SirLancelot

Thanks Dennis and Randy. I was indeed expecting a "Welcome Letter" but I wasn't expecting that letter to be on a Notice of Action I-797 letterhead. This is much more official looking than on a plain white piece of paper that I was anticipating. We can definitely take this to the CA DMV and use it to get a driver's license. All along, I never thought that the Welcome Letter was going to be printed on a I-797 letterhead. CA DMV policy specifically lists an I-797 Notice of Action (as oppose to a I-797c Notice of Receipt) as evidence that one is legally in the country and thus allowed to apply for a driver's license.

Like Dennis' Leiqin, my wife also received her Notice of Action approval notice today. I wasn't expecting this as someone posted on CFL before that for AoS, the applicant doesn't receive a NOA2, just the GC. But in actuality, the applicant receives both a NOA1 and a NOA2 during the AoS process. http://i20.tinypic.com/21ehhf.jpg

Well I'm glad to hear that. It seems times are changing. That certainly was not the case just 10 years ago. China also has these 3-year vocation degree at the same schools which offer the 4-year BA/BS degrees, so it makes things a bit confusing. Those 3-year degrees are not very accepted internationally--especially in the US--as the British College degrees which are also all only 3 years. I'm all for Chinese collegiate education being more accepted around the world and especially the US.

That is trippy! Indeed a very small world. Gordon, I'd suggest you bring your step-daughter to the US ASAP if her intention is to live in the US. If her intention is to live in China, than a Chinese college degree may be useful, but if her intention is to live in the US, her degree is useless in the US. Hardly any place accepts a Chinese college degree--not even if it's Peking University or XinHau (which is China's version of MIT and Harvard). So it'll be a waste of time. Just a thought. Obviously she's going to do what she wants to do but she needs to know that her degree will most likely be useless in the States. There are plenty of people in my office who got bachelor's degrees in China, and were then accepted to graduate school in the US. Ok, that may be true for graduate school but I was more referring to just using the college degree for a job. Not many companies will accept a Chinese college degree as an equivalent to a 4 year bachelors degree from a US school. Depending on what kind of college degree one obtains in China, it may apply towards grad school in the US.

wow! after 6 years! Finally! A big congrats to Leiqin!!! This Thanksgiving will truly be a time for thanks at the Dennis household.

That is trippy! Indeed a very small world. Gordon, I'd suggest you bring your step-daughter to the US ASAP if her intention is to live in the US. If her intention is to live in China, than a Chinese college degree may be useful, but if her intention is to live in the US, her degree is useless in the US. Hardly any place accepts a Chinese college degree--not even if it's Peking University or XinHau (which is China's version of MIT and Harvard). So it'll be a waste of time. Just a thought. Obviously she's going to do what she wants to do but she needs to know that her degree will most likely be useless in the States.

Man, how anyone would want to return to China to live from Hawaii is beyond me. I'm sorry to hear of your situation KonaJim. Good luck and hang loose!

This applies to me but I do scrupulously calculate the cost to drive to X place and the cost of gas. My car gets 18-20 miles a gallon for city driving and @ $3.50/premiums gallon of gas required for my car, it costs around 18.5 cents per mile of driving right now--purely based on gas, not including cost of repair or replacement for wear and tear of the car. My nearest Wal-Mart is 9 miles away. Round trip is 18 miles. So it'll cost me around $3.40 to make the trip to Wal-Mart and back. That cost is definitely on my mind before I make the trip. And it's actually that precise reason why I rarely get to shop at Wal-Mart. It's not because I don't like Wal-Mart; it's because it's so far away from me. The nearest Safeway (grocery) is a little less than 2 miles away. Target is right door next to Safeway. I substitute Target as my Wal-Mart but prices are definitely lower at Wal-Mart. If Wal-Mart was closer to me--like 2 miles away--I'd probably be going every week. High cost of gasoline is killing any desire for us to travel anywhere. I'd like to visit Napa Wine Country for some weekend, but the cost of the drive alone will cost $40. Likewise with hoping over the hill to see the Pacific Ocean. That drive will be $10. On the other hand, Amazon.com has earned a lot of revenue from me because they offer low prices with free shipping and no sales tax to CA.

