The Long, Winding PATH to an American Student Visa C oming to the United States as an international student was a dream come true. Actually, that’s not accurate. It’s not a dream that “came true”, it’s a dream that I made come true: made, because it took tremendous effort and thought, above and beyond the considerable energy required to apply and be accepted. When you live outside of the U.S., the very thought of applying to college here isn’t taken for granted. Luckily, I was educated at an international school, and when applying, I received plenty of support from dedicated teachers and one particular guidance counselor. After applying, deciding, and committing to a school, a process that readers here are familiar with, there is a whole other process to be considered, one of equal if not greater trepidation: applying for a student visa, moving to this country, maintaining your immigration status and being reminded of it every single time you go any considerable distance. You pay a fee to be enrolled in SEVIS, the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System. Your school then sends you the venerated I-20, the Certificate for Eligibility for Nonimmigrant Student Status. You pay the visa application fee. You set up an interview with the American embassy or consulate in your country of residence.You gather your valid passport, your nonimmigrant visa application, the application fee receipt, your photo, your I-20, and potentially some additional documentation based on your country of citizenship. You make sure you have everything, obsessively re-checking your checklist. You go to the interview, dressed appropriately and well-prepared with the answers you are expected to give.You pass; you wait for them to send you back your passport, with your beautiful, cherished, brand-new visa page. You fly off, and present every single document required, in immigration; you are allowed in. If everything works smoothly. I was so excited for this next chapter of my life was to begin that I researched the entire process over six months in advance, gathered everything I needed, went over everything with my parents countless times; I had hoped to start the bureaucratic process as soon as possible so as to alleviate some of the nerves that would inevitably be my part closer to my departure. Those concerns came to head when the computer systems of American embassies around the globes crashed all at once, a few weeks before my appointment was to be held. I was beyond myself with worry: even if they managed to fix the systems quickly, it could impact my own timeline and arrival in the US. In the end, I breathed a sigh of relief after my interview went ahead only a day behind schedule. Little did I know that the more frightening obstacle would be when I finally arrived on these supposedly safe shores. Imagine--after setting out at 4am to catch your flight, after spending 12+ hours in the sky, after standing in line for ever so long, to be faced with an immigration officer-- you, practically still a child, and your father next to you, and be told that your papers weren’t in order, that you were to enter a side room while they figured it out. It couldn’t have been more than an hour, the time in that room, but being surrounded by other “suspicious looking” people, and the fear that was raging on in my mind, combined to make it one of the scariest hours of my life. Days later, when we finally had the time to make the uptown trek to my home for the foreseeable future, it was like coming to the promised land: I thought back to the bureaucracy, the uncertainty, the money spent, and the time, and thanked the heavens, and my parents, for bringing me to where I was at that moment-- to my beginning. by Hadar Tanne <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< THE BULLETIN - 21 - april/may 2017 Disclaimer: The Bulletin does not own any images on this page P&O