Hey Folks. This may be the wrong board for such a question, but my Fiance is from China. We are tring to decide when to get married. I am in a very demanding Ph.D. program so I want to put it off for as long as possible. But, she will graduate with her masters degree in December 2004, after that she gets 1 year of OPT time then they will send her back.

Here are my questions:
How long can we wait before getting married?

If I want to take a trip to China with her this December, will she be able to come back if we are not married?

Thanks for your help

Thai
It is much easier to get a fiancee visa than a visa for your wife. Makes no sense but the immigration dept. never makes sense. She can stay only 6 months before you have to marry,so you need to be sure before filing papers. Is she on a student visa here now ??
If you marry her here without fiancee visa I believe she still has to go back to China and wait for spouse visa there. The laws are truly fubar. I'd get an immigration lawyer's advice.

She REALLY needs to take some more classes! No, REALLY!

HAve her check to see what she needs to do to go into a Phd program. She can do "just enough" and that will allow her to extend her current VISA.

That is, IMHO, by FAR your best bet!

But yes, you should probably consult with a good immigration lawyer. Our immigration is a total mess, and NOT very "user friendly". It is easy to get screwed over, so be sure you follow all the (stupid) little rules.

Haha, yeah, good idea Curious. Actually I just started a Ph.D. program, and my stories terrify her(even though she knows that she is way smarter then me in almost anything). She dosn't want to do that. It's too bad.

Khun, yuper, she is on an F1 right now. I guess I don't exactly know how all of this works, but after she graduates I think she gets 12 months to stay here (Optional Practial Training) I guess we will have to get married in that time, otherwise she has to get someone to sponsor an H1.

Anyway, thanks for the advice Curious and Khun.

>>She can stay only 6 months before you have to marry>>

Khun_mor,

Fiancee visas now allow only for 90 days of time to get married.

It`s been 90 days for years, most likely he just made a mistake. From time to time Congress disscusses extending the 90 days but at this time have no plans to do so. BTW there are no extensions, but you can send her back, reapply a 2cd time and bring her back for another 90 days. K-1 fiance visas are one time entry visas, but you can apply for reentry if she needs to leave the country during the 90 days, there`s a name for it but don`t recall it. You must apply and get approval before` she leaves the country.

There is another option now, if you know for 100% that you will marry once she arrives in the US, you can apply for a K-3 visa, good for 2 years with multiple entries. Takes just a tad longer for approval than a K-1 fiance visa. The immigration lawyer i spoke with said he highly recommends the K-3 over the K-1, but you must be 100% sure you will marry. K-1 visa is for those who want to marry but want to see how everything goes once she arrives and how she adjust to life here in the US, with the option of chosing not to marry and sending her back home.

K-3 visa was created in 2000 as Congress wanted to address the lenghty processing times (currenty running about 18 months)for people who wanted to marry in a forgein country, a K-3 visa will allow your wife to join you in the US while the paper work is being completed. But according to the Imm. lawyer you don`t have to be married to apply for one, just 100% sure you will marry once she arrives in the US, didn`t get into any details on how one would prove it.

BTW, contrary to what most might think 9/11 has had no impact on K-1 fiance visas, as the ncic was aready conducting background checks on applicants prior to 9/11 so the same background checks continue after, no need to change anything. The visas most affected by 9/11 are student and bussiness visas, that`s what was explained to me by a imm lawyer.

In Rio, I have been couples approved in less the 2 months after application if they had gotten married in Brazil. Most of these people did the paperwork themselves in Rio.

The process in Brazil is different then other countries.

If Brazil you can get married, and have your spouse her within a coupule of months.

This is different in other countries, and it is up to each US embassasy in that country as to what they want to do.

MM

For some unknown reason, it is pretty damned fast to get a visa for the wife if you marry in Brasil. I know a few guys who have gone that route and it's even easier than the K1 route.

As long as the topic is K1, have you guys ever heard of a girl being denied a K1? I haven't.

Fooledagain-- Yeah it was a year old mistake. I knew it was only 3 months as I brought my Thai ex-wife here on a K-1 visa. I guess it just seemed like 6 months. Shoulda been 6 years. Woulda saved me a whole bunch of alimony !!

>>This is different in other countries, and it is up to each US embassasy in that country as to what they want to do.>>

An Indonesian K-1 is 180 days for processing, another 3 months for assorted BS on the part of the embassy, medical checks and interviews. The time lag is different in other countries.

Catocony,

Never.

Khun_mor,

Dude, that is why I moved out away from civilization, including television signals. I am keeping my girl as un-American as possible. If I wanted my girl to become an American bitch, I would just marry one and brace for the alimony ahead of time.

I had a lawyer tell me that the K-1 is for 90 days, but you can request an extension of another 90 days. It takes them like 30-60 days to process the extension, and you only must file it before the original 90 days expire. Thus, even if you are denied the extension, by the time you learn of the denial and she must return you've already milked 30-60 more days beyond the original 90.

He also told me of a rule I didn't know of. He said that any legal resident with right to work in the U.S. (thus, not citizens... anyone with a green card or permanent residency) is allowed one 'servant worker' from their own country. Thus, if you know a Brasilian person living in the U.S. as a resident and employed here in the U.S. - you could import your GF by having that friend 'sponser' your GF as a servant worker.

I'm only passing on what this lawyer told me - I have no personal experience.

I`m pretty sure there are no extensions for K-1 visa. Wouldn`t be surprised different lawyers would say different things. I was on web sites that said the girl has to apply for a card to work once in the US and that it takes time to recieve this card, in some instances longer than the 90 days, yet i went to my local imigration office and they said, not a problem, bring her in and we`ll give her a card the same day. I also ask about bringing a prostitute here, they said, does she have a criminal record ? I said no, they said shouldn`t be a problem, but they also said they`ve never heard of that coming up before so maybe not aware of all the laws.

Once she recieves her K-1 she`ll have 6 months to enter the US. When she enters the US she becomes a conditional permanant resident. She recieves conditional status because later she must prove she did not marry to evade the immigration laws.

You must apply together within the 90 day period prior to her 2cd annivesary of date of entry to US to remove the conditional status and become a permanant resident. If she fails to apply in this time she could be ask to leave the country.

A friend of mine`s brother married a girl from Portugal about 8 or 9 yearsa she was gorgous, he was maddly in love, they bought a house together, on the very day she became a permanant resident he came home from work and all his belongings were laying in the front yard and all the locks were changed on the house, took the poor guy 2 or 3 years to get over the heartbreak. She married someone else and i think is still marred to him today, but he did get back together with her after a few years for some boom boom sessions behind the new husbands back.