F1 VISA- My Experience

My experience of procuring an F1 Visa for studying MBA at the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia.
The experience has been divided into two parts, the first when I was denied and the second when I was issued a visa.

Part 1: The not so successful one

Date: 22nd April 2014
Time: 10:30 AM
Place: The US Consulate, Chennai, India

After a long wait outside the consulate under the scorching Chennai sun, I finally faced the visa officer. This is how my interview went:

Me: Good Morning
VO: Good morning sir

VO: Please pass me your passport and I-20 (I did)

VO: When did you pass out?
Me: 2011, sir

VO: What have you been doing since?
Me: I have been working at abc at Bangalore

VO: What is your salary at abc?
Me: My salary is xyz in INR

VO: Why MBA?
Me: Gave him an answer (which I myself believe wasn't so convincing)

VO: Did you get admits from any other schools?
Me: Yes sir, I got admit from pqr university as well

VO: So, why William and Mary?
Me: Again a not so convincing answer

VO: I am sorry sir, cannot issue you a visa today (and hands me a blue paper describing 214-b)


Part 2: The successful one


Date: 13th May 2014
Time: 12:30 PM
Place: The US Consulate, Chennai, India


This time I had to wait for even longer before I finally faced the visa officer. Initially I was sent to the same officer who interviewed me the last time, after a couple of questions, he realized that he had denied me a visa on the last occasion. He then asked me to visit another counter and told me which one.

VO: Good afternoon, were you asked to come to this counter?
Me: Good afternoon sir, yes, I was sent here from the gentleman at the xy counter.

VO: Okay, that is fine, can I have your passport please?
Me: Hand him the passport, he goes to the other officer perhaps to ask why he sent me there.

VO: Okay, can I have your I-20, SEVIS receipt and GRE/GMAT score please.
Me: Hand him all of those

VO: Inspects my GMAT scorecard for about a minutes and then asks me the same first few questions which I was asked on the previous occasion.

VO: So, why do you want to do an MBA at this point in your career.
Me: I give him an answer which convinces him. I tell about my goals and how an MBA is the best way to fulfill my goals. I also tell him, how I intend to use the knowledge gathered in my post MBA life. In the same go, I also tell him about my ties in India (I did not want to take any chances as the last time, I did not get an opportunity to tell the officer about my ties back home). The officer was convinced by my responses.

VO: Did you get admits from any other schools?
Me: Yes, from pqr university

VO: So, why William and Mary?
Me: I gave him a detailed response, how W&M MBA is going to help build my career, its salient features and why I am confident that it is the best university for me to visit. The officer is convinced.

VO: Tell me about the school, is it good?
Me: Yes sir, it is one of the highest ranked business schools in the US and is most known for its faculty and rich history. Again, the officer is convinced.

VO: Ok, I am issuing your visa, take back these (hands me the I-20 and other papers and keeps my passport). Have a happy journey!
Me: Thank you sir, thank you very much!


So, what I take out from my two VISA experiences, you have to be clear about the two basic things, why this course and why this college. Other than that, a little preparation on the basic reasons of rejections will surely help enlighten the mind (mine was 214-b and is the most common one as well).


Cheers,
Sid

Nikhil Arya's journey

Life has its own ups and downs, but what if one has to face only the downs and whenever he finds a small ladder to move ahead in life, to get over from the lows, he is bitten by a snake and finds himself down and out, behind where he started last time!

This is the story of the main protagonist in Karan Bajaj's 'Johnny Gone Down'.
Bajaj's book is in a way, a handy manual on how to survive through crisis,again and again but never be down and out.
An above average Indian kid, manages to crack through MIT and sees it as an opportunity to escape the country he has no good memories in, where he lost his parents at a tender age. In MIT, he sticks with his childhood friend Sam, who persuades him to a Cambodia trip in the midst of an ongoing civil war and ends up protecting his friend at perhaps the cost of his own life!
Two years in captivity later, which cost him his right hand, he is rescued by a buddhist monk in whose words he finds solace and decides to stick with him knowing that his NASA job won't be waiting for him anymore.
But some years down the line, he finds himself attracted to oppoite sexes more than nirvana and ends up in Rio, Brazil as the accountant of a local 'Donos'.
He fulfills all his wishes and even marries a supermodel, whom he once met in a flight but as is his fate, life takes a cruel turn and he has to run away, leaving everything and his wife and son behind!
Next stop, Minnesota, US, where he finds a friend and mentor in another MIT graduate not making very big and helps him make big, but again fails to continue and this time ends up in India, the country of his birth, after more than twenty years!
Here things start turning his way, slowly and eventually he manages to find everything back, his friends Sam, Marco and Phillip and his wife and son.

