robhon

Yeah, if they'd just passed such a bill a few hundred years ago this would be a GREAT country! Oh, but wait.... B)

Yeah, I get a sense that the smattering of people who are getting their interview dates are on the old system, those who've been waiting a long time and got their P3 shortly after their NOA2. Everyone after that is stuck at NVC where the only information I've been able to get from anyone (NVC, DOS, congresswoman, lawyers, etc.) is that our case is in security check. Period. No-can-do nuthin'. I'm fairly confident that after the security check is done, and GZ gets the stuff, all will progress pretty quickly (with a little polite begging). Mostly I think this because GZ's workload will likely go down dramatically since a big chunk of their work will already be done. Am I missing anything?

I just can't stand it any more. All this waiting, whilst my wife's belly is getting bigger by the day, is just killing me. I booked a flight to HK, and will then fly on up to Chongqing. Leaving on July 3rd and will stay until 1) my visa runs out, 2) the baby's born, or 3) my wife is in the plane seat next to me. (Hopefully #3 and before the baby's born.) To my surprise the air fares starting on July 3rd (from SF) are only $548!! One day, and every day, earlier was $1600. Go figure.

Do you remember that movie Raiders of the Lost Arc? At the end of the movie the government guys crate up the Arc of the Covenant and store it away in some massive warehouse. I think all of our paperwork is in the crate right next to the crate with the Arc. Don't worry. The government will find us eventually.

Are you saying that most everyone going through this process of trading packets with GZ has been dealing with the same thing?

Yeah, they already did that. Her father has a friend in the PO, so if that person sees the packages it's no problem. But if another worker gets it they're not sure what'll happen.

My wife informs me that her parents' house, where she's currently living, has no actual mail route service. There's an address but no postal worker delivers mail there. We are concerned about packages arriving there undeliverable and being returned. My wife asked that I have them add her father's cell phone number to their address but the nice lady at the NVC said, "No. We don't do that." They live in Hechuan, just about an hour north of Chongqing. Anyone here have any experience or suggestions about how to handle this?

Whatever the hotel you find (I'm sure someone will have a good suggestion here), just make SURE if you are not being picked up by someone that you find the "real" taxi loading area. I had a very bad experience with a guy who just ran up to me outside the airport saying, "Taxi? Taxi?" He dragged me way off to where his taxi was parked. His meter didn't work. He wouldn't tell me a price. When we arrived at the hotel he drove around back to drop me off. He charged me NYC pricing for the ride. I got his taxi driver number but not his tag number. Nothing could be done. I guess that one ride fed his family for a month. So, be careful. I've also almost run into the same situation in Shenzhen (luckily I speak Cantonese and could argue my way out of it), and shortly after that, at a trade show in Orlando! Really!!

Well, shoot. I don't think I got that link set up right. But the address you see is correct. http://thomas.loc.gov/

Emergency Immigration Workload Reduction and Homeland Security Enhancement Act of 2003 (Introduced in House) HR 2235 IH 108th CONGRESS 1st Session H. R. 2235 To suspend certain nonessential visas, in order to provide temporary workload relief critical to the successful reorganization of the immigration and naturalization functions of the Department of Homeland Security, to ensure that the screening and monitoring of arriving immigrants and nonimmigrants, and the deterrence of entry and settlement by illegal or unauthorized aliens, is sufficient to maintain the integrity of the sovereign borders of the United States, and for other purposes. For the full text go to: http://thomas.loc.gov/' target='_blank'>http://thomas.loc.gov/ search for HR 2235

And hopefully not 10 third Mondays!!

I'd love to contribute a photo of my 5' tall, 6 (going on 7) month pregnant wife with a caption saying, "Terrorist threat?"

Thanks kind of funny because I had just told my wife a couple of weeks ago that, if it's a girl, I would like call our baby Sarah. To which my wife replied, "Oh, but it's so hard to say."

direct email: *************.com Edited to remove e-mail address by moderator. Spam-bots troll sites like this for e-mail addresses and then flood you with spam. Also, it is generally not a good idea to broadcast your personal email address. No rule against it though, so if you really want to do so, just repost the address and we will leave it alone.

Punished for having a heart... Jeez-louise, working for the DOS must be purgatory.

I've been trying to come up with something, anything, that could be used to really convey our circumstance to others. Here's what I've come up with... I would like to put together a booklet of all of our stories. I have Photoshop, Illustrator. Any of you who have time, would you send me your story and a picture or two to go with it? Please keep it down to 1500-2000 words. Tell how you met, what you love about your spouse/fiance(e), a funny event, meeting their family, why you miss them... Include every little thing that will pull on the heart strings of Americans. It'll be our story book. We can print 1000's of these and send them everywhere. Email me this stuff at your earliest convenience. Don't worry about the size of attachments, I've got DSL. Anyone who'd like to help me edit this is more than welcome to do so. Who's in?

In my notes that I've been keeping I wrote down that name and a number. I just left her a message but I don't know who she is... I hope she's a nice person.

When I ran out of pages in my US passport I just went to the passport office and they added pages. Took 48hr I think. Don't know if that'll have any bearing on your situation.

The larger hotels in major cities (Nanjing, Shanghai, Shenzhen) those have been no problem. It was in Yancheng. What the maid was actually doing, by coming to knock on the door and asking if we needed anything, was coming by to make sure our door was kept open. In Chongqing I've only stayed at my wife's parent's house. It was in Shenzhen where they would say no guests were allowed after 10pm. My favorite hotel in Shenzhen is not one of the pricy ones, but it still has nice rooms. No one speaks any English, though.

Absolutely folks! We may not be a huge constituency but we are all in the same boat willing to make an incredible effort to forward our cause. That's a powerful thing! Let's all band together and focus our combined energies into one action that will benefit us all, and all who come after us. Don't know what it is, but let's do it!!!

Maybe Di Fi (as we used to call her around these parts...SF) will be more sympathetic to a married couple, expecting their first child, wanting to get to an American obstetrician ASAP. None-the-less that letter sounds very discouraging....

You can't be serious. Your not properly prepared for China, or for that matter most of the developing world, if this shocks you. I just re-read the original post to find there were two different subjects. I was thinking the suggestion was to pay off the cops so you don't get caught buying your $1000 bogus visa. I'm annoyed but not shocked by the payola stuff that goes on in China. My wife's father had to do a little palm greasing to help get our marriage papers filed. It's just such an unhealthy thing for their burgeoning economy. And I've been there with the hotel thing too. Before we were married, when we came back to the room late, the hotel people would just politely say that no guests would be allowed after 10pm. And in Yancheng (pretty small place), even during daytime hours, if my girlfriend was in the room with me and we closed the door, a maid would come knock and ask if we needed anything. I was told, "In China there is no such thing as privacy." Later I noticed that everyone's hotel room door was always kept open.

That's exactly where I'm headed. Turns out my mother has a friend that has a Diane Feinstein connection. I hope it will be more fruitful.

Hmmm.... Well, who is it that made the K visa program happen? There has to be someone out there who cared enough to get it enacted. There is a very clear intent behind the K visa that's been lost in the implementation. Also, the larger suggestion I was trying to initiate here is, I believe we are all acting here as small, disaggregated bands. I'm just one person who's annoying one individual in my congresswoman's office, who is in turn making an annoying call here or there to someone at the NVC/DOS who just wants to end the conversation. It's pretty easy to ignore us and get away with it. But, as a small organized group, if we could find someone with position with real interest in this issue, then maybe something could really happen. K visas are NOT being treated as non-immigrant visas. There is someone out there, besides us, who cares about it and can actually do something about it.

You can't be serious.