The Neglected Blog

I think back to Peace Corps when I would see other volunteers' blogs on my blog roll say things like "Last updated 3 weeks", "Last updated 1 month", "Last updated 3 months", and so on and I always secretly judged them for not keeping up with it. I felt it was so easy and fun. Well, I am now one of them and believe me, its not easy to update this blog. Even updating photo of the day is getting harder.

I am lacking inspiration to know what to write, which makes updating a challenge. I am struggling to put our experiences down on paper (or on the screen in this case). I have a hard time feeling like our life is interesting enough to detail. I don't always know how to phrase things sometimes as our life here is far more watched and scrutinized than any any aspect of life in the Peace Corps was.

A typical day for us involves waking up at 6:10 am, being to work a by 7:45 am, working all day, leaving work around 7:00 pm, coming home to figure out dinner, doing a few quick things around the house, and finally collapsing into bed. And this doesn't even take into account all the side projects and events we have going on, such as trying to start up a summer camp, collecting a million visa records from the past few years for analysis, and trying to make time for friends and basic things like grocery shopping and laundry, let alone time to think of how to creatively write a blog post.

I love the idea of our blog. It is an easy way to keep friends and family back home updated on our life. We would love to be able to call and email everyone individually, but that isn't realistic between the time difference, the sometimes spotty internet connection, and everyone's busy lives. Theoretically, the blog should be the easiest way to update everyone, but even it falls victim to neglect. I do prioritize doing laundry (a 4 hour process here), planning this summer camp, and trying to keep our apartment tidy (thank goodness for our weekly apartment cleaning). I would never say our life is difficult, because let's be honest, we live in a ridiculously nice place, have great jobs, and great friends. But, it certainly is a never ending to-do list.

Human Interaction

One of my favorite parts of my day happens sometimes when I am fingerprinting. These moments are brought to you by the precocious children and happy elders of China. Today, it was a child. Often when I say, "ni hao" and wave to the kids, their parents smile, and the kids hide. Today, a spunky little seven-year-old responded with, "Hello!" and a huge grin. The look on her face made me melt. When I had finished with her mother's fingerprints, she gave me a perfect smile and said "Goodbye, have a happy day!"

A few weeks ago, I had another adorable child, this time a 10-year-old boy. After I had fingerprinted his parents, he looked up at me and said in flawless English, we had this conversation.

Child: "Hello madame. May I please give it a try"

Slim: "How old are you?"

Child: " I am 10-years old" (said very proudly)

Slim: "Sure, left hand. Right hand. Thumbs. All done. Perfect!"

Child: "Thank you very much. Have a good day."

Finally, the elderly people often make me smile. I have had old women jump up and down and tell me how beautiful I am. I have had older men tell me they are sorry I am married because they would like me to marry their sons. And I have had many people smile and laugh at my Chinese, but I know they are doing it in a loving way.

Fingerprinting can be long, it is four hours of doing the same task over and over again, however, time flies when you have fun people to interact with.

The Life of a Consular Assistant

My first month of work has been tiring. Very tiring, but also very exciting. However, I have gotten to do some really awesome things that make the job a great fit for me.

In the last two weeks:

- I got to help a fellow Minnesotan get home for an emergency despite having an expired passport.

- I got to watch several families go through the final steps in their adoption from China.

- I got to help stop people traveling under fraudulent pretenses from getting a visa to the US.

- I got to play an essential role in the non-immigrant visa process by collecting biometrics of almost 100 people per hour for hours a day.

In reality, my job involves many different things. I am a Consular Assistant, which means I get to, well, assist in the consular section. To explain what that entails, there are a few things you need to know first. There are four parts to the consular section here in Guangzhou (not every U.S. Embassy/Consulate has all four). The consular section here is comprised of: 1) Non-Immigrant Visas, 2) Immigrant Visas, 3) American Citizen Services, and 4) Fraud Prevention. Right now, I work in three of the four sections.

I start my days in American Citizen Services (ACS). The ACS section helps Americans overseas. Some services offered include: Passports (i.e. adding more visa pages if you are almost out and issuing Emergency Passports for those who had theirs lost/stolen or expired and have an immediate need to travel), Death of a U.S. Citizen abroad (they are the ones who notify next-of-kin), Marriage in China (to marry a Chinese person, you need an affidavit stating you are single), Consular Report of Birth Abroad (if a U.S. Citizen child is born overseas, this document states they are a U.S. Citizen), Notarial Services, and Emergency Assistance (Prison visits are a common one). While all of these services are approved and processed by Officers, I get to assist with some of these services, which is really exciting.

After two hours in ACS, I move down to Non-Immigrant Visas (NIV) for biometrics collection, ie: fingerprinting. Every person (with a few age exceptions) who is applying to a visa to travel to America gets fingerprinted. Fingerprinting must be done my a cleared American. In Guangzhou, we process hundreds of thousands of visa applicants each year, so that is a lot of fingerprints to take! Each day I spend four hours saying, “left hand”, “right hand”, “two thumbs”, and a few other phrases in Chinese. A lot of people find fingerprinting boring, but I enjoy it. It is a chance to interact with people and to practice my Chinese. I often turn it into a game and try to guess people's ages before they show up on the screen or make up stories about what I think they might be doing for work or why they might want to travel to America. While I don't get to find out most of that information, it is fun to guess.

I end my day in the Fraud Prevention Unit, helping with some of their databases, it is all very interesting work.

Quite a few people have asked PM and I how it is working together and to be honest, we enjoy it. Very rarely are we in the same area, and never are we working next to each other interacting, but it always makes me smile when I am moving from one section to another and I get to see him for a couple seconds. I think I can speak for both of us when I say that we also really like that both of us are getting to know more people at the Consulate. I have met some people he hasn't yet and visa versa, but to us, the Foreign Service isn't PM's job, it is our life and it feels really good to be even more a part of that. I hope this is the first of many jobs at the U.S. missions abroad.