Charlotte

Yes, i got the same thing. It must have happened very recently.

Good luck, Mick -- I believe your strong willpower will help you through any situation. Get well soon. I will call Li when I get a chance.

Just a question: how did you know your interview date? If you know this through the info line, this has no bearing to GZ because they can always change it on the computer later. Like it or not, you have to wait for the mail from GZ to tell you the interview date, which is real; any other route info is not going to change the way GZ handling the business.

I don't have experience about first name change on license. Usually they won't allow it, but if you get a guffy employee, you may be in luck. I would not let anyone change my name without proper documentation. A divorce lawyer can argue about the validity of a marriage certificate if the names have no legal documentation backup.

For them not to call you "mean", you need to add "g" to your "min" They can pronouce " Ming" well.

You can get her travel coverage until you marry her. No insurance company will recognize fiancee as spouse until you marry her.

Hey I got this from a friend of mine via email. Don't shoot me -- this is how American women feel here.... With all of you American men marrying Chinese girls, I think they should replace the first line: nice men are marrying Chinese wowen!!! *********************************** Who understands men? 1. The nice men are ugly. 2. The handsome men are not nice. 3. The handsome and nice men are gay. 4. The handsome, nice and heterosexual men are married. 5. The men who are not so handsome, but are nice men, have no money. 6. The men who are not so handsome, but are nice men with money think we are only their money. 7. The handsome men without money are after our money. 8. The handsome men, who are not so nice and somewhat heterosexual, don't think we are beautiful enough. 9. The men who think we are beautiful, that are heterosexual, somewhat nice and have money, are cowards. 10. The men who are somewhat handsome, somewhat nice and have some money and thank God are heterosexual, are shy and NEVER MAKE THE FIRST MOVE!!!! 11. The men who never make the first move, automatically lose interest in us when we take the initiative. NOW ....WHO IN THE HELL UNDERSTANDS MEN? Men are like a fine wine. They all start out like grapes, and it's our job to stomp on them and keep them in the dark until they mature into something you'd like to have dinner with. SEND THIS TO SMART WOMEN WHO NEED A LAUGH AND TO THE MEN YOU THINK CAN HANDLE IT!

A student is considered good at English if they have a big volume of vocabulary in China. But they could not respond to a simple question like "Where do you go to school?" quickly because they can't THINK in the vocabulary they know. To this day, I don't know how many English words or even Chinese words I know . I always recommend the students including my daughter imitate /not create or translate the terms and phrases. Take the entire sentence/phrase and find the equivalent meaning in Chinese, not the word to word translation. In the movies or soaps, they can also pick up some slangs. It is important to understand the English slangs here, but I suggest they not say them until they are totally familiar with the culture here and know the circustances to use them occasssionally. Hey, good idea to start with the actors and actresses they like.

I would like to put in my 2 cents here: I think any movie that is PG-13 here is good and entertaining. Some R movies are also good. If you give them the carton movies, this helps training so lonely listening, which can be accomplished by radio program. I would like to see the lip movement when I want to imitate. I can¡¯t help using my daughter as an example: she had only normal high school English when she came in 2001 and I was surprised how much she could understand then. Now after a year in college in China, she is here listening to radio and watching TV with 90% understanding. She virtually watches all movies without subtitles. The TOEFL test she took here is no easy cake for a Chinese fresh off boat (plane). TOEFL test is all computerized here. The listening part is harder than the paper based. The speed is normal movie talk speed; they don't show you the multiple choices to the question until you after you hear the question. I was a little shocked myself when I tried the sample test questions. But she did very well in listening portion. Her overall score was 257 on 300 total; 213 is equal to 550 on paper-based score here. To answer April¡¯s question, from my personal experience and my daughter¡¯s, yes listening to English songs and watching movies will be very helpful. It may not show instance result, but in the long run, it does. My daughter is not the type that memorizes vocabulary or read a lot, but she has seen more English movies than my entire office staff put together and knows more American pop singers than many Americans born here. She spent all her pocket money buying those pirated CD/VCD/DVDs. I even scared her about getting caught at the POE. So she let me take some for her when I came last August. Owen, it is a good idea to let them have English subtitle. I would even recommend them to watch it with the English subtitle first and then without it. During the waiting, my daughter took my advice to watch her collections again -- surprised that she did--- and they did help her listening comprehension.

Talking about screwing up -- this is an understatement!!!

Schools in mainland China teach British English!

PJ - this might not be a bad idea if you want to find a Chinese wife. At least you can get to know someone better before any commitment. Good luck!

Me, either!!!!! Well on 2nd thought, you really need to take this into consideration: all K visa holders only get a stamp in their passports. There is really not too much processing paperwork involved since the immigration process will not start until they arrive in the USA. Unlike the IR cases, they can't miss that because they carry all the immigration paperwork with them, which they have to update or they can't close the case - and POE uses whatever they bring and INS issued the green cards, in my daughter's case - 3 weeks later. There is no excuse for such sloppy record keeping in GZ, but we also need to realize, they are still in the middle of backlog cleanup. It only takes one goofy employee that can make the entire organiztion look ridiculous, as some of us have encountered how easy it is to make mistakes if we don't double/triple check before we send out company reports. I truly hope this is an isolated case, but also be on guard for the NEWBIEs; as long as your case is not resolved within a reasonable time frame, it is your right to get answer from them; they owe it to the petitioners. Persistence pays off. It doesn't hurt to check, double and triple check for any lead you might have.

