Forum	Title	Content	Member	Sex	Country	Date/Time
United Kingdom	Bon Voyage to elmcitymaven	Yippee! Have a great flight and have a wonderful time together in the good ole USA!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-08-18 12:03:00
United Kingdom	Time in JFK	4 hours should be enough. My fiance came through JFK a couple weeks ago, and while he says the immigration line was HUGE, he got though it all in about 2 hours.	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-08-20 16:50:00
United Kingdom	Good Luck Dawny&Tommy tomorrow	Courtney is so cute! Good luck with everything, I hope it all goes well:)	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-08-15 17:41:00
United Kingdom	Good luck tomorrow, blspicer and marstorr!	Congratulations to both of the happy couples	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-09-04 18:06:00
United Kingdom	Good luck tomorrow, missingmilwaukee!	Good luck with the interview!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-09-07 20:35:00
United Kingdom	Trip to England	This thread really makes me miss England...	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-10-26 09:29:00
United Kingdom	Trip to England	Have you ever visited York? I loved going to York when I was over in England, its so beautiful with a really quaint feel.	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-10-24 13:18:00
United Kingdom	Interview tomorrow in London!	Woohoo! Congratulations!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-11-01 09:54:00
United Kingdom	United Kingdom Interview Thread 2007	QUOTE (julezabelle @ Nov 6 2007, 01:13 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Chris & Kara (MargotDarko) on .........2007-11-05 APPROVED Yay!!!! Congrats!!!!!! Your NOA2 should be any day now Julezabelle!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-11-06 15:39:00
United Kingdom	United Kingdom Interview Thread 2007	It is so good to see that big red "approved!" Thanks for updating us Tracy	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-07-20 17:07:00
United Kingdom	United Kingdom Interview Thread 2007	FYI Nealandcari, There is an explanation for your emails being deleted without being read. You have to call the embassy first to get the proper "code" to put in the subject line of your emails, or else they will just get deleted. Just so ya know:) Oops, just realized that several other people already told you that! Sorry!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-07-11 21:21:00
United Kingdom	United Kingdom Interview Thread 2007	FYI Nealandcari, There is an explanation for your emails being deleted without being read. You have to call the embassy first to get the proper "code" to put in the subject line of your emails, or else they will just get deleted. Just so ya know:)	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-07-11 21:17:00
United Kingdom	United Kingdom Interview Thread 2007	Just found out yesterday from DOS our interview is July 20th! Yippee!!!!!!!!!!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-06-12 06:57:00
United Kingdom	Filing taxes with a British husband	Hi everybody, Taxes stress me out every year, but this year even more so because we are now married and Rich is obviously a Brit. He arrived in the US in late July and worked temp jobs for part of the 90 days he was allowed to, and before that had worked in England until June. My question is: When we file our taxes, does he have to pay taxes on his income from England? I'm not sure how all this works so any advice you have would be great. Thanks! Jenny	Jennymc11	Female	England	2008-01-30 12:37:00
United Kingdom	irn bru	This thread motivated me to find a British store nearby and I found one called "The English Teacup." It was awesome! I bought all this stuff for Rich: Irn Bru, Coleman's English Mustard, Bisto gravy granules, Heinz beans, Flake chocolate bar, Galaxy chocolate bar, Robinson's squash, and a few other things I can't remember right now. I could have gone really crazy. He was so excited when I brought it all home! We had beans on toast for breakfast today	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-11-03 21:03:00
United Kingdom	irn bru	QUOTE (Leney @ Oct 31 2007, 06:42 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> My hubby has been frustrated and looking for it around Pennsylvania, but no luck so far. He'd also love some Tennants He doesn't really want to order it from the internet but maybe I'll surprise him for Christmas. That is such a good idea for a Christmas present!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-11-01 09:52:00
United Kingdom	Brits in the USA	Hi, can we be added please? Jennymc11- Jenny (Littleton, Co) and Rich (Leeds, UK) We are both in Leeds until Visa approval. Thanks:)	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-02-11 12:14:00
United Kingdom	What Won't You Miss About The UK?	I will not miss the humidity and the mold (although the humidity makes my fingernails grow better). I won't miss how every time I ask for help in a store, that person always says "you need to go ask someone else." ####### customer service for the most part! But I will miss Chocolate Hobnobs!!	Jennymc11	Female	England	2007-04-03 06:07:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	another new member	QUOTE (Corey-Mariya @ Jun 12 2009, 05:59 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> QUOTE (slim @ Jun 12 2009, 04:46 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Stop wasting your time learning words like dostoprimowhatever and start learning phrases like, "Dai mi peeva, sichas! Bistreeeeeeeeee!" Is that "bring me a beer, now! somethiiiiiiiiiiiing (quickly?)?" Since it's transliterated I can't plop it into a translation service; so I have to rely on my unreliable Russian skills.