shadeOgray

I think that is what bothers me. I want it to be our family, our children, etc. However, when it becomes she giving her property to her daughter, then my ideal breaks down. Suddenly, it is her daughter, and my children. It creates a distance between me and her daughter and she and my children (I try to avoid her/my but I need it in this context for clarity). She agrees I should give a house to my 2 children as well, but that would leave us with nothing. Perhaps it is expectation. If I gave a house to my children, they would feel free to sell it, and use the money as they saw fit. My wife thinks we can continue to live in the apt. after she gives it away, until we die. Still thinking.. still not comfortable Your still thinking like an American, you will no have "NOTHING". Your children will take care of you as you get older, it's the Chinese way.

Poke'em in the eye and drink a beer. Give them hell brother!

Hmmm My Ting must be an exception to the rule. I asked her about finding other Chinese to talk with here and she looked at me like I was nuts. I think her reply was something like "You crazy?" "I am so glad to finally have my privacy and I can't stand the social complications associated with Chinese people" And I said "Ohhhh Kaaaaayyy" She said she much prefers it here compared to China but does miss her family but not the complex social stuff. She tried to explain this to some people in China before and they went as far as calling her a traitor One guy on QQ actually got VERY crude and nasty with her. Never seen her let someone have it like that before. It was soooo cool to see my lil Ting Ting rip some guys head off on the net I was so proud

Congrats!

GRATS!

We are and have applied for one but the point is it should not be demanded of her and is illegal to do so. So now we have to wait for a long time because of an illegal practice.

http://www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/js335.htm Mr Lee and my self digging around came up with some information regarding a banks unlawful and un reasonable demand of an SSN from a foreign national to open up a bank account. The link above (courtesy of Lee) from the Department of the Treasury under the guidance of the Patriot Act states very clearly the banks are under no obligation to acquire an SSN from a foreign national. That a passport will do just fine. April 30, 2003 JS-335 Treasury and Federal Financial Regulators Issue Final Patriot Act Regulations on Customer Identification The Department of the Treasury, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, and the seven federal financial regulators today issued final rules that require certain financial institutions to establish procedures to verify the identity of new account holders. The rules announced today were developed jointly by the Treasury Department, Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, and the seven federal functional regulators, including the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the National Credit Union Administration, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Office of Thrift Supervision, and the Securities and Exchange Commission. These regulations are part of the Administration’s continuing work to implement the USA Patriot Act and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, identity theft, and other forms of fraud while also providing financial institutions the flexibility they need to effectively implement the rules. These final regulations implement section 326 of the USA PATRIOT Act, which directs that regulations be issued requiring that financial institutions implement reasonable procedures to (1) verify the identity of any person opening an account; (2) maintain records of the information used to verify the person’s identity; and (3) determine whether the person appears on any list of known or suspected terrorists or terrorist organizations. The regulations apply to banks and trust companies, savings associations, credit unions, securities brokers and dealers, mutual funds, futures commission merchants, and futures introducing brokers. Institutions subject to the final rules will be required to establish a program for obtaining identifying information from customers opening new accounts. The regulations will require that institutions implement procedures for collecting standard information such as a customer’s name, address, date of birth and a taxpayer identification number (for U.S. persons, typically a social security number and for non-U.S. persons, a similar number from a government-issued document). A financial institution’s program is also required, among other things, to contain procedures to verify the identity of customers within a reasonable period of time. Many financial institutions may rely on examining standard identification such as a driver’s license or passport. However, the final rule gives financial institutions the flexibility to implement procedures to verify identity in other ways appropriate to their individual circumstances. Financial institutions will have until October 1, 2003, to come into full compliance. Publication of the final rules in the Federal Register is expected to occur later this week. Here is some other good stuff I came across. SEC. 326. VERIFICATION OF IDENTIFICATION. (a) IN GENERAL- Section 5318 of title 31, United States Code, as amended by this title, is amended by adding at the end the following: (l) IDENTIFICATION AND VERIFICATION OF ACCOUNTHOLDERS- (1) IN GENERAL- Subject to the requirements of this subsection, the Secretary of the Treasury shall prescribe regulations setting forth the minimum standards for financial institutions and their customers regarding the identity of the customer that shall apply in connection with the opening of an account at a financial institution. (2) MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS- The regulations shall, at a minimum, require financial institutions to implement, and customers (after being given adequate notice) to comply with, reasonable procedures for-- (A) verifying the identity of any person seeking to open an account to the extent reasonable and practicable; ( maintaining records of the information used to verify a person's identity, including name, address, and other identifying information; and © consulting lists of known or suspected terrorists or terrorist organizations provided to the financial institution by any government agency to determine whether a person seeking to open an account appears on any such list. The below is what I pulled off a web site but I was unable to understand the CFR language sufficiently to personally verify it. Maybe one of our higher IQ members can look into it The bank can not be held legally responsible by anyone for failing to obtain a SSN pursuant to 31 CFR 103.34(a)(1) and 3) Under the Internal Revenue Code Section 6041, the financial institution is not required to provide any taxpayer identification numbers on the Form 1099 that they file with the IRS at the end of the year, and pursuant to 26 CFR 301.6109-1© are were under no legal obligation to obtain a SSN, and that 42 USC 408 makes it a FELONY to use threat, duress, or coercion to try to force a person by fear or deceit to provide his SSN in an unlawful manner. Later today I intend to take this info and fire a few shots across the banks bow There has been allot of chatter about this issue and now that we have the info again in one spot maybe someone needs to pin this.

