divabot

Suddenly, there is more appeal to a university in Canada.

From:

reddragdiva

You're actually a US citizen, so you're OK.

From:

Yes but none of my UK friends will visit me. :)

From:

also-huey.livejournal.com

Compromise: we can meet you halfway. Cape Breton Island NS CA, or maybe Iceland.

From:

razorjak.livejournal.com

First step of a Dictatorship sealing the borders: Make it incredibly hard to enter the country.

Second step: Make it IMPOSSIBLE to leave without risking life and limb.

From:

50-ft-queenie.livejournal.com

So....when are you moving to Canada? :)

From:

razorjak.livejournal.com

When I've saved enough that I don't have to mooch off others in order to make ends meet during and after a move.

Which, the way things seem to go, will be about the time I tame a herd of unicorns to cart my shite over the border. :-(

From:

compilerbitch.livejournal.com

I've visited the US many times and never really had a problem, but it is always a slight worry. Though I should emphasise *slight* -- I think that this whole thing really is blown up out of all proportion. The journalist in the first case was treated appallingly, but she really didn't have the correct visa, and the border officials were basically following procedure in denying her entry. Not noticing the limitation on the green visa waiver form is no defence. She was treated for more harshly than makes any kind of sense, of course, but she *was* in the wrong.

What really *is* bad is the sheer complexity of the US immigration system. There are just *so many* kinds of visa, with labyrinthine rules and regulations underpinning them and a glacially slow infrastructure processing the paperwork. By glacially slow, I really mean it -- some classes of visa are only now being processed for applications submitted in the mid-1990s.

I've had two for-real US visas in my time: a J-1, which is called an 'exchange' visa, though what it really is is a temporary working visa for students, and the H1-B visa that I recently received in order to allow me to go to work for NASA. The paperwork for both of these was nightmarish, and in both cases waiting for the decision of the INS (now the USCIS) was quite nervewracking. For the H1-B, the application procedure was quite onerous, including extensive documentation requirements. I had to arrange about 5 reference letters, and copies of my degree certificates, then fill in page after page of forms. This was just to gain the ability to *apply* for a visa, which had to be done, in person, at the embassy in London. I was questioned about a lot of the detail in by application -- I had to provide a copy of my CV and a list of my publications, and was asked why I'd visited Russia and Hong Kong recently. It all went through fine, though, but what a ridiculous process. My next entertainment will be applying for permanent residence, which by all accounts is *much* worse.

From:

miss-soap.livejournal.com

This was lurking in my mind as we went through passport control, but nothing came of it. The immigration guy seemed quite cheesed off that he couldn't pin anything on us, though.

From:

Trouble and cost of visas halts Hallé's US tour:

What the article missed is that each and every single one of the musicians, technicians and managers has to turn up at 9:00 o'clock in the morning, queue outside in the rain all morning, submit to a searching interview with a less-than-charming immigration agent, then guide their own application through an obstructive and unhelpful bureaucracy.

Musicians aren't all from comfortable middle-class backgrounds, and successful ones will have performed all around the world, visiting places that US immigration officers regard with suspicion. They are artists, and emphatically not good with forms and bureaucracy. Many will have left-wing political affiliations from their student days. Some will be foreign, or have worrying Islamic surnames. One or two will simply be too complicated to process in one day - names changed by deed poll, two addresses, dual citizenship, gaps in the paperwork - and a lazy official will always find it easier to say 'No'. It only needs one or two of musicians to fail the process to render the whole exercise meaningless, because it's not a random crowd of replaceable drones, its an orchestra: some of them are key performers and there's no certainty that any of them could be replaced in the time available.

The Grauniad may or not have guessed correctly, with its £45,000 headline figure (Private Eye has £15,000): but I can believe it when you count the train fares, at least one night in a London hotel (remember the early morning start!), feeding them for a day, and the $100 fee, for every single member of the entire orchestra. They simply do not have that kind of money to spend.

I doubt that there are any British Orchestras, ballet companies and theatrical troupes who do. Even the well-funded London ones. Actually, I doubt that many European orchestras have, either - and they will all have the additional problem of being international orchestras, with musicians from every country and continent bar Antarctica: there's no way that'll get through the bureaucracy, even if none of the musicians are from countries that frighten the American security services.