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-12 11:38:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Popping in to say hello, I'm new here.	QUOTE (slim @ Jun 12 2009, 03:58 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> My wife is from VVO area also. We've been exploring the possibility of a trip there next year sometime. Talk about a logistical nightmare. When I met her in Russia to fulfill our two year meeting requirement (we hadn't seen each other in over five years) I flew to Moscow and then she flew to Moscow. Trying to line up a VVO trip was outrageously expensive compared to the "discount" Moscow trip. If you have any cost-saving advice for Far East travel, by all means, share it here! Whenever I finally do head over there, I'll route through Korea, no doubt. I lived there for two years and I absolutley LOVE that country. I'm going to make sure I have at least a two day layover there before heading home. Wifey's talking about staying in the Far East for an extra month or two, and if I'm rolling solo on the way home, you better believe the layover's going to be, as they say in Korea, "Kraygeeeeee!" I wish I had some magical cost saving magic. A friend from Texas said Aeroflot used to fly direct from Seattle to VVO; which isn't the case anymore;as best I could tell. I found nothing. I tried a gaggle of online and offline sites, AAA, orbitz, vlad-travel.com, brick and mortar travel agencies etc. and they all ended up being $1900-2100 depending on the time frame involved. I looked for 3 months and nothing cheap came up that didn't involve going to Moscow. In a few months I (hopefully) get to coordinate a one way trip for 2 from VVO->Moscow as well as Moscow->Denver a few days later. I'm already in savings mode for when the day comes. Katya and I both plan on returning to VVO as soon as possible. She has friends who constantly give her grief for not introducing us while I was there; but I was only there for a week. She has a solid support structure of friends and family in VVO; so I definitely wish to return to see all of them again. Katya has never been to Moscow/St Pete, nor have I; so that is something we both want to do. Perhaps Fly to VVO and take the Trans Siberian Railway from VVO to Moscow. I read where it takes an entire week to make that journey by train. Oh and patience is one thing I am not blessed with. "Hurry up and wait" both sucks and blows. Hurr up and gather forms and fill out paperwork, then wait for it to be mailed to me; then rush deliver it to the gov't, then wait for them to process it, blah blah blah. It's going to drive me batty. But it will be worth it.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-12 11:23:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Popping in to say hello, I'm new here.	QUOTE (K1researcher @ Jun 11 2009, 05:44 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Welcome! how did u get to VVO? I am curious and have been wanting to go there. Did you transfer in Moscow or route through Korea? DEN->LAX->Korea->VVO DEN->BWI->MOSCOW->VVO was like 350 hours of something insane like that. No thank you. It was $300 cheaper for the longer flight through Moscow; but no. 18 hours is enough for me. Plus I would have had to switch Airports in Moscow, crossing the entire city North->South to catch the last leg to VVO. This was my first time ever having even a connecting flight, much less an overseas flight; I wanted a low-key flight plan. QUOTE (baron555 @ Jun 11 2009, 08:26 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yes hello and welcome. My Alla and I are in a similar situation to yours. But.....there is nothing she has to sign on the I-129F form. You do all that. She does have to sign the four pages of a G-325A and her letter of intent to marry. I hope that's what you meant to say. Phil I really should've consolidated my replies in a single post. But yeah, that's what I meant.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-11 13:02:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Popping in to say hello, I'm new here.	QUOTE (slim @ Jun 11 2009, 01:48 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Welcome to the VJ Russia Forum, Johnathan. Now, let's get down to business! First of all, stop wasting your time in other forums or other subforums on VJ. This Russia forum is the one place you need to be for all your answers. You'll find all the time you spend in the K-1 forum is misleading and also a little frustrating as you're an old fat bald guy who is just marrying a mail order bride because you're too old fat and bald to find a good wife here in the U.S. (Or from Canada or the U.K., either of which are acceptable places to order brides from. I don't make the rules...) Secondly, we like guns and pie. Please state your preferences of both. I'm not old, I'm 33! (bad Monty Python reference) I like Pie. and thanks a lot, now I'm hungry. This banana for breakfast isn't cutting it. And damn, it's almost Noon. QUOTE Third..... How old is the boy? What's the status of his father (divorced, never married, alive, dead, wants custody, etc.) and has Katya gained permission of the father to leave Russia with the boy? Does the boy want to go? He's 4, never married - only lived together, father is a deadbeat who Katya had to go to court to get Alimony from, father has said he will not oppose the move out of the country (because he won't have to pay anymore!), and Denis does indeed want to come over here. At least until he realizes he'll be surrounded by a bunch of Americans who go "Dude" a lot. QUOTE Did you know they can do their medical exam in Vladivostok but have to travel to Moscow for the interview? That's going to be later on