FORMS

I hate dealing with the Government, the wife hates dealing with the Government, I think most people hate dealing with the Government. We however get the triple wammy as we get to deal with so many different organizations due to the whole immigration dance we are forced to endure. The biggest pain is simply the number of forms we are required to fill out to do normal things. For example if we want her sister or parents to visit they require visas, this means paperwork. If we decide to travel outside the US RG needs a visa, again this requires paperwork. Or worse if I wanted to visit her for the weekend in Moscow I had to have a visa, and to come and go as I please I needed to obtain a multi entry business visa that of course requires a lot more documentation. And the big daddy of all the processes of course is the immigration paperwork. As you get to deal with 3 government agencies there is a lot of paperwork.

In fact to date I have a running list of all the forms, letters, and documents we have had to submit since before we were married. The current grand total is 49 give or take. This of course is not including all of the documentation that many of the visas require; such as proof of hotel accommodations, travel arrangement, financial security, insurance, etc. In fact the number of pages would be thick enough to be a Harry Potter novel! We have gotten so proficient at Visa applications that we can prepare a 20 page package in a matter of hours. It is pretty sad too that we are able to give other people advice that is more accurate than some of that given by the embassies. Now that isn’t to say we get everything we apply for. Many times we only get single entry visas when we would have preferred multi entries causing us to skip a couple weekend trips, and RGs name on her passport and green card are spelled differently than the marriage certificate due to a strange process called transliteration causing some confusion from time to time. But all in all we have managed. Even if most of my raise from last year went to fees associated with these forms, processes, and documents!

I have actually joked that if I get sick of consulting (which is more likely lately) that I might have a decent career as an immigration lawyer. Heck we have been through a good percentage of the processes and without any legal assistance. But then I have to wonder if I want to spend that much of my life chasing government forms and creating documentation. Maybe I will wait and see if we can get through the Citizenship process. Then at least ½ the requirements will cease as RG will get a US passport. One thing I can defiantly say to anyone is this, if you have a US passport, be very thankful, it opens more doors around the world than you can even guess!