Thanks guys. For those did not take the test, TOEFL test here is all computerized. She had to type the essay too. The listen portion is more difficulty than the paper-based test. On the paper based, you see the multiple choices before you hear the conversation -- you can kind of guess what kind of the conversation coming up; on the PC based, all you see is a picture of a man and a woman while you listen. After the conversation, you see a question, then 4 answers popped up for you to choose. I was surprised she did fine in that section! She even had 30 minutes to spare in the structure/writing section and scored the highest of all 3 sections. Lily has seen more American movies than Rudi and I put together. She also has a huge collections of American pop music --- believe or not, that contributed to her listening comprehesion. Rudi and my colleagues are amazed at how much she can comprehend here already. For those who don't have much exposure to the English environment, I would still recommend to take paper-based if you are still in China-- of course this is only applicable to those who want to attend a college here.

My daughter received her green card today --- 23 days after she entered country!!! What a speed! The officer put a stamp in her passport good for one year to serve as a temp green card when she entered the country, telling her that she should expect her real card in 6-9 months. Obviously government timeline is unpredicable. Of course no one will complain receiving anything earlier than promised. I am done with her paperwork! BTW, she has successfully passed the TOEFL test and is ready to enroll as as a sophmore in Sept. Maybe this is a good sign to all of you processing AOS here in this country. There is hope after all -- they are processing at lightning speed!!! Good luck to you all! My prayers are still with those who are waitling for the delayed visa. Just keep your faith -- don't give up!

This should not be a surprise to most of us that things like this can happen; there are cheating men as well as cheating women in this world, in any race of any country. The only way to prevent this happen to you is to exercise caution in the steps of moving forward. Still, there is no guarrenteed for any relationship, married or not. It still takes huge effort on both partners to make the relationship work. Tell your friend she should consider it a blessing that she found it out in time before she goes any further. It could be much worse if she is already here. If I were her, I would use the my 2nd profile to get in touch with him and let him have a shock too when he found out it was me again!!! Then I would gracefully wave goodbye to him!

Lori - I did exactly the way you want to do with your name. I don't know what state you are in but I know for a fact in TEXAS, you can change use your husband's last name after you get married, legally without any problem. Marriage license will use your maiden name, but you can show your marriage certificate to change any of your personal ID documents, like driver's license, SSN card, etc. As to the first name, in Texas, we need to go through court, cost money to do so, but can be done. The easiest way is you use your husband name now and change your first name at the citizenship interview. The INS name change form is legally biding. I had my Chinese name for 7 years in this country, but everyone knows me by Charlotte. All my documents show my Chinese name until I became a citizen. It does not really matter. I kept my Chinese family name as my middle name; this way I still have something Chinese in my name without intimidating my American friends. I don't know if you have read about my Chinese name change post I did earlier. Here is the link. This might give you some idea, why I did what did with my name. Hope this helps. BTW, every state may have different laws about name change, you may call an attorney about it. As to your Chinese passport, you need to contact the Chinese consulate in your state jurisdiction. I believe you have to reply for a new passport with your marriage license. http://candleforlove.com/forums/index....2e2ef854aa53341

Glad to see you both make it home safe. No fun to travel so long distance, luckily you have each other's company. Welcome to America, Li!!! Best wishes to your new life here in USA!!!

Obviously you looked like a sweet little Chinese "terrorrist " to them But you made it safely, that all matters. Welcome to America and all the rest will be easy-sailing in this country for you and Alan. Rudi reserves the biggest bear hug for you when you and Alan come to visit us in PA. I will certainly reserve one for Alan -- just to get even with him!!!

Congratulations, Yan! Hurry up to get her here I was holding my breath for your sister. Now I can breathe again! Best wishes to you and your family!!!

Mick and Li, I will count the hours for your safe arrival!!! Your journey seems very long, but you will have the company of each other, which will make the time go faster. Have a safe and pleasant trip home! Welcom to America, Li!!!

Hi Danswayne, I moved it to the culture and language without consulting you, I am sorry if you feel you are not consulted and I am not aware that we have to consult with original post writers when we see if a topic fits the category. Here is my reason to move it: 1). As I understand this forum is more visa DELAY related and your post is regarding the trading possibility in China. I believe it is closer to culture and to VISA DELAY. 2). You may post anywhere you choose to, but I just want to see where it really fits and relocate it to where it belongs. Besides, it still leaves the threat in the original forum and if you click on it, it will bring you to the new location. You actually ended up in two places with one post. 3). There are still many delayed cases that are waiting to be cleared, yours may be one of them, please let us focus on delay issues and let the off-topic items go to different places. As others pointed out earlier, we don't want those delayed cases get buried with non-visa related issues, which is why PJ created many different forums to for people to post their different issues and concerns. Although this forum is the most visited site, your topic is still having a link there if the people want to join your discussion. Therefore, I don’t think moving it back is necessary to get more attention. I apologize for any inconvenience that may have caused you.

Rob, great news to hear -- Congratulations! Finally your life will be back on track soon!! Very happy for you!

Lily's applied on 3/14 and received on 3/22. Beat you Eric --- But they told me 2 weeks. This turned out only one week. Anyway she is all legal to work now, if she chooses.

Tony, I am sooooooo happy for you! I feel like to have a German schnups to celebate for you!!! Happy, happiiiiiiiiiiy!!!