It’s Nghia’s Social Security card with her new number. And her new number is…
Psych!
Hello, everyone. My name is Angelo and I’m a Passport Brother who brought his fiancee from Vietnam to the United States to get married. We plan to live here in the States for a few years as we prepare for the next leg of our journey, which is to move back to Southeast Asia for my early retirement and to spend some time in other wondrous countries.
IT’S ALL HAPPENING SO FAST
Today, I am here to talk to you about the great things that have been going on in 2024 for me and my wife. As we celebrate…I think it’s been six months of marriage. We are a few months into the Change of Status process with the USCIS I filed a few months ago, late last year, and things have been progressing so I wanted to take time to put together this short video just to share some of the great things that are going on.
One it is obvious that this was Nghia’s first time celebrating the American version of the New Year celebration on December 31st. So that was the cool thing. We kept it pretty low-key. My youngest kids were here. We had a couple of bottles of sparkling grape juice and we just waited for the countdown to come and call it a night.
CHINESE NEW YEAR – TET
But as in most of Southeast Asia, the Chinese New Year or the Lunar New Year is a big celebration. And it has been for Nghia and her family since she was born. Also, now I work in a predominantly Vietnamese community. And so the Lunar New Year or Tet Celebration or Chinese New Year, whatever you want to call it, has been a big part of my job for the last ten years.
The place where I work is a big cultural center and multicultural center, that celebrates the Chinese New Year in a big way. They hold the biggest celebration in the area. People come from miles around just to attend that celebration.
So being the person in charge of my department, I’m usually standing guard over the VIP access area. And this was my chance to give Nghia some access to the VIP area where there is a band and some food and drink. And, you know, it’s all outside, and the local politicians come to speak. The mayor speaks, the City Councilmen, the County Supervisor, etc. Police Chiefs and others are there.
This is very different from celebrating in Vietnam, where it is kind of low-key. Mostly you go to spend time with your family as opposed to attending a big outdoor event with Lion Dances and all kinds of other stuff.
So I convinced Nghia to join me at work that day. And she dressed in her traditional, Ao Dai.
FIRST NEW YEAR CELEBRATION IN THE U.S.
It happened to be the same Ao Dai she wore during the Christmas party for her old job back in Vietnam in December of 2022. She was the hostess for the holiday party for a Malaysian company and she got rave reviews for her work and leadership at that time as the hostess. She did all the announcements, interviews, all the talking to keep people from getting bored.
She also got to wear her Ao Dai (traditional Vietnamese garment) at the Tet event. She got to meet some of my coworkers, some of the people that I work with regularly, the tenants, and the shopkeepers in the area.
I even introduced her to my millionaire, or billionaire boss, who was happy to meet her. She took pictures by the inflatable dragon (2024 is the Year of the Dragon) and it was a really good time.
So 2024 started pretty decently with welcoming the New Year on January 1 and then we had a two-week festival that led up to the celebration of Tet or the Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year on February 10th.
So we’re really happy about things so far. And now we’re waiting on the status of our I-485 petition, which is for the Change of Status to transition her K1 Fiancee Visa to a Permanent Resident status. Also, we are waiting on word on whether or not the USCIS and DHS would accept the application for work authorization. So we’re waiting.
USCIS CONTACTED US TWICE!
And finally, we got a notice pretty that told us that we had an interview scheduled at the end of this month for the Change of Status.
This is past the middle of February. So we’re getting excited about that, and getting ready to deal with that situation and prepare all of the things that we need to prepare for the interview. And that’s all I’ll say.
But then there’s some scuttlebutt going on that says sometimes they don’t hold the interview, they waive it based on your application package. So obviously that’s in the back of my mind. We’re hoping that that becomes the case. But regardless, we are prepared for this interview. So that’s a good thing.
But what’s next is we get another letter, the I-797 Notice of Action form, that says, Whoa, we have already been approved for work authorization! That’s crazy! So with that approval, Nghia will be mailed an EAD card, which is the approval or employment approval card (Employment Authorization Document).
And then I read the letter to find out if I needed to take some steps to obtain a Social Security card for Nghia. It wasn’t clear to me. But when I read the rest of the letter, and I checked back on the USCIS website, it said that after she received this notice, and then about two weeks later we should receive her EAD card.
