"The girl you profess to getting married to is in Italy 'working' for money to support herself and her child. And you are worried about trying to reach her to 'talk' to her? Well put up man.....support your going to be wife....."
Beemer, talking to her is no longer a problem. She got an email off to me with her phone number. I am well aware of the financial implications. I don't want to discuss it anymore.
RB, a friend told me of support but I didn't ask amount he was told, I going to ask him. I think that 30K for a family of 5 extremely low.
"I am serious and yes I know of the affidavit of support. There are ways of making the rules work for you if you look at all the possibilities. And yes, she still wants to come here and I still want her to come here. Isn't that enough? "
Well RB, you didn't mention anything about the 'relying' on each other portion. To me talk is cheap, it is our actions that tell all. You couldn't make your trip, so what is someone supposed to think.
It is just like me visiting a girl and something comes up and she can't make it...how am I supposed to know if it is a story or not.....there is no way for me to confirm or not, so don't tell me that your gf has not lied to you....you just don't know.
I said not to quote me, but you can google it. I am not going to do that now, but you will see that's not far from the correct amount. They do talk about several thousand above the poverty level. Perhaps someone in this forum knows.
I have to go by what she says, Beemer. I cannot assume she is a liar, and I do look at the details. There is a communication gap. Her English is not that good. One word misunderstood or not understood is a big problem. I have to take that into consideration along with the difference in culture.
You are right if her english is not good, chances are communication will suffer.
Even the current girl I am seeing( not gf now)speaks very good english but our letters are through an agency because our letters are long, speak of politics, cultures, history, our lives,the future
that if we communicated directly many problems may have developed. The interpreter uses phrases as I would if speaking to a girl from here, so it IS like i am speaking with a girl from home. When we were in egypt and we had a situation, the girl could not properly explain her feeling in english and I didn't get much of what she was saying in russian and writing something to each other was the next best thing.
"I have to go by what she says, Beemer"
You don't have to believe blindly RB. There are a lot of guys here with a lot of experiences, you don't have to believe it all but if many agree on one aspect chances are they are right on. Just because you haven't caught her in a lie doesn't mean she hasn't.
I say 30K for a family of five because I know a lady who petitioned her three children and that is the number I remember. (Remember, we will be a family of three: Me, my gf and her child.)
This lady's petition got complicated. She came in on a K1 and her petitioner filed for her three children. One week before her children was due to get their visas, her petitioner died. They didn't issue the visa. It would take another five years. During those five years, one of her children turned 21. That changed her status. It has been five years and the two children are now here. The child that turned 21 didn't make it, at least not yet. It will now take a lot longer.
This is a true story. The petitioner was my father. He was in his seventies and married a woman in her thirties from the Philippines. I had a stepmother younger than me.
I don't know what she would gain from lying. Right now, her main point is for me to go visit her. She is just as concerned about me getting another woman as I am her getting another man. What have I lost if I lose her anyway? Did I ever have her?
"What have I lost if I lose her anyway? Did I ever have her?"
I don't know??? You tell me!!
How can you ask and agree to marry a girl if you don't know if you ever have her?
Like I said RB, talk is cheap, actions speak much, much louder than words. With girl I am seeing, I having always done what I said I would do...... things have come up, and I believe this, that if someone really wants something...you will make it happen, no excuses, no reasons, just do it.
You know what I mean. We both want each other but we're apart. You're not telling me anything I don't know. What I say here are not intended as excuses.
Well I would not worry about what Ins requires for a minimum. You need to worry about what it takes for her. I saw once where Nasfan said $50,000 is not big enough to support an FSU lady. I do not think 70 is. I can list some highlights for a 10 month period. $6,000 for the trip for the interview and return, we used my brothers minivan to haul the suitcases from the airport she wrecked it so we bought it $3,000, new furniture 8,000 at one time, green cards $1,600, $10,000 for her and her boy to spend the summer in Ukraine. Then she announced we were spending $10,000 for a car this fall. On 70,000 my take home is a little over 900 per week after taxes. So that makes about 36,000 take home in 10 months. Now notice most of this is low dollars for what you are buying except the vacations but without buying the car that leaves you 7500 to buy groceries, cosmetics, clothes, gas, insurance, remodeling, utilities and entertainment for 10 months. And you might say that a lot of these are one time expenses but there is a long list waiting for funding. So do not worry about what Ins requires. Like I have said on here before getting the lady is the easy part of this venture. Keeping here happy for life is what you need to focus on.
