Reflections During a US Visa Grind

Did you write such a long essay in your waiting line #3?

Good read, a bit sardonic at times. I couldn’t tell if the sarcasm is directed towards the Americans or those who are willing to put up with this mockery. May be a bit to both.

Excellent article. Informative, topical and illuminating. The message is bang-on target. Bravo.

Riotously damning and incisive. And yet you choose to go through with it.

So the days of having dad's messenger boy walk over an envelope and bring it back endorsed are really over?

Riaz,

A true reflection of reality. U punched both desis and US babus in this. Well written.

Whilst in Madras I use to notice long queues @ 5.30 AM at the US consulate. I was told that ppl queue-up from previous nights. As usual there's no shelter along the queue. Ppl spend the whole night in such pathetic conditions even though some of them are big shots and scientists.

For the sophistication fo Americans they can devise a more humane method of taking interviews. They care less.

Luckily for me I had it in Hong Kong b4 9/11. There're only two heavy doors and friendly sec guards but the consular staff are rude to some ppl. The pre-interview queues had some roof over our heads and queues moved quickly.

The guy who interviewed me talked gently and gave me a 10 yr visa (B/R) but the evening collection clerk (Chinese) talked derisively and got a rough treatment from me and the result is that a white guy was called in and he stamped my 10 yr visa 'Cancelled Without Prejudice'.

Anyhow I got a 3 month single entry visa subsequetnly without even waiting in the queue and giving an interview.

I can relate this aticle to what I saw and underwent so far.

A true reflection of reality.

People should not criticize USA govt.
We need to respect that is their choice and it great opportunity to escape from des but they have to consider all as potential Immigrant and once person is in almost impossible to take out due to Human rights . Now one should not coplain as they take only good above average people who have skills lacking in usa people. When you have people coming in like A.Stani people here they never go back but displace native.
Also our old people have always said way to heaven is hard and difficuly but its worth standing in line. If it was not nobody will come there. I think still usa is heaven compared to desh. There are countries like Saudi Arabia more richer than usa but there is no sex content in social millue, all men with beards and women under vail. USA is special place in world all dollars of world, nice hard working peolple and even drive can have his car which is amazing and almost beyond imaginations. I always wonder will be there that way after 50 years ? no body knows.

Why are you complaining about the US? Pakistanis treat Indians far worse than that when they apply for a visa and Indians do the same to Pakistanis. It is hyporcitical to criticize americans when we behave in exactly the same manner.

[The barriers that alternatingly block the left and right halves of the road are not made of wood or pipes. Each unit is assembled by placing three angle-irons, about four feet long and eight inches wide, welded together in the middle to form a three-dimensional X. Each end of the X is sharpened into a pointed arrow of steel. Four or five of these units comprise a single barrier. If a vehicle, even a large vehicle, were to accidentally run into one of these, it would be instantly shred into pieces. You may have seen such murderous devices on footage of mayhem zones in Iraq or Afghanistan. What they are doing on the streets of Islamabad, the crown jewel of Pakistan’s cities, you cannot fathom. Not only do you wonder what Pakistanis have done to deserve this, but also what these “diplomats” have done to be so fearful.]

What have these diplomats done to deserve this?

Don't ask us. Ask the Islamic Terrorists!

Brilliantly recorded and written, but I am surprised that they let you take a pen and paper in to take down all these notes and observations, or did you buy/borrow a ball-pen at every step from the guards or what?

Wow.... it is hilarious, sarcastic, narrative, enlightening - all at the same time. And I thought only people in India were subjected to such treatment.

Nicely written account of intentional queues.
But do like i did, don't go there! Who the hell needs to go to Harvard if here in Bangalore you can do what you want!
There is no better future for your children anywhere else except in your own country, amongst your own community. Remember when you make it to these countries, you are always amid foreign corns.

#10 Posted by purvamitra on November 8, 2007 3:12:02 am


Who the hell needs to go to Harvard if here in Bangalore you can do what you want!


Pakis don't have that option..

Indians have IITs, pakis have IITs(institutes of islamic terrorism)

The author clearly hates the US but whines about how hard it is to get a visa to come here?

Times have sure changed since the early 1970's

when I used to just walk into the American Consulate

in Karachi to check out the books and the people there.

Too bad, but this is the reality today.

Ras

Re #11 Arjun, what appears from this write-up, I don’t think that the writer “hates” the US, but he is demonstrating how Pakistanis are willing to put up with this indignity to go to the US. I don’t think that Pakistanis will be willing to put up with such humiliation by “brotherly” Arab countries. I could be wrong.

Kulharee writes "but he is demonstrating how Pakistanis are willing to put up with this indignity to go to the US...."

The tens of billions spent by the US pushing its culture, the corporate culture of consumption and land of opportunity and free booze and sex, has to produce some results in the minds of those its directed towards, otherwise they would be fools to spend that kind of money pushing it. Unfortunately when the desi reaches America it aint that pretty from near as it looks from afar and the only mate you're going to find will be a social reject like a 600lbs dumbo that you will carry around with you like a prize or trophy. For some people who have more self-respect, [unlike Kulharee], they spend their time alone, and don't sell themselves for a few $$....

#14 Posted by masadi on November 8, 2007 8:00:03 am

Even people who've read c. wright mills seem to fall for that trap...

go figure..

IslamIslam writes "Don't ask us. Ask the Islamic Terrorists! "

For those who have visited US ghettos, similar implicit barriers exist for the ghetto dweller enforced by extra police presence and invisible boundaries crossing which will lead to your run in with the law and in many cases a brutal beating. All colored are treated by the white elite in similar predictible fashion, the "terrorists" have nothing to do with it, the farce set in place by the US elite has to be made visible for all to see and its victims have to be those that have the least role to play in the entire farcial episode, the common folk in Pakistan or the poor grandmothers living and struggling in the ghettos...