Still absolutely miserable

Things are not going so well here. I have a complete wreck since Wednesday, as we are all aware. Because my partner has to work, I have all of the nights to myself and that is when I think the most. Because no one is around me, and I'm all alone, I can't do anything but cry and worry. Yesterday, when I woke up, I was "ok" then my partner went to work. I was supposed to go over to my partner’s sister's place again to just be around other people...but she ended up ringing after 10:00 and asked if it was okay if she didn't come pick me up. I thought I would be okay, and said sure. She said "don't hesitate to ring." So, 11:30, I'm having a bath and then I go crawl into bed and that's when I started crying again, and I couldn't stop. I ended up ringing my sister in law, and she came over and stayed with me until 1:30. I was so drained after that, that I fell asleep quickly and was woken up by my partner when she got home at 3:00. Today has been okay because my partner is physically with me. But it seems as soon as I'm completely by myself, that's when I think of the worst. Monday, I'm going to my sister in law’s again and am going to stay the night there till my partner can come pick me up. My sister in law has been great for me, and I'm very grateful that she's been a shoulder to cry on.

People keep saying that everything is going to work out, and that they have good vibes about this. But no one knows for sure, and who knows when we WILL know. I keep running the scenarios thru my head, and I am asking myself all these "what if" questions. It’s so disheartening and frustrating that it has come to this. Why would I jeporadize my residency chances to stuff up with my visa? Every official person I’ve talked to, everything I’ve written, I’ve clearly explained what happened, and everyone can see that it was a genuine mistake. If I end up having to go back home, because of a mistake that could have been prevented, I am going to be completely devastated. When I was crying last night, I was thinking to myself “if I’m this bad now, how am I going to be when I DO leave?” I would stare at Charlie, my cat, and just cry my heart out. She’d look at me and have no understanding of why I was so distraught.
I know I have to STOP thinking of the worst, and think positive. But being the type of person I am, everything in my life has to be in control. If it isn’t, I stress out. And this is ONE major time in my life where I can’t control anything. Overwhelming is an understatement. But people keep telling me that I have to let fate do it's job. I can't control what happens, and I just have to stay positive. But it's so hard for me to, especially when I'm home alone. I have all the time in the world, and it's just so hard not knowing. I have no idea how long it's going to take for DIMIA to make their decision, so that waiting game is extremely hard on me. They have NO idea how this has affected us. They can't see me crying my eyes out every night. They only see what they've seen in the interview, and what is written on paper. How hard can this decision be for them? They clearly have seen all of our evidence to prove we ARE a genuine couple, what more do they need? It's not like we can get married, and I'll be able to get a marriage visa to stay. It's not that simple, and I don't know how much my heart can take if I have to be separated from my partner again. I'd eventually be able to handle it physically, but emotionally, I'd never be able to handle it. I keep asking myself "WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS???" And I don't have an answer. Our dreams of being together could be forever shattered, just because of a MISUNDERSTANDING, because of people NOT doing their job completely. But the government is never going to own up to that mistake. I already feel as thou my life and heart has shattered. You find this kind of love, but once in a lifetime, and to have it shattered because of a genuine error, how can I think of living my life w/out my partner? Going back to a life of solitude for how long? I can't fathom the idea, I really can't.

I honestly don't know how I'll get thru the next few days, next few weeks, or how ever long it takes. And if we have to go thru the appeals process, that is going to be even more stressful. But I don't want to think about that right now. We have some avenues to go down if we DO cross that bridge.

So please, please, tell everyone to say a prayer or a million prayers for us. Light a candle for us, cross your fingers...do all you can, it's what I'm doing. I've never prayed so much in my life as I have the past few weeks. And I hope to God that it'll pay off in the end.

-current mood-MISERABLE

True intentions

During the interview we had with our case officer, he mentioned the reason I said I wanted the tourist visa was to travel and that I was staying with a friend. He then asked if I had done any actual travelling. I panicked, because the main reason why I applied for the 6 month tourist visa, was because I wanted to stay with my partner and so we could get the 12 months together. My partner piped up and said that we had drove to Adelaide and Sydney, and then said that we didn’t do a lot of travelling. I think that is when the officer said “yeh, when in fact you got the visa so you could be together.” I really really hope that if we have another interview, he asks us individually about our travels. I told my partner that we needed to get our story straight, just in case. I guess I also can say that even thou I wanted to travel, my partner wasn’t able to take a lot of time off of work, so we did a lot of weekend day trips. Just because I wanted to stay longer on a tourist visa, hopefully didn’t mean I HAD to travel. I didn’t work, I met my “conditions” I just didn’t travel as much as I could have. That question keeps popping into my head, and I really hope it isn’t brought up anymore during any interviews. The guy knew that the main reason why I got the visa was so I could stay with my partner. He should also know that I wasn’t supposed to let immigration know that I was hoping to become a permanent resident.

