Hi guys,
Thanks for the kind words and support, and I'm glad now its all over. I'm just sorting out some flights, I think I will meet up with Elsa in Hong Kong then we'll both fly home together, so its a matter now of synchronising flights.
To be honest the whole visa process was fairly quick, she called on January 6th, and got the interview 2nd February, and visa issued today, so just 2 months, and that was with the Embassy doing local checks. I'm certain Elsa would have the visa on February 2nd if her passport hadn't have been stolen. Compared to US visa applications, this is very quick - I know of some of Elsas friends who have applied for US visas and have to wait a whole year for processing.
Now in my case, the visa process may have been short, but the legwork getting all the required documentation was at times, painfully slow, and at times seem to snowball out of control. As a rough timeline this is what happened:
2004 May 28th: Married in Palo
June 10th: Elsa sends off for Marraige secpa
June 12th: Elsa applies for new passport, this denied because birth certificate had errors (!!Was told to get her Birth Certificate corrected.
July: Starts petition process for amendment to Birth Certificate
July: Marraige secpa arrives
then nothing till November, grrrr
September: Applies for CFO certificate, was also denied due to error on birth certificate.
November: New Birth Certificate issued with amendments
December: New passport issued, CFO certificate issued.
January 2005: Visa applied for
March 1st: Visa issued.
Maybe if her original passport had not have been stolen, I'm sure Elsa would have been in the UK long time ago, but hey we made it now and we are together and thats all that matters.
Peter, no worries, I will keep monitoring this site (I spend hours on the net anyway everyday - gotta read something!
Regards
Rob