Thanks for sharing, Oz. It is really helpful. I know I have a lot of work in front of me. But I hesitate to share it. Noone seems to agree with the way I do things and I end up arguing with them.
OZ - thanks for the account. To put it into perspective, how much less would it cost to keep an average woman from any culture? Of course discounting the visa, travel and other involved with a woman (girl) from the FSU, it is the same cost as finding Sally from the next county. Although Sally does not spend quite as much on cosmetics as does Olga.
"Then she announced we were spending $10,000 for a new car..."
I feel for you dude. But she does not announce "we are spending $$$ for a car ... etc."
Seems there was not a true partnership there. A true woman would be concerned about the family and survival as a unit taking into account the budget and etc.
I admit I am almost guilty of spending dollars already. But she is happy knowing she will have a car to drive. And of course a new treadmill. But otherwise, it seems money is less of an issue rather than being comfortable and survival as a couple. But your story and and another still gives me pause to wonder. If it all fails, I have a couple back up women. Americans. :)
Of those major one time items the travel is over half and my salary would be about be a balanced budget without that but I have a little baggage of my own and if it was not there taking the travel out would make it ok. She was not happy when I told her I don't think so on the car.
One of the big fallacies of this is that as we are led to believe that FSU women make perfect wives they are led to believe that money grows on trees in the US. There was only one perfect person and he was killed almost 2000 years ago and they are real women and no matter how much better the economy here you cannot go wild spending.
An American woman is already familiar with the country so it is not as necessary to do as many excursions for them to see. They also are for the most part already adapted to spending a budget that is realistic to income and most are already working or can readily adapt to work in a new area of the country. It is also not necessary to go across the ocean often to visit family. American women are more self confident and for the most part do not feel the need to stand out in their dress. You would probably have a wider range of beauty item cost for American women.
I would not know about women of neighboring countries.
I think I can be of assistance there. My ex was Australian of Filipino origin, and came across to the UK to live with me.
Annual Holiday - Flights & Accomodation (average one per year to visit family, sometimes two) = £4,000 per time
Transfer of belongings = £1,000
Communication (most of her friends didn't have Skype & her parents barely know what the internet is) = £100 per year
Paying for her grandmother in intensive care in the Philippines = £2,000
Furnishing a house (to replace furniture it would not be feasible to transfer across) £10,000
UK residency visas (working visa, spouse visa, "unlimited leave to remain") = £1,000
Paying for her to study in Oz (she was homesick) = £5,000
It may be true that some of these aren't essential and inextricably linked to her being from abroad, but having family and history abroad does add complications that you just wouldn't get with a 'home grown' wife. This is one reason why I'm doing the initial search with something of a budget in mind - I know from experience that the big costs come thick and fast later on.
The cost to keep them happy is no more than it would cost if you was at home. It is all relative, if you love and trust your girl enough to finance her that is great and should be done whole heartedly.
My girl i would say costs me close to 500 dollars a month 6k a year so maybe that is cheaper than the cost to live here in the uk but to her 500 dollars goes a long way. Also if i add in the cost of flights to see her etc then again that would be at least another 1k per year. These are all my costs so far, at some stage we will have the cost of getting married and that can be anything from peanuts to silly money. From there we have the visa issue to get her here and also the issue that her kids do not speak English well also her oldest wants to go to uni here and that will cost up to 20k. All this before she gets here and after that the cycle of life begins. It is hard and takes a lot of dedication and a lot of money.
I do not think it is often fully factored in, just what the woman you are marrying is going to do for a job in a Western country.
My Ukrainian gf has now finished 2 years English study but is still not at a high enough level to even start a course to be a preschool teacher. They wont perfect English.
She is now looking to be a nurse and will need to do 1 year foundation course and then 3 years for Nursing diploma. Thats 6 years full time study before she starts work.
If she does not study what else would she do? Wash dishes or flip burgers on minimum wage, why bother?
Her counterpart western woman of similar age would already be working and earning between $60,000 & $80,000 a year, so after 6 years the difference in income could realisticlly exceed $400,000. Add to that nearly $30,000 in tuition fees.
We pay a big price for chasing FSU women.
The company i worked for exported big time to the ukraine and russia, they always wanted russian speakers to work on the phones and admin to translate for the exports to the FSU. Now this is true, many uk companies are looking at the FSU as an untapped market and alot of very big companies will be looking for russian speakers. They will not need to be word perfect in English but it is a fact that there is a shortage of Russian speakers in the UK and some big companies will pay good for their interpretation skills. Look around at other avenues teacher is a hard enough job to learn if you speak English, best to try and take advantage of her russian speaking skills first.