Posts Tagged ‘HIV’

Many of you have won a Greencard this year. So I thought it would be nice to tell you guys what you can expect the following months to be. First you should either stay calm or begin packing your stuff. We chose the first option, because we were sure, that we would let some time pass by before moving. Than you have to wait for your American Dream package to arrive! What comes in the big brown envelope are a lot of forms you have to fill out. To be prepared you can arrange a detailed CV, make a list of all of your US visits, get a biometric passport (if you don’t already have one) and get some biometric pictures.

Some weeks (or even months) after you’ve send the forms to the Department of State in Kentucky you will receive an invitation to your interview in Frankfurt. Before that interview you should visit the doctor. You can do that afterwards, too, but this will lengthen the time till your Visa arrives. We visited the doctor a week before the interview. In our case the doctor took an X-Ray of our lungs, checked our bodys for diseases, took blood for the HIV test (I think you don’t have to do that anymore), checked our urine for drugs and asked us about our disease history. We also had to affirm that we didn’t get our tattoos at jail or some shady place. Before you go to the official doctors appointment you should get all the required immunizations. You will find a list of the required immunizations in your American Dream package. Note that you can’t get all of those immunizations at one appointment, so try to start as soon as possible!

To your interview at the consulate you have to bring along your birth certificate, all of your education certificates, a confirmation from your current employer, your criminal record, statements of account, (if needed) your marriage licence and the birth certificates of your kids, your passports, passport photos and dollars. I hope I didn’t forget anything, but you will get a complete list from The American Dream anyways.

It actually took us quite a while to get together all the certificates and all the other stuff, so I recommend that you start with that as soon as you receive your winners package!

So much for the abstract part, next time I will tell you about our interview at the consulate!

Since we won the Greencard last May so many things have changed regarding the whole US VISA process. First you don’t have to do an AIDS test anymore, while applying for the Greencard. That is one of the best changes, because it means that the many restrictions against HIV positive people are now history. But for us this change came too late. We had to do the test!

The next change happened only a few weeks ago. The I 94W formular, which my fellow germans better know as the nervwrecking green document, that you have to fill all your personal information in when travelling to the US, is history, too. Again for us, this change comes too late. Because we don’t need to fill out one of those forms since our last visit to the US!

But the most exciting and the only change that affects us is the new look of the Greencard! It will finally be green! And we will hopefully receive it very soon! Last week our american friend Scott found a letter in his mail, saying that the US Department of Homeland Security received all our information and will deliver our Greencards very soon! I am so curious about the day that Sott will send us a pic of him holding our Greencards! Our green Greencards!

For me one of the most disturbing things in this whole Greencard-process was the HIV-test we had to do. When I first heard about it, I was kind of shocked. A disease like HIV is something you should deal with personally and nowadays shouldn’t be a reason to be redlined for. My mum said that this would be one reason for her not to apply for the Greencard, because with banning HIV-infected people out of their country, the US makes a statement. And not a positive one. We applied for the Greencard anyways, but this ban was stuck in my mind. With this ban the US kind of blamed their own people of being not worth living in the US, because it is not as if this disease wasn’t present in their own country. Therefor I was more than relieved when I heard that this october president Barack Obama vowed that he will lift this ban till New Year! This is a vow that has been overdue for the last 22 years! Obama himself confirms that, stating that he has to thank former President Bush and the Congress for initiating this progress he now wants to complete. He also said that the situation is kind of twisted, because the US does so much do stem that infection and at the same time bans infected people from entering the country. Lifting the ban wouldn’t only mean that HIV-positive persons will be allowed to travel the US in the future, but it will mean that HIV-infected Greencard applicants won’t be denied for being infected anymore. I don’t know, if that also means that applicants don’t even have to do that HIV-test anymore. I hope so, because I don’t think the whole consulate staff should be informed about an applicant’s infection through a stamp on their file! This matter is peronal. And even if the US gives you the right to travel their country while being infected, they should leave you the human right to decide by yourself wether you want to inform people about your infection or not!