It just seems like every thing we’ve done, we’ve had to be secretive, about my intentions of staying. Why should we have to “hide” the fact that I want to stay permanently? If they have interdependency sponsorship applications, why don’t they have interdependency spousal visas that we can come on? Like a marriage visa, something straight people are able to get? It seems like there is a lot of red tape, and a lot of stuff we as “average people” have to know. It’s like damned if we do, damned if we don’t. With the way my mind has been turning, it’s like everywhere I turn, there is something blocking us from being able to get my residency. At the time of lodging the application, we didn’t fit all of the requirements, because we had 10 months of cohabitation (legally). They say that if there are compelling reasons why it was only 10 months, that can be waived. Well, compelling reasons were, we THOUGHT we had the extra 2 months. But then it backfires on me, and according to immigration, the visa conditions were still within my control. But how was I supposed to know that, way back in May when I rang up DIMIA? I didn’t know I had to give my passport details. And isn’t that the job of the person on the phone? And even at the customs desk, wouldn’t it seem logical, that if someone asked if they got an extension on their visa, that the officer would look to make sure? Or does immigration not care if someone stays illegally? I know they do care, but according to our officer, it’s not the customs officer’s job to check and make sure that every single person comes in with a legit visa. But that IS their job, that’s usually why they set people aside and ask them about their intentions of visiting the country.

I’m hoping and praying, that everything works out for us. The letter we wrote is very heartfelt, and of course we are biased. But the officer could clearly see that it was a genuine mistake, and hopefully the combination of our letter, how long we’ve been together, and proof we’ve given of our genuine and continuing relationship all makes the person who inevitably makes the final decision realize that it IS the right decision to grant me my temporary residency visa.

Last night after staying at my sister in law’s house, I was at home alone. I got to thinking, and within an hour, I was crying my eyes out. Usually I would be okay, but every so often, I’d get a pang of worry that would wash over me, and my whole body would get a stinging sensation. I rang my partner, and was blubbering on the phone, she couldn’t understand me. She felt bad because she couldn’t do anything to comfort me. So I got off the phone with her and ended up ringing my sister back in the states. It was 6:00 in the morning or just after, and I was blubbering on the answer machine as well. She didn’t pick up straight away, but she did pick up. We talked for about 20 minutes. She kept telling me that there wasn’t anything we could do yet. That they have to do their side, and that everything has to be in writing. They can’t just make a decision, based on verbal communication. Everything has to be written, so that if something was to ever happen, there would be a paper trail. I started blubbering about having to go back home, and how hard it was going to be for me to do that, aside from the emotional aspect. She told me to stop thinking about that. She said wait to find out what happens here, and then if the appeals process has to happen, then to focus on that.

But like everyone has been telling me, it is completely out of my hands, out of my control right now. There is nothing I can do, the letter is in the mail, and it’s gone. We just have to hope he gets the letter on Monday and then quickly makes a decision…hopefully the one we want. We may have to come in for another interview. I’m hoping we do, instead of them just sending us a rejection letter. I am kind of hoping that our officer already has sort of an indication of whether he’ll grant us the visa or not. And that this letter, that gives compelling reasons why I should be granted the visa, is only the icing on the cake. I’m hoping that the interview we already had, was sort of a test for him to see how we handled things under pressure, and how we interacted with each other. Even thou the interview would have been to determine the genuineness of our relationship, if we didn’t have this visa hiccup, that the case officer was secretly hitting two birds with one stone. He knew he couldn’t grant me the visa just yet, but wanted to see how we reacted.

My partner has a friend at her work, that knows someone who I think is an immigration lawyer for DIMIA. She said she would give us his phone number soon. This immigration lawyer helped her husband’s son migrate here to Australia. So maybe he’d be able to give us some help, or even an indication as to what our chances are of getting this visa. He might be able to help us with the appeals process, or at least direct us toward someone who can. I don’t want to have to think about the appeals process, but it still is in the back of my mind.

Someone told me yesterday that “good things happen to good people” and that’s my affirmation for the day. My partner and I are good people, and we deserve something good to come out of this. It’s strengthened our relationship, if you can believe that. It’s also proved beyond a doubt, of just how committed and just true our feelings are for each other. Not that there were any doubts, but this whole situation has put so much at stake, and we both know that our love will help us get through this. We just hope we are, or were able to show the case officer the same thing.