YAY! Not much longer! You guys have NOTHING to worry about.

CONGRATS! B)

Dont know about the size thing but the post office where Ting mailed me a few shirts demanded she open the boxes to "Verrify the contents". Apperantly they take it uppon them selves to make sure nothing illegal is in there. I personaly think there just abusing there position and possibly looking for things to steal later.

gratz!

ok ok I'm Going I'm Going....

Congrats on living through the meat grinder!

See I told ya Isn't he da man?!

GL Jimmi! Dont forget to hit up the soft ice cream at the IKEA building, yummmmmmm

You mean its not legal before you get married? I have to have a talk with Jie Let me ask a question or two about marrying as soon as possible. I will probably go the same route. Apparently, she doesn't need a social security number to get married in my state. So, is it best to wait until after marriage to get the social security number? She has to have it for a driver's license. Can there be a name change, or does she need to keep her current name until her status is adjusted? There is a specific rout you need to follow, Lee has the skinny on that. You need to wait 10 working days after she gets here to get her a SSN.

Yep were officially 100% hitched now Mom and Lee said it's legal for her to beat me now

Well were still not over the jet lag but were definitely much better. It's been very busy since we returned. We went to Baotou on the 14th to visit with family where they promptly tried to kill me by feeding me too much. I had to let out my belt on my uniform this morning before going to work, it will be diet time again Monday. Now the bottom floor apartment is where the family stayed. Granddad, Grandma, Mom, Dad, Aunt #1 and uncle #1? and of course Ting. Aunt was in bed sick recovering from a brain clot. The grandparents, especially grandfather kept telling me to sit and eat every time they saw me. Grandfather is so funny, have a great clip of him singing a folk song at a restaurant. They had me staying in the newly finished upstairs apartment, Ting explained to the parents for me before about sleeping with other family members in the same bed was not going to happen, so this was the solution. Grandma kept asking why I was being put upstairs, that I would be lonely, she is so thoughtful but it's hard to explain to someone her age about the social differences. We had a formal wedding announcement dinner to the family at a local restaurant that filled about 5 tables of just the closest family. I do remember at one point I reached for what I thought was a cup of water and gulped it down, yeah, bad move on my part, turned out to be that clear moonshine paint thinner tasting liquor. I thought I was going to die, my stomach was not happy for two days after that. Got to meet a lot of family for the first time and we had a lot of fun. We did get a few red envelopes that amounted to a nice amount in Chinese terms. Ting and I both agreed to let Mom have it, we wanted to make sure they were well off before we left, it's tough for us financially right now but is harder on mom and dad and we had to make sure they were taken care of. On the day we got dropped off at the Baotou Airport even dad cried a little bit and I had to comfort Ting on the other side of the security check, it's a huge change for anybody. We landed in Guangzhou around 10pm I think, I didn¡¯t want to screw around with a bus so we jumped in a cab and headed out to Mr. Xia's. We got to his office and something happened to where he could not put us up for the night and we would up having to stay in the worst 4 star hotel I ever saw but it was still the best room yet we rented. Mr. Xia helped us with our bags that night and also showed up bright and early in the morning and helped us out again. He also paid for the shuttle bus to take us to the airport which was very nice of him. Now we had our seats already assigned so we could sit together the entire way. The ticket agent at the counter asked what seats do we want¡­ I had that weird WTF look on my face because I knew our seats were already assigned in business class but we would be sandwiched between other people. I would MUCH prefer an isle seat though so we don¡¯t have to climb over people etc. So we told her IF she had an Isle seat and could sit us TOGETHER we would be happy to get those seats. She said sure no problem, gave us our tickets and off we went. After going through security we noticed something was amiss with our seats. We were both isle seats in different rows! It's times like this that my temper starts to kick in a bit over Chinese customer service and sensibilities. We practically ran to the boarding gate to get it fixed, of course no one was there till just a few minutes before boarding started. The first young lady was saying she couldn¡¯t do anything etc¡­ which being an experienced traveler I knew she was full of shit and just being lazy. This was confirmed when another young man came to the counter and he helped us out no problem but now we were sitting in the very rear of the jet instead of comphy business class seats. Live and learn, once you have ok seats, hang onto them with a death grip in China. We landed in Tokyo and this was officially the first time Ting had ever been out of China. While walking down the corridor to get our boarding passes for the next flight Ting was looking around curiously then said to me "What's that smell"? I said "Honey, that¡¯s called clean air" "oh? wow", she said. She has developed this habit that brings a smile to my face every time, she just starts blurting out at random signs she sees. I noticed this while waiting for our baggage at some point. I heard "Customs!, Lavatory!, McDonalds!" and I started looking around trying to figure out what she was doing, when I finally figured it out I just smiled and watched her. Ting has noticed on western flights, particularly on the flight home that our flights are much colder, to which I was thinking "Thank God" LOL. When we landed at Dallas the first words was this is the first time in her life she was a free woman, to which I replied "I have your visa in my pocket so you're not free quite yet LOL" Then gave her the visa. The Dallas Immigration was VERY fast compared to Washington DC. We both went to the window and after looking at our documents the officer took us down to another window to our right at the leery end of the row. Apparently K-1's and other such visa's are transferred to another window specifically for them as not to hold up the other people waiting just to get there passport stamped. It also happened at there shift change so we had to get up again and go in a back room to be processed. Ting was getting nervous at this point and I had to explain to her what was going on and why. She didn¡¯t relax though until everything was done. Took about 15 to 20 minutes for the entire process and every one was very nice. After rechecking our bags we got on one of those jets about the size of a pack of gum and headed out to our final stop at Pensacola. She was so nervous I felt her hands shaking while she had a death grip on my arm. The Family was all there to meet her with a couple bouquets of flowers and taking photos. Ting was very excited and the kids instantly hugged her and said welcome home mommy! The next day after a good nights rest and a hot shower we headed off to get her a cell phone and our marriage license. The marriage license concept was a bit odd to her so I had to explain it a few times. After explaining it so many times in different ways it occurred to me the entire marriage license thing is stupid and just another way for the county to get cash out of your pocket. So far TingTing loves it here and were going to get married in just a few hours so we can get all the paperwork rolling and her medical coverage and military benefits. In a few months when we have cash again we will do an actual ceremony on the beach. More photos to follow soon... Sorry it took so long but to say I was busy is an understatement. Ting also told me last time we were in Beijing together and had dinner with Uncle #3 and a couple of his buisness partners that later the buisness partner was picked up by Chinese security and questioned about me, who I was, why was I here etc... Nice huh?