THESE NUMBERS ARE LIKE WINNING THE LOTTERY
And then a week after that we will receive her Social Security card.
So with that whole thing, we’re golden. This process is rolling along quite rapidly. We’ve got a lot of motivation, and a lot of momentum, and things are moving smoothly.
Next thing you know, two days later it is Saturday morning and, my daughter goes to get the mail. She comes back and she has a piece of mail for me. And I open it up and holy smoke: It’s Nghia’s Social Security card with her new number. And her new number is –
PSYCH! I’m not going to give it to you.
So she’s got her new Social Security card and a new number that facilitates getting a bank account, her getting a job, and a whole bunch of things that you can’t do as an American citizen or an American resident without a Social Security number.
So now we are like on top of the world because things are moving and we’ve already set the stage. We set things into motion and now it’s like a snowball effect.
One thing after the other is happening and we’re just kind of reaping the benefits of our hard work because I did assemble and put together and fill out all of our documents.
WE DID IT ALL OURSELVES
We didn’t use a lawyer. We didn’t use any of these Visa services out there or anything like that. And, you know, a lot of people told us that we should. My wife’s cousins have spent thousands on their petitions. But I don’t I don’t think it’s necessary if you understand what’s being asked of you.
If you don’t understand something for sure, you should get a consultation from a professional.
But nowadays it’s really kind of hard to determine who is and who isn’t a true professional.
And so we’ve had a lot of luck, we’ve had some hardships and we’ve overcome obstacles. But we are in the final stages and now we’re sitting back wondering if at some point before the end of this month when our interview is scheduled we are going to get a call or a letter from the USCIS waiving the interview and telling us that we don’t need to attend.
We hope that they will automatically process the temporary or conditional green card, which I think is valid for two years.
Everything is now rock solid and ready to go. So, yeah, I’m excited. I’m excited about how things are going and how things are progressing.
MEETING MORE PASSPORT BROTHERS IN THE U.S.
To top it all off, I think I mentioned in a previous video that I met someone at work, an African American gentleman retiree or maybe somewhat retired, and he came looking for information on what it took to obtain a visa to visit Vietnam.
Luckily he mentioned this to one of my coworkers. And my coworkers knew that I had been to Vietnam five times. So obviously I knew this information. So he and I sort of talk, and his name is Jon and Jon had met a mature woman over there in Vietnam, and they were talking and he was going to fly out to meet her and see if they had chemistry and they would kick it off.
So I am excited. This is a brother that’s going through the same thing I was going through her. Then fate just dropped him in my lap so that I could help him and facilitate his process.
Well, now it turns out that he spent about two, maybe three months in Vietnam in the latter part of 2023, and he just returned to the United States. He sent me an email with pictures of his lovely fiancee, Hong, she coincidentally was born in the same province as my wife in Vietnam.
Jon plans on going back to Vietnam in a few weeks and then they’re going to get married. So I’m I’m excited for him about that.
And, you know, there are more brothers like me out there, like him out there, men who are looking for traditional women to have traditional relationships, traditional marriages. We are not fighting with masculine, uncooperative women, and we just want to have a good, peaceful time with a woman and we want to provide for them, you know, take care of them, and we want to do things together.
I’M HERE TO HELP – I ADVOCATE FOR SINGLE MEN
As you know, the world is changing. And I’m excited about the direction it is going for men, finally. So I will keep you guys informed of every step of the process. If I find out that we don’t need to have that interview, I will make another video and tell you all about that. And then the next stage is whatever is going to be – we don’t know at this point because everything’s moving so fast.
But in the meantime, please always check out my website my blog at www.AngeloJBell.com. There I talk about Passport Brothers, Finances, Relationships, Travel, and Minimalism is something that I’m also trying to get involved in right now.
So thanks again for staying tuned in. Thank you, if you are a new subscriber, thank you for subscribing. Thank you to the old-school crew for hanging in there with me. I’m going to try to pump out some additional videos with some information that will be helpful to you, as well as telling you the story of how things go with Nghia and myself. Don’t forget to check out the pictures at the end and I’ll see you in the next one. I’m out.