Our Immigration: The Long Story

Immigration is a long process. It’s not simply a matter of packing a suitcase and hopping on a plane. This is the long story of how we came to the US

• The Green Card Lottery
• Our entry
• Did we really win?
• The endless documents
• Waiting…
• The Interview
• Preparing to leave
• Goodbye
• England
• San Francisco
• Luck!

The Green Card Lottery

Every year the United States government has a Green Card lottery in which 55,000 Green Cards can be won. Only people from countries with low immigration rates to the US can enter. A maximum of 3,850 Green cards can be awarded to one country. Anybody who has the equivalent of a US 12th grade education, or who does a job requiring 2 years training, may enter.

The entry is very simple. When we did it, it consisted of placing some information on a sheet of paper, and mailing it in. Nowadays it’s an electronic entry on their website.

After the closing date, 100,000 names are drawn randomly. These “first round” winners receive notice by mail. Then you have to fill out a bunch of forms and submit supporting documentation to the NVC. Once this is received, and 3,850 Green cards have not yet been issued to your country, you get an interview date and location. The interview is at the closest US embassy or consulate.

The Interview

If you’ve reached this point, you’ve basically got it. The interview is really just to check that you aren’t “undesirable.” They want people who can support themselves. At the interview, you also pay an administrative fee ($200 per visa in 1996).

After the interview you receive a US immigration visa. It is valid for 4 months. (So you have 4 months to pack your stuff and get your butt over there). Upon entry into the US you receive a temporary Green card. A few weeks later you receive the real thing by mail.

Our Entry

You have to realize this whole thing really works on luck. It’s like entering any other competition. You’re one among a whole lot of other people who entered. As such, your chances of not winning are far greater than your chances of winning it.

The irony of our initial entry is that we didn’t even do it ourselves. I had to leave town for three weeks and didn’t have time to prepare our entries. So I asked a friend who was also entering, to submit entries for us too. This was around February 1995.

Unfortunately for him, he did a better job with our entries than with his own. (Don’t worry, he’s living quite happily in England now.)

Did We Really Win?

I forgot completely that we had entered the Green card lottery.

One fine day in August 1995, we received a large envelope with an Amsterdam postal marking. I don’t know what I was thinking when I opened the envelope and read the letter. I do know I didn’t believe right then that we had won. So there was no joyous jumping up and down! (Esmé says you’ll never see me do that anyway!)

Knowing that a lot of my friends at work also entered, I tried to solve the mystery the next day. None of them had received anything. That’s when I realized we had won!

I don’t recall us ever discussing whether we should go to the US or not. It was just, “Yes, we’re going. This kind of opportunity comes only once, and we should take it now, or lose it forever!”

Little did we know how much it would change our lives, and which challenges we would face. Maybe it was good we didn’t know…

The Endless Documents

If you’re scared of filling out forms and running from one agency to the next to obtain documentation, then you’re in for a tough time. OK, it’s not really that bad. I survived it. It is a lot of work though. And you want to get it done before everybody else because there are only a limited amount of Green Cards available.

I was able to get all the required forms and documentation off to the NVC by October ’95. It was about 6 weeks after hearing we had won. That in itself was a miracle. I got to understand very well why some government departments are not famous for their efficiency!

Waiting…

“Waiting” is something that most people don’t do very well… especially if your whole life is placed on hold by it. We were reluctant to make any changes to our lives. It could all be in vain if we had to pack up and leave for the US.

After 3 months I couldn’t stand it anymore and tried to find out from the NVC what was going on. They couldn’t tell me anything other than “your documentation has been received and you will receive further instructions later”.

Then, after another 3 months, we received notice that our interview was set for May 16, 1996. Once we got the interview, I knew that we would get the Green cards. So I started planning the entire relocation operation step by step.

The Interview

On May 15 we flew to Johannesburg for our interview.

The first consulate person we dealt with was a very rude, impatient South African! I have later discovered on SA expat billboards that this Indian gentleman is quite notorious for his obnoxious behavior. Anyway, this idiot’s job was to collect the remainder of our documentation, and to collect our first money ever paid to Uncle Sam.

A very kind, pleasant American conducted the interview! It lasted about one hour. Two hours later we walked out of there with three immigration visas that were valid until September 15, 1996.

Preparing To Leave

On our return to Port Elizabeth I pulled out the relocation plans I prepared before, and got the ball rolling. We had a lot to do – sell our house, cars, and furniture. It wasn’t worth shipping furniture and appliances it to the US.

We also tried to keep the essentials right to the end. For 2 months we lived in a practically empty house. Everything went very well though and we were done with most of it ahead of time.

So we decided to take a final holiday with some good friends. In July ’96 we flew off to Mauritius (an island in the Indian ocean) for a week. It was during this time that crime-ridden South Africa gave us our farewell. After 2 days in Mauritius we found out that our house had been burgled. The place was a mess, but luckily the burglars didn’t find our immigration visas that were hidden in the house.

Goodbye

We decided to spend a week with each of our families before we left. So we spent a week with my parents on their farm outside Steytlerville. Then we flew to Johannesburg to spend a week with Esmé’s parents.

The goodbyes at the airports were the worst! Saying goodbye to family, knowing that it’ll be a while before you see them again, is not easy.

It is only now that our kids are grown that I realize how difficult this must’ve been for our parents. We flew out of Johannesburg for Amsterdam and London on September 2, 1996.

England

This is where my friend who entered us in the Green Card lottery comes into the picture again.

He had left South Africa about a year earlier and was now living outside London. We decided it would be great to see him again. It would also be good to split our trip in two to make it easier on Johnny, who was only two years old at the time. It also gave us time to come to grips, in the “safe” company of a friend, with what we were doing.

So we spent two great days in the beautiful English countryside before flying off to San Francisco via Amsterdam.

San Francisco

September 5, 1996 was our first day in the US.

We arrived at San Francisco International airport at 13:35. After going through immigration, we received our temporary Green cards (stamped into our passports). Then we called up the Residence Inn in Foster City and their courtesy van picked us up.

We didn’t know the San Francisco Bay area at all. We didn’t know anybody either. And to top it all, none of us had work. But we knew we’d have to put up with uncertainty, and that we’d have to take it one step at a time. And so we did.

Two weeks later I found a job as a PC support engineer at a company in San Francisco. A week after that we moved into the apartment that we lived in until we relocated to Austin, Texas on October 20, 1998.

I have since become the programmer that I set out to become. Esmé worked as an airport sales agent for Continental Airlines.

Luck!

There is always a certain amount of luck that accompanies you on big ventures like these. We had lots of it.

Initially we struggled to find an apartment. We had no credit history and no jobs. In the already tight Bay Area housing market, no apartment manager would rent an apartment to us… until we met Fred & Kathy Goodfellow. They were the managers of an apartment building in Hillsdale, San Mateo.

By sheer coincidence their son-in-law was a South African. They planned to move to South Africa two months later. So Fred & Kathy had a lot of sympathy for our situation. Despite no job and credit history, Fred convinced the apartment owner to let us have an apartment anyway. We lived there for two years, and were great friends with Kathy & Fred.

And that’s the long story of our immigration to the USA.