And, being European artists, a substantial minority will have long, long records of undesirable political affiliations. It may well be that there is no modern democracy with an orchestra or performing company that can get into the USA.

I have no idea how the Vienna Philharmonic is managing it's New York residency this year, with the continual transatlantic to-and-fro-ing. Badly, I suspect. Despite what you read about the 'Red' states, the cities are full of cultured wealthy people who support the arts, and they will be playing to full houses, but the cost and the administrative drag of repeated day-long bureaucratic battles will probably make it the last such appearance of a major European orchestra in the United States of America.

The phrase 'they don't know what they are missing' doesn't even begin to describe it: if you think the performing arts are irrelevant, fine. Maybe they are, to you. But whatever is important to you - banking, raising capital, architecture and consultancy work, presenting papers at scientific conferences, mid-level diplomatic negotiations, medical treatment, Christmas shopping - you'll find that it simply isn't worth going to New York to do it; often, it simply isn't possible at all.

Isolationism is one of those words you need to sit down and think about for a while. It means more than you realise.

From:

arkady.livejournal.com

Like an economic Forbidden City that spans an entire country.

From:

redcountess

Very well put!

From:

reddragdiva

"she really didn't have the correct visa, and the border officials were basically following procedure in denying her entry."

Er, no. The appalling bit of the story is that the US regards outside journalists as inherently threatening. Which is especially twisted given the respect granted in law to the First Amendment.

From:

poggs.livejournal.com

Now this worries me about going to the US later this year.

From:

mstevens.livejournal.com

The other bit I remember from being at university and investigating BUNAC is that you can easily know the procedure better than immigration people for even slightly odd visas, and may need to correct them. (this was before 9/11)

These days I suspect they'd just insist they were right, and let you get screwed over by a nother bit of the system later.

From:

What's happening in banking is that international work that would've been done in New York is now happening in the London offices of the American banks. And, increasingly, in the London offices of their competitors.

The reasons are simple: it's not good customer relations to insist that your clients get a US visa: not a pleasant experience for a noncaucasian. Also, a lot of people don't want to waste a day queuing: time is a lot of money for a trader. Or a contract programmer, for that matter. It's worst of all for deals (or organisations) where the key people are from North Africa, Egypt, and Pakistan: if they can get a visa at all - and it is an extremely unwelcoming process for a Moslem - there is still a risk that they will be arbitrarily refused entry and sent back on the next plane.

This is a particular burden for the French banks, who employ a lot of Phd's with Arabic surnames from the former colonies in North Africa. Far too many of my former colleagues have been to New York once, had the attitude from the officials (or the strip search) at Newark, and they have told the bank, flatly, that they will resign if they are asked to go again. And why should they? These are educated and successful people, used to freedom, used to respect, used to doing as they choose - not impoverished refugees who must meekly acept what they are given.

Just as we profited from the French and German stupidities in labour law, when all those trading desks were closed in Paris and Frankfurt and transferred to London, so we are now gaining from America's isolationism.The problem is that it isn't even a zero-sum game: the withdrawal of the USA from commercial and cultural engagement is diverting work to London, much to our profit, but it's a shrinking pie.

From:

I would suggest that you do, while you still can. Avoid Newark (few transatlantic flights go there anyway), they have a bad reputation, and you'll probably be fine. Providing you are caucasian, and just visiting as a tourist, anyway.

From:

You and me both. Every time I meet the savings goal I'd previously set, I decide I need another thousand (£, not $), and chicken out. Now I've got some money, the exchange rate is not in my favour. Should've moved when the Canadian dollar hit 2.40.

I did have a low point just before Christmas and was *this close* to showing up at my friend's house in TO with two suitcases.

From:

We had no problems at Newark last October. The thought of going through US immigration with someone whose place of birth is Belfast on his passport was keeping me up nights for six months. I didn't know if we'd have to go through separate immigration queues so I made duplicates of all our information - where we were staying, return, flights, etc. but all they did was ask us how long we were staying, take Jason's picture & fingerprint (as a Canadian, I don't have to do that) & wave us through.