down the road - On that note, the police certificate can be obtained from the Primorskiy Krai police office (whatever the heck that is.) Basically, they have to go to the "big police" place in Vlad, the one that has authority over the whole region, not just the city. Free takes a couple weeks, $100 could get it next day. But, you have other stuff to worry about first. I wasn't certain about the medical exam, I hadn't bothered to look into it since it's down the road. Katya was aware that the interview HAS to be in Moscow, and must include her son Denis. She is prepared for that. We've only just started looking into the Police Certificate thing, she'll pay more attention to that after the I-129F stuff is sent to me. Baby steps. QUOTE The I-129F application process is amazingly simple. People want to try to make it hard but it's not. Follow the guides here on VJ in the Guides Section at the top of the intro page and you'll be fine. Include what they ask for, DON'T include anything else. There's a hoop USCIS wants you to jump through, anything more is just a waste of time. Have a "certified copy" of translations when sending in the packet to U.S. destinations (keep in mind "certified" just means someone says, "I translated this and I'm a translator.") and don't worry about translating every single little thing. A plane ticket is a plane ticket. You don't need someone to say, "this is a plane ticket." We're almost done with the I-192F stuff. She should be mailing me her package next week if things go as planned. QUOTE Since we're on translations, start learning as much Russian as you can. Not because you'll really need it, (She's coming here, afterall) but because it'll make understanding all the rest of the stuff (and boy is there a lot!) somewhat easier. She'll naturally pick up more English than you will Russian so don't try to keep up. Simply learn what you can when you can and keep in mind the goal is communication, not fluency. Learn to read Cyrillic as soon as possible. Being able to read it will help about as much as anything. I have Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone, and a Penguin Coursebook to learn form. Katya and her friends and family were all impressed with what I did know (which really is not much); but were more impressed with my pronunciation. I guess those few words I did know, I spoke damn well. I can read Cyrillic fairly well; though pronouncing unknown words is comical. I can go letter by letter figure out what it should be, but then stringing it all together to speak the word is an exercise in futility. I'm sure I'll get better with practice. Pimsleur helps with that, since it's a bunch of audio with real Russian speakers. The Penguin coursebook can explain how a word should be pronounced, but without hearing it I will still likely butcher the word. PROMT does a descent enough job of translating back and forth. Sometimes it shits a brick and I have no clue what she just said. I will try google and bablefish translation to see if they offer a different context. Otherwise, I just say "Ne ponimau" and ask her to repeat. Katya's most often used phrase during my stay was "Laptop, Please"; as she needed to use PROMT to get a point across, or to ask a detailed question. I have been very cautious with using idioms when talking with her. I try to keep my language as formal as possible to help PROMT do it's job. It can translate the words, but if the phrase is an American idiom she'll still be clueless as to what I really meant. We both expect to be leaning on translation utilities for a while once she is here. She has a friend who went through a similar process a couple years ago; and they used a English:Russian phrasebook/dictionary for the first few months. She is prepared for a similar experience.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-11 12:56:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Popping in to say hello, I'm new here.	QUOTE (Corey-Mariya @ Jun 10 2009, 02:15 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Hey!Welcome to the forum! P.S.Go Broncos My mom bought a Broncos outfit to give to Katya's son. I don't think he has a clue what american football is. Plus the colors are Orange and Blue. Poor kid. He better get used to it; all of the grandchildren are subjected to horribly color coordinated broncos outfits.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-10 18:56:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Popping in to say hello, I'm new here.	Greetings everyone, I figured I'd introduce myself here in the Russia subforum as well as the general newbie area. I'm Jonathan, 33, I live in Denver; and met my fiancee Katya a year ago on a russian bridal website. We only spent about a month communicating through that site before we moved onto emails. At first, she was paying someone in Vladivostok to translate our emails; and the communication process was slow as molasses. It would usually take a week between emails. I decided early on that weekly emails were really annoying. I told her to send me her messages in Russian and I would use PROMT to both translate her messages to English and then translate my messages back to her in Russian; along with copying my original English response. The quality of the translation that came from PROMT was enough to get us communicating on Skype. She can type to me in Russian, I can copy/paste from Skype into PROMT, get the gist of the message; write my reply, translate it, and paste it back into Skype in a few seconds. Neither of us speak the other's language well enough to speak to each other in a casual manner. We usually treat Skype as just another IM program; only occasionally turning on the video camera. Our initial attempts at verbal