We had our interview in Seattle DO on Jan. 13, 05. Here are the details for us:
Filed based on five years
File received by NSC and priority date: June 3, 04
Check cashed: June 9, 04
Receipt Notice dated June 15, 04 received in the mail on: June 17, 04
Finger Print Notice dated June 24, 04 received in the mail on: July 2, 04
Finger Printed on July 16, 04
Interview Letter dated November 5, 04 received in the mail on: November 12, 04
Interview on Jan. 13, 05 at 10 AM for me and 10:30 AM for my wife
We received a call on Jan. 12, 04 around 3:30 PM from Immigration officer saying that she is handling my case and the photos that I have submitted were not acceptable since it was taken with the eye glasses on. She wanted me to bring new photos without eye glasses on. And she mentioned that since I am going to bring in new photos any way then bring the photos with the new requirement as well which is the pose of the front of the face and not the right ear pose.
Showed up around 9:30 at the Seattle office. There were approximately 150 candidate for the naturalization interview on that day. The oath ceremony takes place every day for the one who makes the interview.
Called for the interview at 10:40. Very polite and professional immigration officer. She asked me to raise my hand and take a oath before sitting down. She asked me take out green card, passport and selective service registration card. She informed me that she has received my case about two days ago and that was the time she started to analyse my case. She realized about the photos yesterday and thus called me to bring new photos. She went through the application extremely fast. She stopped at the employer section and asked me if I work for the same employer which I responded in Yes. Since my employer is a foreign company so she asked me do I work from home in which I responded Yes as well. She wrote down on the application under the employer, "Work for home." She stopped again at the trips taken abroad and started looking into my passport for the trips. Since my old passport expired in July and I have received new passport, none of the trips mentioned in the application were mentioned in the new passport. She asked me about the old passport in which my reply was the old passport was kept by the embassy when they issued the new passport. She just ticked marked ok on all the trips and at the bottom wrote down, "work related trips." She asked if all the three children were born in the US, and I said Yes. She asked if they were going to school, and I said Yes. She wrote down on the application, "Children going to school in the US". Asked me to read a simple sentence (I don't remember what it was), and asked me to write, "My children live in the United States." She asked six questions from the 100 question and told me I scored 100%. She informed me at this time that when she was looking at my application two days ago, my FBI name check was not clear and she will check it again at this time to find out if it had been clear. She said unfortunately your name check has not cleared yet and gave me a sheet of paper saying you passed the interview, however, a decision can't be made until the name check is cleared. I should contact CIS if I don't hear from them in three months. She told me that my file will move to the record room and they normally check the update every two weeks to finalize the cases which are pending due to name check.
My wife was next with the same officer. Pretty much the same process, however, her name check was cleared and she was given a congratulation letter to attend the oath ceremony at 2 PM the same day. We were there for the oath ceremony which lasted for about two hours. 83 people from 33 different countries were naturalized on that day. Since we were travelling within the next 14 days so I took the apointment at the Seattley Passport Agency for Jan. 14. Applied for the passport at the Agency and received her passport within 2 hours with expedited fee of $145.
Please let me know if anybody has any question. Sorry for the late update because we were travelling and did not have access to the internet.
