Well, today I had my Visa interview. It was actually surprisingly painless. I left home early so that I could speak with the immigration consultant, the person I spoke to wasn’t the head immigration consultant (Barbara J) and so she didn’t actually have any advice for me around the interview questions for immigration.
The interview turned out to be something of a non-event. After waiting nearly an hour, I got the opportunity to speak to a very nice man who asked me a few simple questions about the kind of training I would be getting in the US and then sent me on my way.
Also, I confirmed something that had been mentioned to me the day before: the DS2109 form has not arrived yet. Now, the DS2109 is an approval form which the CIEE sends to the American Consulate in New Zealand to tell them that my training program has been approved for the purposes of a J1 visa. The J1 Visa is a training/study Visa which allows holders to live in the US for the purposes of training or study. That’s the Visa I am going under.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, because the Visa has been delayed (it was only sent from Boston yesterday) I will most likely only get my Visa on Wednesday which means I can only fly out on Wednesday night. Beca have me booked in on flights for today, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, just in case.
On the plus side, it means that I get a chance to visit with friends and family some more and maybe obsess a little over packing. I also plan on helping out with a photo exhibition in the city which could be great fun.
I have heaps of photos from my many going away parties to upload, I will do so shortly 🙂