communication quickly devolved into guttural stammering in our native tongues, apologizing profusely for not being able to pronounce words properly. With that said, when I finally flew over to Vladivostok to spend a week with Katya and her son; she was a walking translation machine. She is by no means fluent, but she was infinitely more knowledgeable of English than I of Russian. She was constantly translating between myself and her friends and family. I took a cheap Asus Eee Netbook with me; loaded with PROMT. We often used that to translate more intricate/difficult sentences and ideas to each other. I have a feeling we will be leveraging the translation software for many months once they finally arrive over here. Which finally bring me to why I came to this site in the first place. This site has been a godsend; quite a repository of information that is laid out in a thoughtful manner. Katya and I were quickly overwhelmed with what appeared to be a very daunting task. Forms filled out in quadruplicate (G325-a), a Police Certificate? - what the hell is that?, who do I send what to, what does Katya need, and when, what needs to be translated into Russian, or into English... so many questions. I also really appreciate people's time line's in their signatures. The single most annoying aspect of my initial investigation was that no one would give me any sort of time line; at all. A year, 2? 6 months? nothing. I understand the unique nature of each case; but not knowing if it was going to be months or years was frustrating. Even if our case does not end up being typical; it is nice to know that there is a catalog of first-hand information on the subject. I am still waiting for Katya to sign and mail me her part of the I-129F form. I hate the game of hurry up and wait; but that is our life for the next few months. Hurry up and fill out the paperwork then wait for a response. Repeat a few times until her VISA is in hand. Good times. Thanks for listening to me ramble. It is a slow day at work as I wait for UPS to deliver something.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-10 11:09:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	K-1 NOA2 Received	That rocks! Very happy for the both of you. I hope to be in your situation in a few months.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-25 14:32:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Simple qustion on G-325A and field length	Thank you all. Now someone tell me how I JUST noticed that I misspelled question in my post title. I'm normally OCD about typos; going so far as to have Firefox underline any word it doesn't recognize. Oh well.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-26 11:27:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Simple qustion on G-325A and field length	QUOTE (payxibka @ Jun 25 2009, 11:30 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> many people revert to a supplemetal sheet Thanks. I've started preparing some notes for Katya on this process. I figured this was the route to go; but I also wanted peace of mind from the folks here. Thank you.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-25 12:39:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Simple qustion on G-325A and field length	Katya recently sent me her 'final' version of the G-325A form. Adobe basically let her type in as much information as she wanted, and some fields show up truncated once the form is printed out. She hasn't signed these, she simply wanted me to double check everything before she did sign/mail it. Her mother's City and Country of birth is very long. I do not know what information to delete, what's important or not. The information she put was "Ukraine, Ordzhonikidze, Dnepropetrovsky krai". The "Full Name" and address of her employers. She wrote both English and Russian. should I have her truncate the entries down to just the Russian or just the English version of the employer? Perhaps i add an additional blank sheet labeled G-25A info that details these extra long entries? Thanks for any help you all can offer. We are *this* close to being able to start the K-1 process and I'm getting a bit antsy. I want to hurry up and submit this paperwork, so I can sit around and wait for months on end like everyone else. Edited by Jonathan Matthies, 25 June 2009 - 12:23 PM.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-25 12:22:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Honey, we don't do that in America..............	QUOTE (slim @ Jun 12 2009, 03:21 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Gravy fries are the best! My buddy (who's from Maine and can get away with it) claimed us as Canadian once while abroad and the Scotsman we were talking to called me out immediately. Turning to my friend he said, "Nope. You may be Canadian, but your friend here, he's an American. I can always tell because they're always wearing the wrong shite." I was wearing a rugby jersey which I thought would be fashionable overseas but apparently it wasn't the right one. That's what I get for wearing an Irish jersey into a Scottish pub. Might as well have just worn a big American flag on my T-shirt. During my week in Vladivostok, people kept trying to talk to me while I stared vacantly as if someone was blowing a dog whistle. Either I dressed neutral enough that they couldn't tell I was American; or it was the opposite was true and they knew I was American and they wanted to screw with my head.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-12 11:42:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	failed relationship	QUOTE (Azzudiin @ Jul 9 2009, 11:31 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Troll, Just joined few minutes before posting. Admins should really just banned IP's from all the trolls on board and it would slow them down a little Not even a very good troll at that.