Reasonable amount of e-mails

[michaelt]

Any suggestions for a "reasonable" amount of e-mails and web chat sessions to send my SO for interview? I have printed over 300 e-mails alone. I do not want her hauling too much stuff! Also, is it ok to just "copy" receipts, itinerary and boarding pass for interview? I do not want originals to get lost.

Thank you all!

Finally got NVC Out letter today in the mail despite having GUZ number since June 18! Adds a whole new meaning to snail mail I guess?

[tywy_99]

I would say a reasonable amount of email to send would be as much as you can send her! Open up the flood gates on this one!

Copies of receipts are okay but I would feel better if she did have the originals at the interview. Don't leave anything to chance!

[IllinoisDave]

Any suggestions for a "reasonable" amount of e-mails and web chat sessions to send my SO for interview? I have printed over 300 e-mails alone. I do not want her hauling too much stuff! Also, is it ok to just "copy" receipts, itinerary and boarding pass for interview? I do not want originals to get lost.

Thank you all!

Finally got NVC Out letter today in the mail despite having GUZ number since June 18! Adds a whole new meaning to snail mail I guess?

Congrats on the "out" letter. A small step but a step nonetheless.

As far as the copies, I believe they can ask for originals for anything. If you're going for the interview, I'd take everything.

[Randy W]

Copies of receipts and any loose items do just fine. Anything on a 8 1/2x11 or AA4 piece of paper fits in their file.

[chilton747]

I think that the number of emails is dictated by what you need to prove a bonafide relationship. It varies according to the relationship and how it is sustained. Emails where there is talk about your future plans, etc. I agree with Ty. Drive the point home but don't send emails in mass volume just for the heck of it.

[michaelt]

I think that the number of emails is dictated by what you need to prove a bonafide relationship. It varies according to the relationship and how it is sustained. Emails where there is talk about your future plans, etc. I agree with Ty. Drive the point home but don't send emails in mass volume just for the heck of it.

Thank you everyone, and thank you Dave! (my first "congrats") Feels good, hope to have reason for more someday!!!

Also starting to feel out co-workers for me to go to interview AND taking time off a month or so later for her arrival in the US. So far, so good. I still have two more key people to talk to. (I need to keep co-workers and employer happy since I am new to this company and was referred by one of my co-workers. I'd love to see us all in October!!!

[mikepellicore]

Hello Michaelt, I am not sure what anyone else would say, but we weren't asked for any e-mail or chat records. Yizhen did however, explain to the VO how we use the computer translator and our handheld translator to comunicate. I think you could could just print the pages of your mail "inbox", listing all your e-mails. And your" sent box" also.

We had no idea how much the VO would use the photos and the captions I wrote, to see if we really prepared, or if the information was true. I felt it was important.

In the final preparation, we decided not to bring too many pages of the e-mails or the chats, several showing consistent comunication, and with the chats we also included 5 days in a row with 2 or more hours each day, but they never came out of the folder. Good luck, Mike & Zhen

[david_dawei]

Asking for email is rare anyway.... asking for every last email you have sent/received is not going to fit under the window anyway.

 

The only pattern of asking for emails I've seen is "an early one", "a recent one"... so what I did (and advise) is to select a dozen from each period (beginning, middle, end) and in order that she would hand one over from each period... One should be organized and ready...

[sawadee]

I think it matters is the communication between you two, the VO will judge whether the relationship is a bona fide one on an overall basis, not just looking into the number of emails particularly. Pictures together and with the family, air tickets, emails, boarding pass...that all matters. I would suggest keep everything for evidence.

[chilton747]

I would think that your best evidence of the relationship would have been submitted in the original petition. Anything you feel lacking in this area should be given to her for the interview.

[ed and ying]

I would think that your best evidence of the relationship would have been submitted in the original petition. Anything you feel lacking in this area should be given to her for the interview.

I agree - our I-129F petition included a few examples of email, snailmail, phonelogs, photos that spanned the 2 years prior to filing. We included all my boarding stubs. These were all scanned and imported to a Word document that was printed for the petition.

 

For the interview - Ying had the originals of everything that was in the I-129F petition, plus a sampling of new stuff since the I-129F filing. The kitchen sink - all the emails, phonelogs, snailmails, etc was in the hotel room - available if needed.

 

I choose the route to provide more than the minimum required with the I-129F, it was not a massive amount - but we had almost 2 years of realtionship to document. The pile was not over 1 inch.

 

Did it make a difference - who knows - Ying did get the 2yr GC without a interview

[jim_julian]

We prepared about a 30 page compendium titled "How we Communicate". It had maybe 5 pages of screen caps of us chatting to include having her daughter, mama, and baba on screen. It was timed so clothing was different ... summer, winter, etc. We had perhaps 10 pages of representative e-mails and 15 pages of Skype call records.

 

I had a "Trips" collection of a few pages with scans of visas, passport stamps, and boarding passes. All printed in color ... looked good.

 

I had a "Photos" packet of about 6 pages ... 2-3 photo's in MS Word per page with a descriptive label under each. Emphasis was given to various seasons and photos with many family members included.

 

Each was assembled and clipped at the top with an acco fastener and a descriptive cover page. Lao Po was thoroughly briefed and understood every word plus like questions.

 

To my dismay I found out months later that she shoved all of this at the VO in response to his first question that had nothing to do with the stuff she gave him. He looked at it. It worked.

[shaffej7070]

Asking for email is rare anyway.... asking for every last email you have sent/received is not going to fit under the window anyway.

 

The only pattern of asking for emails I've seen is "an early one", "a recent one"... so what I did (and advise) is to select a dozen from each period (beginning, middle, end) and in order that she would hand one over from each period... One should be organized and ready...

 

 

I agree with David, and you shouldn't overwhelm your SO with a heavy package of evidence.

[SinoTexas]

Asking for email is rare anyway.... asking for every last email you have sent/received is not going to fit under the window anyway.

 

The only pattern of asking for emails I've seen is "an early one", "a recent one"... so what I did (and advise) is to select a dozen from each period (beginning, middle, end) and in order that she would hand one over from each period... One should be organized and ready...

We did what David said, copies of five early ones, five mid term and five fairly recent emails. Also threw in about five Yahoo IM sessions and five web cam sessions. we provided copies of tickets, boarding passes, etc. Of course at the interview, none of it was asked for.

 

AS aye,

 

Jim

[David&Wendy]

I met my SO September 2005. We both used MSN. Initially it was just friendly chit chat. TV shows, local restaurants, etc.

 

I pasted alot of MSN records into MS WORD. I editted out a few things to make sure nothing "too personal" or embarassing would be printed. Show relationship without writing a Penthouse article.

 

So in my MS Word document that I sent her had the following.

I put in the friendly chit chat from Sept 2005 as proof of when we met.

We have been "dating" since December 2005.

I put about 1 page of MSN records from Sept to November.

From December 2005 to July 2007 I put 6 to 10 pages PER month.

 

As my SO is pretty damn close to written fluency without being born here we chat * a lot *

My entire MSN chat log crashed MS Word the first time I tried to import it. 3 months of 2006 = 3000 pages. Since we had been chatting for over 20 months. I didn't want to kill that many trees.

 

As I had used Yahoo's "call out" VOIP feature it recorded all the out going phones I had made to her.

That was easy as I just printed the call log from Yahoo's website.

 

I had also left her the boarding passes from trips to China for my job, the trip we took to visit her parents during Spring Festival.

Also I photocopied my passport to show the 9 pages of stamps that I have from my travels back and forth between Shenzhen and Hong Kong.