I completely shattered a poor Starbucks barista’s dreams on Sunday morning. As usual, I couldn’t just order my 9am latte (BMX class is a killer at the weekend) without the interrogation about my accent. When the barista realized my husband was American, she wanted to know where we’d met. In London, was my response. Please keep in mind that, at this point, I had rolled out of bed at 8am, shoveled cereal into my son, loaded up the car with his bike, helmet and pads and somehow manage to do the twenty minute drive to the skatepark. Unload the car, attach pads to my son, do up the strap on his helmet, all this without coffee.
With a wistful look in her eye, the barista dreamily announced that she would like to fly to London and fall in love. My response to that was ‘oh, that can be very complicated. There’s so much paperwork and then the flying back and forth!’ But luckily the barista held on to her dreams, despite me trying my best to crush them and replied ‘No, we’ll fall in love and just move in together.’
See what US Immigration has done to me. I was just like the barista at first, falling in love, making plans and then the paperwork hit. Queuing in the early hours at the US Embassy for a visa is not quite so romantic. Completing endless forms, interviews, medicals, providing evidence of a relationship is not conducive to love.
Being told to carry your chest x-ray to show you’re lurgy free in your hand luggage when you fly out to the States is humiliating beyond words. Plus I’ve never met anyone else who has had to do this. Perhaps the immigration officer decided to have a laugh that day and insist on making me do this. Oh, the humiliation of walking around Heathrow with my x-ray, praying it wouldn’t get damaged as it went through the security, trying to find a safe place to tuck it on the plane and then proudly handing it over safe and sound at LAX. Only to be told they weren’t interested in it.
See, I needed to hear that from the barista. I needed to be reminded of the romance that led up to the paperwork.
Did you see the story of the couple that were married in Las Vegas after only knowing one another for 17 hours? My reaction? Oh, the paperwork! There’s nothing quite like US Immigration to kill the romance. If the couple can survive the next six months of interviews and form filling, they’re set for life.
But we’ve made it. Today is our 18th wedding anniversary. So I’m putting aside paperwork, interviews, medicals and x-rays and focusing on the romance. Perhaps I should pay another visit to the barista and this time encourage her to fly to London, fall in love and just move in together.
{ 17 comments }
Don’t talk to me about US immigration … they cost me my job, by delaying my Visa to just join my wife’s visa.. for no reason, causing me to be stranded in Canada, and then leave for home, never to go back to help pack, move or say goodbye to a soul ..
They agreed my visa 4 weeks later….too late, lost job, and moved home ..
Congrats on getting there, enjoy a beer in the Village Pub x
Happy Anniversary! You’re nearly through your initial requisition for 20 years of bliss, but soon you’ll need to fill out some paperwork to request another 20 years of marriage. The extension forms are simpler than the originals, but don’t forget to include either the originals or a notarized copy of them.
Just getting the US visa was bad enough, I can’t imagine trying to persuade them you were marrying an American. I don’t know about chest x-rays but a friend I was talking to the other day said that she and her whole family had to have AIDS tests to get their Green Cards.
Congrats! I just passed 20 years.
It’s much easier to become a citizen (if you’re not already) and then nothing expires. Mind you, I didn’t do it for the first 12 years myself. And I too, had to carry the huge x-ray, but that was a long time ago. Wouldn’t you think they could at least put the damn thing on a DVD?
For starters, happy anniversary! What a wonderful thing; 18 years! As for UK immigration (gotta give my side on this one), it’s been a headache for us…and we never even got there! I (US citizen) have a crazy story involving an ex-husband (British) and my long-lost love of 23 years (US) that involved me planning to move to England, applying to move to England, selling my things and trying to move to England, nearly moving to England then trying again, a few years later and so on and so forth. So, the look I get from people isn’t the dreamy one you’re probably used to. Once we tell people we’re on a plan to move to England, we usually get the condescending, patronizing looks followed by, “It isn’t that easy to just pick up and move to another country you know”. Really? I patiently let them give me their little speech before I list off all of my hard-learned knowledge of visas, the immigration system, the latest headline from the Guardian, the exchange rate and maybe a little jest about the prime minister. Then I get the look I love to get! haha! Trust me, the dreamy-look is probably better, haha! I loved your post, take care!
@moon oh no, it’s been a pain but we’ve never had those sorts of problems.
@ken That’s why I became a citizen – to avoid the continued form filling!
@NVG Yes, I had the AIDS test too. When I look back, it was quite an achievement for a 21 year old!
@expat mum I’m so glad you had to do the x-ray thing as well. I don’t feel quite such a fool now.
@elizabeth hang on in there! It’ll be worth it
Congratulations!
Well, yes, we’ve done the TB skin tests and chest x-rays. And we were checked for STDs too – by a very apologetic doctor who told us that it was ridiculous and out-dated, but he had to do it.
Xenophobia at its finest.
18 years? Congratulations! I celebrated 13 years of marriage this year, and in August I’ll have been in the USA 25 years. Never had to have a chest x-ray done for immigration, though I did have a TB test and they did make me have an AIDS test.
There are an awful lot of us naturalized US citizens who only became citizens to avoid having to deal with the INS any more, not out of any deep founded desire to Become An American!
18 years! So fast. Being around you two for so many of those years has been a real joy.
That’s very funny. Congratulations on 18 years. I’m like the barista—I flew to London, fell in love with a Brit, moved in and then got married. Although nothing is ever that simple, is it? I did have to pass a test to become a UK citizen but I have a feeling it was a lot easier than dealing with the U.S. Immigrations.
Congratulations! You have also reminded me that it is my own wedding anniversary next week (oops) and we will be just behind you at 17 years.
Plenty of form filling for us too, even though we married in Rome and I was the Italian national who had to jump through hoops to get the necessary paperwork in place – long story due to having lived around the world. That’s Italian bureocracy for you. All OH needed was a translation of his birth certificate and letter from the local priest. Pah!
LCM x
Arrgh the expat’s nightmare! UK paperwork is even worse though Lorna. It cost me over £15k to get the right bit of paper, to be able to continue to live here with my English partner (now husband) and my three kids. In not quite two years we’ve had three different visa statuses and even had to plead our case at the Immigration and Asylum Tribunal. It’s not as if I’m from Iraq, I’m from New Zealand, the little colony the Brits set up to be their market garden in the South Pacific. Sigh. Currently I have the right paperwork, but will need to fork out yet more moolah for a revised visa in August once we’ve been here for two years.
I’ve never been asked for an xray though. Only whether my University degree in English Literature was taught in English…considering it was taken at the University of Otago in New Zealand, they were a tad snotty when I asked for a letter of validation.
So jaded! I can just picture this whole scene with you trying to “talk some sense” into this barista.
@iota How nice that you had an apologetic doctor – love how you have to perfect to get a visa.
@almostamerican yes, that was me – anything to end the paperwork!
@greg ditto!
@NappyValleyHousewife See, it is possible! How romantic!
@LCM congratulations! Have fun celebrating!
@vegemitix That sounds terrible. We’ve not had the trouble of trying to process visas for our boys, thank goodness.
@Suz maybe I just shouldn’t even talk before I’ve had my coffee
SO FUNNY.
The image of you and the x-ray. And what the heck is LURGY anyway? I think they made that up.
Congrats!
Happy Anniversary! 18 years – I suppose that’s gone beyond a casual flirt then.
I’m so glad we’re both EU citizens… We had some paperwork, but I’m sure nothing like the nightmare you had.
Happy anniversary! And, oh yeah the paperwork.
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