We had some problems with the return journey in the Toronto airport (you clear US immigration in TO), but I sort of brought that on myself by deciding that as long as I'm on Canadian soil we are a family unit, as we are in Canadian law (and as they'd let us through together in Newark). I had all of our travel information, so when they made Jason go to the back of the line, he had no idea what our flight numbers etc were & he got held up.

I have since found out that US immigration often has problems with married couples who have different last names and the same nationality, so different last names and different nationalities caused head implosion.

From:

wednesday

There's not a lot there. Why not Halifax?

From:

Where's the adventure in that?

From:

wednesday

Getting to Halifax is about as adventuresome as getting to anyplace else in the Maritimes (to wit: dull.as.fuck, if pretty in places), but at least there you'll be able to find someplace reasonably decent to get drunk once you arrive.

From:

I got on a plane in London & off in Halifax. Getting to Gatwick was a bigger adventure. You want to get to somewhere adventuresome, try being from Regina. Not that I'd wish that on my worst enemy, but Halifax has far better links to the outside world than most of Western Canada. Come to think of it, I suspect I can get to Cape Breton faster & easier than I can get to Regina.

From:

wednesday

Er. Perhaps I wasn't clear; I apologize. My point was that the adventure might not be in Halifax, but it's not in Cape Breton, either, so you might as well go to some part of Nova Scotia which has amenities alongside the tedium. I wasn't recommending finding a more troublesome or awkward bit of Canada by any means; I was dissing the Maritimes. :)

I try to avoid adventure in my international travel.

From:

Whereas I *heart* Nova Scotia, all of it. Admittedly I've only been as a tourist. If I ever have enough of the urban living schtick, we're selling the hovel here to buy a hovel on Cape Breton outright with the profit. I do agree that there is nothing duller than PEI out of season, and what I saw of NB was a humongous letdown as well.

From:

wednesday

Yeah, tourism gives a weird idea of a place. I thought Cambridge was fantastic when I visited there, but living there drove me right up the wall.

PEI can be pretty dull in season, and certainly doesn't hold up to repeat visits. It has all of New Brunswick's backwater nature with extra added bonus trapped on a damned island.

From:

jauncourt.livejournal.com

I had a comment all ready, all snarky and realist. Then I had a horrifying thought and deleted it.

I'm afraid of what my own government might do if I said what I wanted to say and they caught me. How's that for an American view on it?

From:

The thought of going through US immigration with someone whose place of birth is Belfast

The INS of olden days was delighted to look the other way and accept the flimsiest of forgeries, admitting known members of the IRA with outstanding arrest warrants, and no questions asked. There is no reason to suppose that the new Homeland Security agencies will be any less willing to shelter armed insurgents and convicted murderers who seek the overthrow of a democratic government.

Not that this applies to you, of course: Belfast address or not. It is only the innocent, and the occasional journalists, who have anything to fear from these goons.

From:

also-huey.livejournal.com

I'm afraid of what my own government might do if I said what I wanted to say and they caught me.

I'm not, and I work for that government. You seem to be operating under the assumption that there's a malevolent intelligence operating here that can track down every snarky LJ comment. I assure you (and I'm in a position to know) that what there is really is an awful lot of stupidity, and only some of it malevolent. We simply aren't smart enough to target most individuals, and instead merely target people apparently at random, which is what a careful reading between the lines of all of the above cites will give you.

So, by all means, rant away. I know I do, and more than you do. Look at it this way: most folks rant about their employer, and rant about the government. If those are the same things, you do more than twice as much about both.

From:

gothgeekgirl.livejournal.com

Thank you very much for posting them, too. The laws themselves are bad enough. What makes it worse is that many INS officers are pretty much thugs. I've read a fair amount of horror stories published in the US press about how they treat people in their custody.

When you first pointed me at them the other day, it hadn't quite sunk in yet that this was the INS enforcing those ugly laws, so yes, I was surprised at the behaviors described. That sort of crap tends to be SOP for them, unfortunately.

From:

reddragdiva

Yeah. But treating outside journalists as inherently threatening? What on earth?

From:

dagwast.livejournal.com

I don't know. In my experience getting into Canada is at least as scary as getting into the States.

From:

So unless I go to a university in the UK, I'm doomed to only see UK folk if I come back over here? :)

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