Tell them exactly what you told us here and provide the documents. Everything should be fine.

Thank you everyone so much for the help and support. Ting and I are thrilled and have been catching up on some much needed rest. We picked up the visa today at the post office, was a HUGE pain in the ass to find it. Apparently the near useless map they provide you is not only hard to read but also printed UPSIDE DOWN! , yes folks South is up and North is down, I think it was GUZ's last ditch effort to F&^K with people. Remember that when you try to find this place. I'll make a better map and post it here for every one later. Were getting our bags packed now and leaving tomorrow noonish to Baotou to see the family then fly back on the 18th and fly home on the 19th to Florida. GUZ MAP There's the map

PINK! She was asked 2 questions how did you meet and do you have any photos. He never even looked at the photos LOL He was in his mid 20's with long wavy hair and glasses.

GOOD LUCK! Wish you the best!

Ok as far as my questions went ACH is a waist of time. We got there out side the famous expensive coffee joint at 1:15pm and waited on the 4th floor at 1:28pm Ting asked if I had the P3 and the case number, I had everything but that. So Ting ran out to go get it and about 2 minutes after she went to get it they started letting people in. It was also at this time I realized I just sent the slowest woman in China to hurry up and get the papers. She made me eat those words this time as she was back in 5 minutes flat, I was very impressed. Went through another check point airport style where they take your cell phone and camera if you have one etc... Once through that I was directed buy a guard to a room with what seemed to be about a dozen stainless steal bank teller windows separated by a very small partition. We were all lined up in front of window 19. At 2:05pm an Asian lady 25 ish with glasses started asking why you were here etc. She gave you a form to fill out basically wanting to know who you were, who the person was your applying for, what is your GUZ case number, what is your SO's birth date and name. Then in detail write down your question. Then at 2:30 almost all the windows open up and start calling numbers in no sequential order what so ever. I was called to window 30 by a guy about my age 39 ish. He was a white male no glasses in a suit shirt with a tie. He had light brown and white hair with blue eyes. I asked him my two questions but he seemed more interested in saying to me that he would put down I was here. He didn't really answer my questions either, I was not impressed. He put down in the computer my concerns and that was that. I felt it was a waist of time.

OK I put captions with the photos now. And I ate ALLL THE DUMPLINGS muahahaha I woke her and told her I had food and she seemed interested for a minute and asked me what the time was. I told her 6:30 am, there was a short pause and a quick "no thank you" LOL I asked her when she wanted up, "no earlier then 8am". So I guess I will try this again in a couple hours LOL Keep Rich in line Amanda! but I have the feeling that is probably the other way around LOL