So keep the positive thoughts, all the prayers and good vibes and send them our way. They WILL pay off

-current mood-ACTUALLY HUNGRY

Worst feeling in the world

Well, we got our letter written, and will be sending it off very soon. The letter was 5 pages long, and it was very heartfelt. I had my mum read it before we sent it off to make sure it sounded okay. I hope to God that our case officer sees how heart felt it is, and realizes that NOT granting my visa would be detrimental to the both of us. Anyone can see that we’d be absolutely heartbroken if we had to separate. I understand that the law is the law for a reason. But why isn’t there any leniency? There are exceptions, and I just hope the commitment my partner and I have shown in the past 6 years is enough compelling evidence to persuade who ever it is, that we deserve this visa to be granted.

I’ve hardly been able to eat or keep anything down. My stomach is filled with knots and butterflies, and I can’t help but feel lost inside. It feels like I’ve already died. My partner can see how distraught I’ve been, so she rang up her sister and I’m going over to her place for dinner and a movie. Since my partner works at night, I am all alone during the evenings. This is a time where I especially would have liked to have my partner able to be with me at night. I just have to keep thinking positive and keeping busy may be helpful. It’ll be good that I can talk to someone about this, even if I ultimately know that talking won’t solve anything. All is not lost, I have to keep thinking that. I haven’t been told that I have to go home, not yet. We still have the appeal process. But that costs another 1400, not to mention more time, effort and of course stress. Living day to day is difficult, emotionally more than physically. I need to keep staying positive…my affirmation for today is “where there is a will, there is a way” and my partner and I WILL find a way.

-current mood-SAD and AT A LOSS

Bad news

Such horrible news. I cry so hard as I write this. We went in for our interview today, and the interview was pretty much a lost cause. Lost cause, because at the end of the interview, the case officer said that the meeting was to talk about me being unlawful, and not so much about the genuineness and continuation of our relationship. He said because I was unlawful for over 60 days, our application now fell into a section 3. The officer pretty much said that we have 7 working days to write a letter explaining compelling reasons why this visa should be granted. But because 1) we don’t have kids, and 2) we’re not married, the compelling reasons seem so miniscule. But the officer told us to talk about our relationship, the emotional aspects, how we’d feel if we had to separate, all the times we went to visit each other..pretty much EVERYTHING we feel that makes us committed to each other. It didn’t matter that this mess was a misunderstanding, because I MYSELF didn’t ask specific questions, or tell the woman my passport details, it is now MY FAULT. And because it’s my fault, immigration doesn’t care.

I honestly don’t know what I’ll do if the appeal doesn’t go thru and I end up having to go back home. I can’t fathom that idea. The fact that my partner and I would have to separate would be devistating for both of us. Devistating because we had to part but not on our terms. We had it in our hearts and our minds that we’d be able to be together, and permanently..now that has been all shattered because of a misunderstanding. I mean, the immigration officer wrote “misunderstanding” on his notes, so he knows it, we know it, but I guess according to the LAW, it doesn’t matter. I feel as thou my heart has already died, and I haven’t even left yet. I still can’t understand why this has happened to us.

Please keep the prayers and well wishes coming out way. There still is a glimpse of hope. I’m hoping and praying that there is.

-current mood-ABSOLUTELY DEVISTATED

Interview tomorrow

WELL, the big day is soon approaching. This time tomorrow (12:40pm) we will hopefully be well and truly into our interview. I can tell that I’m getting nervous, because my partner told me I was grinding my teeth last night, as well as tossing and turning all night. She ended up having to sleep on the couch because I was being so restless. But there’s so much going on in my mind, either consciously or sub-consciously and I guess I just take it out while I’m sleeping .

Tonight we’re heading off to my mum in law’s place. She lives closer to the city, and my partner wants to stay there over night, that way we don’t have to leave as early tomorrow. Since my partner works arvos, 5:30pm-2:00am she thought it’d be easier to stay the night at her mum’s. Not much to do there, since I can’t use her computer, and she doesn’t have cable tv. Oh well, hopefully her dvd player is working, maybe I’ll have a night where I watch nothing but movies. That sounds like a relaxing and fun thing to do the night before a big day.

Depending on how things go tomorrow, we might be staying at my partner’s mum’s place again. So I might not be able to post tomorrow night. But never fear, Thursday I’m sure I’ll have ALL the details. So here’s to a successful interview tomorrow, and my residency being granted .

