,000 to marry her, get her a green card, and then divorce her ASAP, I might consider it, I suppose. We would actually get married (with a certified marriage certificate!) and apply for a visa. Then the green card and the divorce. This kind of stuff really does happen. In such a case the "real" marriage certificate is simply a contract that is intended to be broken at a future date. I personally know a young Chinese woman in the US with a student visa who asked me if I thought it was OK if she had a "sham marriage" (her words) to an American jerk so she could remain in the US after her schooling was finished. They would never actually live as a married couple and they would divorce as soon as possible after the green card arrived. I told her "No", and emphatically. I told her it was first and foremost illegal, and if she were caught she would be deported and ineligible for a proper visa, perhaps forever. But I also told her she was a young and not unattractive woman and she had her whole life ahead of her. What good would it do her to begin her life on a lie? What good could possibly come from getting to live in the US on deception? What about her self-respect? I advised her to try to meet a nice person here, if possible, and to marry him, if it seemed appropriate, out of love. A sham marriage scheme would never bring her happiness (which, ultimately, was what she was seeking, I assume). But there are people who don't feel that way and a "real" marriage certificate actually proves little more than that two people are legally married.

Yes, congratulations. Those "security guards" are worthless. They deal with pushing, shoving people everyday and they will say anything to get rid of someone. They once told me I couldn't go to the Citizen's Services Section even with my passport! I just ignored him and walked in.

Indeed, different US Consulate's here seem to have different requirements on this point. In Beijing (the US Embassy) we filed with only a "Z" visa and less than a day in China last August. No problem. It is reported to be different elsewhere. I guess Emerson was right: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." As far as "getting denied" is concerned, we were, initially, at least to the tune of a blue card. Eventually they granted the visa (about four days ago) but not until they had extracted their pound of flesh. But it had nothing to do with the DCF filing: we had an issue that needed to be addressed. That was my previous marriage and divorce, not very long before, to a different Chinese woman (and a resulting visa). Handwritten letters of "explanation", certified, and a photo of the two of us in front of a building in Luoyang was all they wanted. But that problem got ironed out, and I think the fact that my wife and I lived together in China for a year was a big help as far as the visa was cncerned. My guess is that we would have been simply denied had I filed the CR-1 from the US. "Here we go again", they would be saying at the water cooler in the G'zhou Consulate. It all turned out well, for sure. Not only did we get the visa, but we got to know each other really well, and we are certain (as certain as people who are married and living together for more than a year can be) that we are "right" for each other. We went through it all in the year here: change of jobs (twice), no money at times, minor squabbles, terrific fun, traveling and it was all just part of a regular, deep connection. THAT is actually the best part of a DCF in my mind. It removes a great deal of uncertainty. We discovered we are both people who sometimes make mistakes, say the wrong thing at times, but who love each other and can forgive and forget. That's what marriage is, right?

As you may know from my posts here, my wife and I were in a tizzy about our treatment by G'zhou, but at least they fronted with us and issued a blue card at the conclusion of the interview. Only then did their sadistic game-playing begin. They shafted you two right out of the starting gate with their bate-and-switch game. It's a shame and a half, really. If we meet on the Internet it seems like a scam to them. If we meet through friends, we are all in league to get Chinese women to the US. If we meet at a Karaoke bar or Starbucks our relationship is not bona fide. The next couple needs to say they met at a church social! Also, you are now working on a blue card ~ just like us. And we just got our visa two days ago. The total delay counting from the interview was just shy of four months . . . hardly a lifetime. Hang in there. The things they asked for, while mean spirited because they could have simply asked for them during the interview, sound like easy things to supply (and you apparently already have) and the type of stuff that often gets good turn-around time at G'zhou. You might get a call in letter in a week or two (yes, they don't give a hoot about your trip back to the US empty-handed).

All these blues makes me blue, too. Why? So many time lines seems pretty normal and straightforward: common ways of meeting; frequent visits; lots of time. I hope all of yours turn out as ours did (with a visa) but not with all the agony before the ecstasy. In answer to the KTV question: my wife knew what KTV was, but not the John Denver song. It couldn't be (but it should be) "Almost Heaven", so which one is it?

Many thanks, and the best of luck to you two in July. It wasn't really all THAT bad, now that it's over, at least. It seemed like an ordeal until yesterday. Now, we are simply moving on. There's no use in harboring a sour taste in our mouths forever.

Same here! Nothing like an easy interview.

Trap & your fiancee: you both know my wife and I know a fair amount about your situation and you both know we are with you all the way. But now it's on the Candle.

Indeed, the wait time for a decision when they issue a blue card varies. And it can (rarely) result in a denial. In our case, they wanted a hand-written and "certified" explanation of how I married and divorced my previous wife, how I met and married my present wife, and how and why I came to live with her in China. They also wanted a photo of the two of us in front of our apartment! We sent that all in about 2 weeks after the interview and we were "granted" a visa just shy of three months later. I put granted in quotes because it would be another month before they actually made good on their visa granting. The package never arrived at the post office around the corner, and then they wanted my wife to have electronic finger prints made. But they finally gave it to her. If you show your time line and, as others have suggested, give the reason(s) they wrote for the blue card, others may be able to predict a probable outcome more accurately. Good luck!