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-09 12:37:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	How long was your flight?	Denver->LAX 2.5 hours 2 hour layover LAX-ICH (Seoul)->13 freaking hours 2 hour layover ICH->VVO Vladivostok -> 2.25 On the way back it was 2.25 again, 11 hours across the sea to LAX, and 2 more to Denver. When Katya flies here, she'll go from VVO->Moscow for the interview and then, hopefully, Moscow->NY->Denver - or something similar	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-08 14:32:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	The foods they made you eat... just once.	Katya made some kind of fried cheese contraption. I wasn't paying attention to what she cooked, as I was afraid fried <insert daily product here> was going to be nasty. But it was really damn tasty, it was probably cottage cheese. With a side of some amazingly rich cream cheese. I was feeling sick that day, but man it was tasty.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-11 16:30:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	The foods they made you eat... just once.	My first night in Vladivostok, Katya made a wonderful meal of baked salmon topped with shredded carrots, caviar, Oliver's Salad, and calamari. She did not tell me what the calamari was, and I didn't recognize it. The dish looked like linguini, but tasted like um, something. Needless to say I did not care for the calamari; her mother had warned her that many Americans would not care for it. I enjoyed the Caviar, it was really good. I was suprised that I liked it right off the bat. Katya and her friends all seemed to have this fish jerky thing. It was dried, salted, and cut into 1/4 inch wide strips. Everyone there treated it like we would beef jerky; but I never got used to the taste. Finally, there was this horrible salted sea fish of some kind. i don't remember the name, but the taste was horrible. No one expected me to like it; and I fulfilled their wishes with gusto. We were at a beach at the time and I'd rather have eaten sand. That dish was the only one I will not give a second chance. I will try calamari again, and the fish strips; but not that devil fish.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-06-15 12:19:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Welcome new members!	I've always wanted to be a Rube. err wait...	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-20 12:17:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Russian Forum; what is your favorite drink?	QUOTE (Thomas-n-Elena @ Jul 24 2009, 05:06 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Good mental note I follow a different philosophy, no post till I have had 3 morning coffee's and a homemade cinnamon roll, Ive tried guys but my wife is not ready to make a pie just yet. I used to drink 8 cups of coffee a day, 7 days a week. I have a massive Cuisinart coffee grinder/maker at home. It now sits unused. I went cold turkey a few months back; and now I only drink 3 cups a tea throughout the day. But there are some days, like today, where my mind really really craves some coffee. I'm in a fog and want to sleep the day away.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-24 12:08:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Russian Forum; what is your favorite drink?	I'm Irish going back 5ish generations and I'm a Long Island Iced Tea or Rum & Coke guy. Go figure.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-22 18:30:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Russia Forum; May-August K1/K3 Filers	My story is waiting both sucks and blows. But at least these past few weeks have blown by. 2 weeks ago I somehow missed two entire days. I went through the entire day, until 2pm; thinking it was a Wednesday. It was a Friday. I was pleasantly suprised, and then really confused and agitated that I simply lost 2 days. Now if I could only wake up and have it be 2010 I'd be much happier. Oh and if $6000 would magically appear in my bank account I'd be ecstatic.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-22 18:33:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	questions about love and commitment relative to K1 process	I have suspended DirectTV for 6 months (still might cancel it). I didn't go to rabbit ears, instead I pay comcast $15/month for basic cable; which is good enough. I also have $15/month phone for a year; which is a ton cheaper than the $45/month from Qwest. I feel like I am retired, pinching every penny, looking for coupons, yelling at the damn kids to get off my lawn. Colbert/Stewart are the only two political shows I can watch. I attempted to watch Cnn, Olbermann or anything on Fox, to try and get perspectives from both sides; but all they do is incite me to throw shoes at my TV.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-15 18:43:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	The foods they made you try.....and you liked!	Cold Borsch was delicious Blini (chopped liver in fried bread) was freaking amazing Red Caviar was really, um, salty but I still enjoyed it I guess that's all the strictly Russian food that I tried that I liked. Lots of other meals were 'generic' with salads, sausage, cheese, salmon, etc. Finding fresh fish for Katya in Denver will be interesting. Not sure how she'll adjust to that.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-07-08 14:39:00
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus	Stage 1 Complete	Conga rats! It is awesome to see so many NOA2's happening.	Jonathan Matthies	Male	Russia	2009-09-01 15:59:00