-current mood-NERVOUS, and I've got butterflies in my stomach

English testing

Tonight, on Today Tonight (current affairs news show) one of the topics is about foreigners and the fact that they don’t speak English. The preview stated “all these foreigners coming to Australia, become Australian citizens, but yet they don’t speak English, why is that?” I saw this preview and I asked myself the exact same question. To become an Australian citizen, as well as a US citizen, and probably a citizen anywhere else, you HAVE to pass a language test. So why are there so many people here in Australia, that don’t speak the language, but yet have an Australian passport?

It actually urks me a lot, when I’m somewhere, buying something, or on the phone with someone about a business deal, and I can’t even understand the person. I don’t want to be rude, but the combination of their super strong accents (I know this can’t be prevented) and the lack of English skills, it makes it extremely hard to understand someone. And when you’re doing something as important as trying to get something cleared up, such as a bill…talking to someone who doesn’t understand you, and you don’t understand them, is that good customer service? I don’t want to ask the person “can I get someone who speaks proper English” but sometimes I have to, because I truly can’t understand them.

People state all the time, if you go to a foreign country, you are then supposed to abide by their laws and regulations. Just look at all the drug smugglers who try to get off. If you’re in a foreign country, you need to abide by their laws and regulations. You also need to be able to speak the language, or at least be able to get your point across. I understand that people go to a foreign country as a tourist, I’ve done it before. I’ve been to Europe, and I didn’t speak French, but I tried. And I was only in France for like 5 days. My life wasn’t in France, and I wasn’t planning on living there. But if you go to a country, you need to be able to speak the language. I personally think it’s mighty ignorant when you feel like you don’t need to speak the language of the country. What makes you so superior to others?

You know what makes me even more upset?? Is when a certain group of people (all of the same race) start talking in their own language. And you can tell by their facial expressions, that they’re making fun of someone or saying something rude and derogatory. Okay, sure you know your own language, and you can do that in your own household. But talking in your own language, and saying rude things, so that those who DON’T know the language, can’t understand you…that’s blood rude. My partner HATES it when she sees people do this. And it is rude. Are we not seeing something we should be, to prove that it’s okay to do?

So just how do people pass the English aptitude test, if they don’t know hardly any Engish, if any at all? I wonder if a lot of kids have to still take the test? If they don’t, and they keep on speaking their own language all the time..they’re never going to learn. I think it’s great if kids are able to keep their native language, but they should be putting as much effort into speaking the language of the country they are in, as in keeping their own tongue. Isn’t it a common sense thing? I just don’t understand how people can come to Australia or any country for that matter, and think that they can just get by thru life without knowing the language of the country. That’s ignorant, on many levels.

I know I have an accent, but I am very fluent in English. And I hate it when people just “assume” I don’t know the language because I’m Asian. But I speak better English than some Australian citizens here. English isn’t my birth right language, but I grew up in an environment where English was the language to speak. I don’t speak my native language anymore, I lost it thru the years. But people have always told me how well I speak English. Well, darn right I should. People just make assumptions, and it really annoys the crap out of me. Especially when it comes to my speaking skills. Just because I don’t look white, doesn’t mean I don’t “act” white. If people never get to see me, but they hear me, and see what I write, they’d NEVER assume I wasn’t a natural born English speaker.

-current mood-JUMPY because I can..lol

Honored teacher

Last night, I received an email from my mum back in the states. She wrote to me, telling me she’d won a teacher award on Friday. There was a surprise assembly and my mum was awarded this great reward. My sister and my dad were both there to watch her receive the award. My mum said she was going to be in the newspaper, so I went to the website and found it. It was a great article, and it made me all sad and sooky when I read it. I guess my mum is the first Oregon teacher to receive this American Star of Teaching Award. Her principal is the one who nominated her. The American Stars of Teaching award was created I guess to recognize one teacher in every state each year, as part of the federal “Teacher-to-Teacher” initiative. It is a committee of former teachers that get together who considered 2000 nominations, and winners were selected based on their success in improving academic performance for all their students.

I’m so proud of my mum. She has been teaching in the school district she has for 19 years now. She was at once school for 16 years till it closed down because of budget cuts. My mum went to a new school, a school that has one of the highest poverty rates in the state. She’s had some troubles adjusting to this school because it was so different, but I think this award has boosted her morale. But I may be biased, but my mum is an amazing teacher. She’s won a few prestigious awards before, and I couldn’t be more proud of her. The picture in the newspaper brought tears to my eyes. It truly showed a glimpse of just how powerful my mum is, in terms of her teaching. There were many nights she’d come home, or I’d talk to her and she’d be so down about work. She’s had quite a few troubled students, but my mum always was the one who took them in to her classroom. My mum has a special gift with kids, and teaching has always been her calling.

Well done mum I say..well done. I just wish I could have been there to watch you receive that award!!
-current mood-PROUD of my mum