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In Need of Repatriation Advice?

Posted by Cliff on from the turning-japanese-and-back-again dept.

kir asks: "I've been living in Japan for the last 10 years -- 6 in the USAF, 4 in 'freedom'. My wife and I recently decided to move to the U.S. (back for me, not for her). I am wondering what advice the vocal Slashdot minority might give me. I'm most interested in tips on finding a job from here and gauging a proposed salary based on a location of which I know nothing. I'd also find helpful tips on preparing for culture shock (both my mild case and my wife's possibly severe one). Thanks!"

8 of 231 comments (clear)

  1. Start working on immigration now... by afabbro · · Score: 4, Informative
    The INS (now BCS) is the most backward, retarded, morass of a bureaucracy you can imagine. My wife's been in the country for five years and still doesn't have her green card...it was "lost in the mail" once and the replacement will take 24-30 months. They're the worst government agency I've ever dealt with.

    Also, don't assume that just because you're a citizen and are coming back, your wife can come back. If you married her overseas, she has no more legal right to enter the US than any other alien (IANAL, but that is my understanding).

    My advice is to talk to an immigration attorney ASAP.

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    1. Re:Start working on immigration now... by pclminion · · Score: 5, Informative
      The INS (now BCS) is the most backward, retarded, morass of a bureaucracy you can imagine. My wife's been in the country for five years and still doesn't have her green card...it was "lost in the mail" once and the replacement will take 24-30 months. They're the worst government agency I've ever dealt with.

      I have an extremely important piece of advice with regards to this:

      When you deal with the INS, you always deal with the office/branch at the location you first immigrated to. In my fiancee's case, this means the California INS. Even though she lives in Portland and hasn't lived in California for 5 years.

      This absolutely sucks. The California INS is swamped with millions of Hispanic/Latino immigrants. I am not trying to make a negative comment about those folks, but the system is overloaded by the sheer mass of people and it will take YEARS longer to get through it than it would if you were going to a different office.

      By no means should you enter the United States at California, or any other location with a heavy immigrant load!

      Also, don't assume that just because you're a citizen and are coming back, your wife can come back. If you married her overseas, she has no more legal right to enter the US than any other alien (IANAL, but that is my understanding).

      Would it be possible to get a divorce in Japan and re-marry in the US?

      My advice is to talk to an immigration attorney ASAP.

      I second, third, and fourth this advice!

    2. Re:Start working on immigration now... by Otter · · Score: 3, Informative
      Would it be possible to get a divorce in Japan and re-marry in the US?I wouldn't recommend this:

      1) Having a screwed-up marital history in your case is going to make it much harder for her to enter the country and to get a green card when she arives. Keep things simple and honest.

      2) Staying the hell away from the Japanese legal system is a good idea.

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      What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
    3. Re:Start working on immigration now... by belmolis · · Score: 3, Informative

      You definitely should figure out your wife's immigration situation and act carefully. The deal is this. As the spouse of a US citizen she is entitled to permanent resident status. However, the government can take as much as two years to grant her that status. Therefore, you either want to apply for it while you are abroad with a LOT of leadtime, or you want to get her into the United States first and then apply for it. So long as she enters the US legally, she won't be deported if she then applies for permanent resident status as a spouse.

      The catch is that most visas, including tourist visas, have as an explicit condition that the applicant NOT intend to stay permanently in the United States. So, suppose your wife gets a tourist visa to enter the US. You then go to the US embassy and apply for spousal status. By applying for permanent residency as a spouse, she has just declared her intention to stay permanently in the United States and has thereby invalidated her tourist visa. What will happen in this situation depends on the immigration officer with whom she deals. Some may let it slide, but some are jerks and will cancel her tourist visa.

      The upshot is, if you aren't prepared to wait to return to the US until your wife's permanent residency is approved, which as I say can be a matter of years, what you want to do is say nothing about her intention of staying in the US or her marriage to you and get her in on a tourist visa. Once she is safely in the US, she can apply for permanent resident status.

      She should also be aware that once she has entered the United States and applied for permanent resident status, she won't be able to leave the United States with the assurance of being able to return until she gets her permanent resident status. So if there are things she needs to take care of in Japan, such as visting elderly or sick friends or relatives, it would be wise to take care of them before she leaves.

      One other point. There are two main issues that the immigration people will be interested in in reviewing your wife's application. One is whether she is excludable for a reason like being a war criminal. You probably don't have to worry about this kind of thing. The other is whether your marriage is legitimate. They're on the lookout for fraudulent marriages entered into for the sole purpose of immigration. If you've been living together for some time in Japan that will help. Make sure you have documentation of that. They will also interview you individually and will be suspicious if you don't seem to know each other very well. Even if you do, be aware that sometimes cultural differences, or just idiosyncrasies, will have led to there being things that you have never talked about. So make sure that you each know about the other the kinds of things that American husbands and wives know about each other: personal history, birthdays, likes and dislikes, etc. If, as sometimes happens, you don't know her family very well because they disapproved of the marriage, bone up.

      This is based on my knowledge of immigration law and of various friends' situations over the past 25 years. I am not a lawyer. You should check on current US immigration law and possibly consult an immigration lawyer.

  2. Regarding salary information... by Xaroth · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'd start with salary.com, actually. There's a lot of information on cost of living, expected salary ranges by geographic location for virtually any position, and comparisons between different areas so you can start to guage how expensive it is to live somewhere.

    As a personal recommendation, Saint Paul or Minneapolis, MN (or the surrounding area) is probably one of the best places for a tech-minded person to find work right about now. The salaries are still high versus the cost of living, and there are a lot of positive things about Minnesota... just so long as you don't mind the freezing cold in the winters or the massive snowdrifts. ;)

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    That green slime had it coming.
  3. A few random thoughts by Chang · · Score: 3, Informative

    A few random thoughts...

    Health insurance in the US is a giant pain in the ass compared to Japan. Try to shield your wife from this as much as possible by dealing with the paperwork. There will still come a day when some doctor's office gives her grief over some mundane insurance detail and she'll be furious at having to deal with this.

    As you already know - customer service of all kinds is the US is a nightmare compared to what you are used to in Japan. This will bother you a little but drive your wife absolutely insane. Japanese people take it for granted that service workers do their job with politeness and a smile and as you know US customer service is hit or miss. On the other hand 24 hour stores in the US are way more convenient than Japanese convenience stores.

    Japanese supermarkets in the US can be quite good depending on where you relocate.

    Try to avoid friendships with Japanese in the US who are only here for a few years on overseas work assignments. As they go back to Japan it will devastate your wife. She'll do much better if she can meet Japanese women who are in the US to stay. This may be impossible at first but it might save her some homesick feelings. Even better would be to make some solid American friends but this isn't always going to happen right away.

    The hardest part of culture shock is to stop trying to compare the two countries. There is always an urge to whine about some annoyance that is better here or better there. Try to avoid that urge and just accept the US for what it is and move one with life.

    Good luck

  4. Re:My Advice? by Ironsides · · Score: 3, Informative

    Don't forget that in the USA, public schools HAVE to take ALL students that want in. In most European countries (notably Germany), the schools don't have to take you if you don't get at elast a certain grade on tests. Essentially filtering out those who would drag down the scores to begin with. The USA doesn't do this, hence the score are lower.

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  5. Re:My Advice? by petard · · Score: 3, Informative

    Too bad we can't moderate this with (-1, shameless plagiarism)... see the original.

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