I know I'm going to get shit for what I'm going to say, but so be it. It's never stopped me before. I went to Whole Foods Market today. This was my first time ever going to Whole Foods. I took my wife to see this monstrosity. I knew before going there that it would be a place full of absolute decadence and extreme prices for food and I wasn't disappointed. It absolutely amazes me how outlandishly expensive food (organic) prices are there. They had ready-to-cook crab cakes at $5.99/oz! That's right, not $5.99/lb but OZ! There's 16 OZ to a pound, so that's $95.84/lb or 718.8RMB/pound for crab cakes. Everything single thing there is so outrageously expensive that it made me puke. I don't care how local or organic the produce and food are, there's no fracking way to justify the cost of these foods. Along the way, there is an entire industry of people being way overpaid with "living wages" and other artificial price level to eventually produce the outlandish prices that is demanded of the final consumer at WFM. But the amazing thing is, there's TONS of people at WFM. It wasn't empty. It was crowded as hell. It absolutely amazes me. So I can definitely argue against GZBill's point "Incredibly naive to think people will pay more for a shirt that has a sticker saying "No slave labor used in producing this shirt." Incredibly naive.". Certain kinds of people will definitely pay the premium as indicated by the abundance of patrons at WFM, but a bigger majority will not pay--as demonstrated by shoppers at Wal-Mart and Costco. Indeed, with Whole Foods Market and Wal-Mart/Costco in existence in the same country--and in fact same city--it's pretty amazing to see the amount of free choice and free market at work. Carl and Dennis are free to cough up the extra dough to support people who demand a "living wage" but others are free to support the poorer folks around the world who are content with $100/USD month. The free market does work. WFM is thriving. Wal-Mart has not crushed WFM. There is a choice.

America was a new invention when it first started out too. "...Things have never worked out that way before." as well.

Man so looking forward to this part of the process!!! One more option, some people go by there middle name?? Can you give your SO a middle name when chaging her name from her getting hitched license?? Like Christine SO McGillicuddy? This is really governed by your state, but generally speaking NO. Only family name changes to the groom's family name. Check with your state's DMV.

In your example, what we've done for my wife is to use "Qi McDaddy" throughout. Qi McDaddy for all bank accounts, credit cards, GC and SSA and soon for the driver's license. As for when to change over to Christine McGillicuddy, that's a tough one. Jim Julian was able to do that at the time of his daughter's AOS interview. I originally wanted to do that for my wife at our AOS interview as well. However, on 002 my wife read about situations where it was problematic to return into the US with a GC with one Western set of name and a Chinese passport with a set of Chinese name. For example, if Christine had a GC which showed Christine McGillicuddy and her Chinese passport showed WANG, Qi she may encounter difficulties when returning to the US. So we decided not to do the name change until the Naturalization process. When you do the naturalization process, she'll be able to choose to use her then current name or change it to something completely new. After naturalization, she'll be able to obtain a US passport in her new name.

I hope Jim Julian will comment. He's had recent experience with a full name change for his daughter and her GC/SSC.

Ah. Therein lies the rub. I do want to change her name to Christine McGillicuddy,at some point at least. When can I do that? Why would I want to change only the surname? Isn't it the goal to change both ultimately? Surely I'm not the only one who wants to do this right? Ok, now we've honed in on your problem. That ain't gonna fly. When one gets married, one is allowed to change one's maiden family to that of her husband's. One is not allowed to change one's entire name. That requires a court order. After 9/11, the usage method is out. You'll need to get her name registered as what you want via the AoS process before doing the full name change at SSA. What you're trying to accomplish is not possible at SSA right now. What is possible now is to change Christine's surname to yours.

That's right Dave. You've described it correctly. Don't go back to the same office. Go to another SSA office. Bring Christine's SS card. Bring her passport with I-94. Bring your certified copy marriage cert. Ask for a new card to be issued in Christine's married name. And make sure you're only asking for a surname change. If you're trying to change her entire name to Christine McGillicuddy, that ain't gonna fly. That will require a legal name change from a court.

I don't know. She looked pretty hungry. I'll try that. I can't believe the bullshit your SSA office gave you. Carl is completely right. Like any American woman who gets married and wants to change her surname to that of her husband, a woman is entitled to change her name at the SSA from her maiden name to married name after marriage. They have to accept the change. What Carl describes above is actually how we did it. I was able to obtain a SS card for my wife within two weeks of her arrival to the US but we didn't get married until 2 months later. Her first SS card was obtained using her maiden name. After we got married, we went back to the SSA office and requested a new card in my wife's married name. The lady there asked to see our marriage certificate. We showed her a certified copy of our marriage cert and she made the change no question asked. A week later we received a new SS card for my wife in her married name. I can't believe the BS your office gave you. You should try another SSA office near you. Perhaps Christine isn't so eager to take your name and that's why she didn't put up much of a fight with that lady.

