Its official, I have dust allergies. I spent the whole of yesterday cleaning the first floor of my house and ended up sneezing until half my eyes decided to pop out. I still have to finish the basement and the first floor. Good luck to me. If you see me not completely dead next time, please do NOT forget to congratulate my organs for recovering from all that sneezing.
So lately I’ve been telling cos theta that I’d make a nice little post about my little incident that took place in the American Consulate-Chennai.
I was just looking for the copy of the interview that I had written down somewhere but as it turns out I don’t have one. I don’t remember deleting it but honestly I don’t feel like writing the whole thing down right now but I promised cos theta and now she’ll be furious if I don’t so I will.

SO this was July 16th 2004 —I think.
Dad and I flew into Madras a day earlier and I still remember we ate at a restaurant that served some excellent Malaysian cuisine, I’d show you pictures but I don’t have any. We went back to our hotel and the next day had breakfast (still no pictures) and then we were at the American Consulate well ahead of time. I went into the building with all the panicked half dead wanna-goto-america-to-do-something-with-my-life people.
Once you go in, you have to go past a security check point where they’d check if you are contemplating killing the CIA Agents in there. Once they confirm that you are not a terrorist and that you are not going to plant a bomb killing half of Chennai they’ll contemplate letting you in.
Then you are at the second phase where they pull out all your documents, your I-20, your passport, photographs, your GRE/SAT scores (or whatever applicable) and all the other documents that are relevant to the Visa you’re applying. All of that will be put in a folder and number put on the folder will be the precise number given to you. Mine was 434 (I think) and I was given a yellow folder which is apparently a VIP folder because of which I was made to wait a good effin 3 hours before I was subjected to my interview.
While I’m at it let me tell you about how careless I was. I took passport size pictures for my interview. And apparently I was stupid enough to take pictures of the wrong size, so I got kicked out of the Consulate, I had to go across the street, take pictures and come back within 30mins after which I got back inside, cut through the line and went straight to the interview room (if you could call it that) So I would suggest you pay some attention to details, like the size of the photograph requested.

I waited for my interview for 3 fucking hours after which I was in a state where I didn’t even care if I got the damn visa. Finally I heard my number and went to a window, where he asked me a bunch of stupid questions. And he blabbered something to me, smiled and asked me to go.
After which I smiled and then I wondered weather I had a visa or not, because I understood what he said throughout the interview but in the end when he smiled and asked me leave I drew blanks, I didn’t understand a word he spoke. I just smiled and left WITHOUT my passport. Which means that he should’ve kept my passport so it could be stamped and sent back home, RIGHT?
After getting out of that damned building there was some kissing and hugging and celebration after which I told dad I wasn’t sure if I had the visa. Bottom line is if they kept your passport then your getting your visa BUT BUT BUT I’m special. I already had a valid visiting visa which was valid for 5yrs, so dad and I sat dumb struck trying to figure out if he kept my passport to give me a student visa or to cancel the existing valid visiting visa.
If your visa was rejected then they’d give you a paper with the date stamped on it and the reason for rejecting you on the basis of a Potential Immigrant or whatever. So we looked at the file I had taken inside and searched if he had given me a rejection paper and I had some how missed it, but we found none so we decided to take comfort from it and just wait for the passport to get home. I got the passport a couple of days later and obviously my visa was there.
So here’s what I have to say to people who might be applying for a visa and for some really insane reason reading my blog.
1—Get the right type of photos
2—Don’t panic.
3—Watch a lot of English movies if your week in catching the American accent.
4—Dress comfortable, I wore a jeans and a t-shirt. The last thing you wanna worry about there is how you look. Just look good and feel comfortable. It will be slightly cool inside, take a jacket along if you don’t find it cold then just leave it on your chair while you go meet the horrible person whose gonna interview you. Take my word for it, no one would be interested in stealing you’re jacket, even if it’s GUCCI.
5—This is the most important one, make sure you greet that guy, something semi casual. A good morning or a smiley hi would be nice.
If any of you have questions I’ll answer them but I’d have to charge you a couple hundred dollars.

Photo Diary entry 3 (or was it 4?)
These were the stairs we had to take to go down to the train/tram that we had to take to go to the top of the arch. These stairs remind me of this horrible movie called “The Texas Chainsaw massacre”



Yes, Yes I know that looks like a toilet seat and my sister asked me why I took a picture of the toilet seat. It’s the tram that you’d have to sit in on your way up. That little box which could make a claustrophobe die will seat 5 people. 2 on either sides of the chair that looks like a toilet seat.