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EVIDENCE OF MEETING IN PERSON FOR PURPOSES OF YOUR FIANCE VISA APPLICATION
One of the basic requirements of filing a Fiance Visa (K-1) on behalf
of your fiance is that you both have met in person within the past two
years.
One of the misnomers of the term “Mail Order Bride” is that you can’t
just order your bride from a catalog and have her delivered to your
doorstep in America.
The Fiance Visa (K-1) was originally designed for those people who, for
cultural reasons, had their marriage pre-arranged by their families.
For example, people from Indian Hindu culture frequently have their
marriages pre-arranged by their families.
One fiance may be a US citizen of Indian decent and the other fiance
may be a citizen of India. Their families arrange the marriage and the
US citizen must petition the US government to bring his fiance to
America for marriage.
The US Department of Immigration and Naturalization (INS) adopted the
Fiance Visa provisions to allow for this circumstance, but they put the
proviso in that the two fiances had to meet in person before the US
citizen could petition the INS to issue a Fiance Visa.
The exception to this rule is that the two of you are not required to
meet if it violates your cultural beliefs. Of course, you have the
burden of proof to show that not meeting your intended prior to
marriage is a cultural belief of yours.
The INS Is Suspicious Of "Green Card Marriages":
It’s much easier just to go and meet her. Besides, you want to meet the
person you are going to spend the rest of your life with before you
marry her anyway, wouldn’t you?
Consequently, one of the main requirements for the processing of the
Fiance Visa application is proof that the couple to be married has met
within the past two years.
The INS is very cautious about ‘Green Card Marriages,’ where the sole
purpose of the marriage is to get a so-called Green Card (indicating
lawful immigrant status) to the person immigrating to America.
The term ‘Green Card’ comes from the predominant color of the US Permanent Residency card.
Many INS personnel and US embassy personnel are naturally suspicious of
Russian women marrying American men. Many of them believe that the main
reason that the Russian women are marrying Americans is to ‘get to
America.’
You Have The Burden Of Proof:
Regardless of your feelings about their attitudes toward your
motivations, you have the burden of proof to show that your petition
for a Fiance Visa is a valid one.
As a petitioner on behalf of your fiance, you must provide documentary
evidence of having met your wife in person within the past two years.
The best evidence of the two of you having met is having photographs of
the two of you together.
When you are taking your world wind tour of Russia, make sure you take
plenty of photographs of the women that are special to you. When you
are on each leg of your trip, have lots of pictures taken of the two of
you together.
I know this may sound a little obvious, but make the photographs of you
together look like you like each other. You know, the ‘lovey-dovey’
type pictures with your arms around each other.
I have seen pictures where the couple is standing together in front of
Red Square with six inches distance between them. That could be a
picture of you with your tour guide.
Make the pictures cheek to cheek, with your arms around each other, and look like you are having a good time.
Take Lots Of Lovey Dovey Pictures:
If you are traveling from city to city and you have a number of women
that you are courting, have these kinds of pictures taken with each
woman. This comment is made to be eminently practical.
If you have not made up your mind who you are going to ask to marry
while you are taking your tour – and you may not until you are at the
end of your tour – are you going to retrace your steps to go have
pictures taken with the woman you finally decide to bring to America?
In other words, if you finish your tour in Kiev and the woman you want
to marry is the one you met in St. Petersburg, are you going back to
St. Petersburg to have your lovey-dovey pictures taken?
It probably makes sense to take these kinds of pictures while you are there with her.
You don’t have to have ‘lovey-dovey’ pictures taken with all two
hundred women at the Social, but if you have one or two women in each
city that you really like, it makes sense to have lots of pictures
taken with each of them.
Also, it makes sense to have some pictures taken in front of monuments
or other famous locations to show that you were together in her
country. You may have to show proof of when the pictures were taken, so
keep processing receipts or, better yet, take pictures with the date
imprinted on the photo.
by John Kunkle
John has been to Russia and CIS countries many times. He has been successfully married to his Belarussian wife for over five years. He will show you how to meet her, how to bring her home, and how to successfully survive marriage to a Russian woman.
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