I won't speak for any others, but I agree with what you're saying above Carl. I also agree American companies should send more audit teams to the Chinese factories--and they need to do it without prior notice. As for the idea of unions, I honestly don't believe they'll work now a ways. When America was developing and the idea of unions proliferated, there was no easy way too outsource. But now a days for manufacturing, it's extremely easy to move around. If Chinese wages start becoming too high, the international companies are totally free to move to a less developed and cheaper wage country. You can't imprison them from leaving. I don't think unions could have taken off, even in the US, if outsourcing and offshoring were so readily possible when unions obtain so much power in the past. It's not a good situation, but no law can change that, unless the entire world bands together and gets rid of free trade entirely. No Chinese laws can keep a company invested in China if Chinese wages go up significantly. Just as no American law has been able to keep private companies from offshoring and outsourcing a lot of the American jobs--especially manufacturing jobs. In a free world, a business owner is able to decide if they want to open a company in China, India, Mexico, USA or Laos. You can't force a company to stay in a country. I'm fairly certain the central Chinese government (Beijing) doesn't clamp down very hard on the provincial governments because they know if the cost of labor increases significantly in China then less foreign investments will come into China and some of the international companies already in China will move elsewhere. The central Chinese government certainly doesn't want that. So they don't much about enforcing laws that may already be on the books. It is a sad situation. I believe the US has implemented laws which prohibit a US based company from engaging in bribery/graft even if that bribery/graft takes place in a foreign country. If US companies are caught bribing Chinese officials in China, the US company can be prosecuted in the US.

Carl, I respectively disagree with your very first remark, but everything else in your passage above I pretty much agree. China does have many laws that simply aren't enforced. I also hope eventually there will be more enforcement. Of course everyone would like to make more money and the migrant workers are no different, but I really don't think they're complaining, at least if the alternative is to take away these factory jobs. If you give them the option of having more pay for doing less at the same jobs, yes, they'll take that option of course. But if the option is to close down these factories and they can go back to where they came from, I'm willing to bet that the overwhelming super majority would want to keep their factory jobs, even if they had to do 16 hour days during the Christmas season. Because in the end, it's still better than what they had before. Chinese needs to improve, no doubt about that. Wages are going up and have gone up in fact. But already some factories have been moved to Vietnam and Laos and Cambodia because the cost of labor has increased too much in China. The higher they go the more jobs will be moved out of China to even more poor countries. Despite the migrant workers' desire to seek higher pay, they would be worse off if their jobs departed China completely. It is not an empty threat. Some jobs have already left China. I anticipate more jobs leaving as the wage inevitably increases in China.

Hi yemmie. Welcome to CFL. I think it would be helpful if you could or would disclose from what area your SO is from in China. I'm gathering from your original post that she's probably from a bigger city, but I'm not certain. It would help to establish a context for her overall actions and demeanor if we knew what part of China she's from. Good luck.

Roger, while I would like to see improvements for the general Chinese population--especially the poor--the rural poor ladies you point out did not have a better life in their respective poor farmlands. They didn't have a better wage or better and safer environments working back home. I agree with you that the new companies should hopefully provide for something better than what the migrant workers had before, but it's highly doubtful that they're having it worse than before. In the end, the migrant workers are not forced to leave their poor rural villages for GuangDong province to work in those factories. They do choose to go because they know they'll have more opportunities of securing employment and getting higher pay than they would staying back in their poor rural village. I agree with SQN that these factories are bringing wages up in China and that is a good thing, but there are negatives as well. Without question, this increase in factory jobs is bringing in pollution. That is a negative. But all countries go through this, even the US during the early 1900. Tony_O, you amaze me with some of your brutal comments. You're actually comparing lawyers and I-bankers who make $8K/month starting salary with those who make $80.00/month? For the eventual payoff of $250K/year salary, I think the lawyers and I-bankers don't put in enough time. They should be doing 100+ hours a week! We did that in IT during the dot.com days!

De Beers has been extremely potent in their marketing of diamonds to Chinese. They've translated their motto "A Diamond is Forever" into Chinese and it's known by many if not most urban youth in China.

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

Joanne, when did you become a MOD? Congrats! I thought the idea was for you not to become a MOD, lest the responsibilities of an objective MOD restrict you from more freely posting your own opinions. Nevertheless, I'm happy to see you as a MOD. We need more Chinese ladies as MOD! Dennis, sorry for being Mea culpa.

I hope so. I don't want to dish another $675 if the bank check bounces. Tony, call your bank and ask. Most checks are valid for 6 months, but it's all explicitly spelled out in your terms of agreement. After six months, a bank has the right to not honor a check, but if it's made out to a US government agency, I think the bank will probably honor the check. But again, best advice is to call your bank and ask specifically.