I really shouldn't be surprised, because we have been through the system, but it still amazes me that US immigration is such a total mess. Mbamie really could use some supernatural help at this point. She has received notification that her petition for her husband has been approved, that the INS would contact their embassy abroad, who would then notify her husband as to how to travel here to the US and that their participation in this process is complete and in their favor.
Meanwhile, the US embassy abroad is saying they will close his file (which is hardly touched) because he hasn't given them originals of the DNA testing that they complied to. Mbamie made the petition on US soil, so it was the division here that made all the requests, expensive hoops and she willingly complied, including paternity testing on both her kids and a husband on the other side of the globe. Getting all of this done in their time frame was costly and an amazing feat, so to receive the letter of approbation LAST DECEMBER was truly a reason to celebrate. We thought they were home free.
Apparently the office on the other side of the globe has a little bit of a complex, because they would not recognize the official document coming from US immigration here to say that this couple had done all required of them and are in the clear. Now they want to look into all the nitty gritty. So we write the company who did the DNA test- could they please send a copy also to the US embassy in Africa? No answer yet. Call the 1-800 immigration line and once navigating this humongous phone tree, talk to some nice man who says she needs to call the local office in Houston or make an appointment in Dallas to see someone. The long distance number for the Houston office won't even let you talk to anyone. And I've been to Dallas. We don't want to go there.
Now what? She has this supremely cool letter from immigration that we thought was her ticket to a life again and it doesn't mean anything abroad, with their own "company"? It's like when I took my Canadian money to my American bank- they didn't recognize it- like are other countries even allowed to make money?- we don't deal with "that" money here! We are just a BANK you know.
Meanwhile, there is a wife who has nearly gone half a decade without a husband, a little boy graduating kindergarten who forgot what his daddy looks like and a daughter, who has already learned her second language who has never even met her daddy- all because of war, hate, bloodshed and a power trip to top it all off. It's totally ridiculous. No international company could survive with these same tactics.
2 comments:
Oh COME ON!!!! This is what gets me so much about immigration. We can turn a blind eye to all of the illegal immigration going on, but the ones who work so hard to do absolutely everything by the letter of the law are hasseled the whole way through.
I am really glad she has someone like you to help her through it, and I've said a prayer for her and her family that things start to pick up and go more smoothly.
US immigration = BS.
Agent Wife & I have lived through its process, as AW is a Canadian.
We had possibly the easiest case: me, an American since birth and law-abiding. She - a citizen of the US's closest neighbors and allies.
She entered the US legally with a student visa. We got married. We tried to make everything "right" in US eyes.
The BS we went through...you would have thought I had married Osama Bin Ladin's daughter and sneaked her into the country.
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