For someone down and out, this is a perfect guide, how not to write off life and love, how valuable true friends are and how to keep the spirit of life alive!
Bajaj, in many ways has written a masterpiece which so many authors have tried and failed before(Read The monk who.. and You can win). His book is a perfect description of what are the capabilites of an travelling nomad, who is a non-achiever which a office going cubicle honcho can't.
Kudos to Karan, i loved his book and i am sure most people will, atleast it is much better than this blog, believe me!

The Indian Superhero - MIND IT!

There is Superman, there is Spiderman, there is Batman, there is Hulk and then there is RAJNI too!

He is definitely a wonder man in India. A country where emotions are as prevalent as snow in the Alps, he leads an army of his own, his followers.
In some places in India, he enjoys GOD status. Temples being built and the man being worshiped, well, that takes something too.

It did all start some 60 years ago when Shivaji Rao Gaikwad was born to Marathi parents in Bangalore(now Bengaluru) in the south Indian state of Karnataka. He was the youngest of four siblings and had two elder brothers and a sister. Having lost his mother at the early age of five years, he led an impoverished life and often did petty things for survival. In his early life, he often worked as a coolie and then finally started working as a bus conductor in the Bangalore Transport Service. It was where it all started when his colleague Raj Bahadur motivated him to join the Madras Film Institute and the rest is HISTORY.

He has acted in almost all major film industries n India including Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Hindi and Bengali film industries. In addition he has appeared in a Hollywood movie too titled 'Bloodstone'.In total 150 movies and almost 35 years in the industry, he has written his own success story, from rags to riches. He is a motivational force for the young Indian lot who aspire for success in the film industry.
His last few movies have written their own success stories with critical acclaim and even in countries like Japan and Germany, where his movies dubbed in local languages have been released and gained critical acclaim.
He is being considered as a God by his die hard fans who have constructed temples in his honour in the state of Tamil Nadu.

So the next time you prepare yourself to forward a Rajni sms... MIND IT!!

FIFA world cup.. where are we..??

Someone has truly said that if cricket world cup is of the size of an elephant.. then its football counterpart is like a big blue whale!
Its not a biased comparison, if we look at the number of teams participating in the two events, or more importantly the nations playing it as a regular sport, we can easily come to the same conclusion.
If there are 10 major cricketing nations, along with a handful more who have a few amateur cricketers playing for them occasionally, there are more than 132 in football, atleast the ones who are ranked above India by FIFA!
If we dig into the history of the Indian football team, we find surprising results.
The official Indian football team was formed in 1948 and since then, it is affiliated to FIFA. India got a chance for a direct entry into the 1950 world cup finals, but as we say in India that even our lives are decided by the politicians, the then sports ministry decided to go against the opportunity quoting that there wasn't enough practice time along with selection process, inspite of the fact that FIFA had agreed to bear a major part of the Indian team's travelling expenses.
Just to cover up their inefficiency, the government came up with a unique blame game, blaming the then captain Shailan Manna and his team that they didn't participate in the world cup because they wanted to play barefoot, which was not accepted by FIFA!!
Shame on these politicians...!!
That was India's only chance till date to participate in the largest world event. Since then, India has never even been close to qualify for the finals of the football world cup.

A major reason for the game's plight in our country is unavailability of infrastructure for the game.In a country of a thousand million people, is it so difficult to find 11 men who can be coached to match the skills of the best football players in the world?
This question remains to be answered by the politicians and all the men behind football in India.
It is also a long standing belief in our country that football has not been able to prosper in our country due to the menacing growth of cricket. Well, to some extent is is true. To a youngster choosing sports as his career, cricket is always more elusive given the huge gains in the sports. A cricketer playing for India is paid handsomely, in range of a few lakhs per match he plays, along with a yearly contract, leave aside the wealthy endorsements they get adding to their celebrity status.
On the contrary, a football player gets a petty match fee of a few thousand rupees and a slim contract money. These players hardly get any endorsements and talking about celebrity status, most Indians won't be able to name all the players of the Indian football team!!
If we compare India's most successful football player, Bhaichung Bhutia (who has 102 caps and 42 goals to his credit) to the most successful football players in the world like Lionel Messi, Wayne Rooney or Kaka, we would come to know of the status of football in India.
However some consolations for India are the recent wins in Nehru Cup and other Asian tournaments, however a Football world cup BERTH, still alludes the nation!

Aaj Ka Gunda'RAJ'

The word 'Hooligan' was out of my mind for a very long time, until very recently, when i figured out what Mr.Raj Shrikant Thackeray and his so called 'party workers' are.

Truly, he has inherited something from his great uncle very very well.

Perhaps he is trying to get his name into the Guinnes Book Of World Records for getting the maximum number of cases registered against his name.

Shiv Sena is a party long known for their long 'Hindu' favourng views. Recently, after breaking off from his uncle and creating his own party, Mr.Raj Thackeray thought of taking up another issue...

'ANTI NORTH INDIANS'. His party workers started harrasing Bihar and Uttar Pradesh people residing in Mumbai and other parts of Maharashtra.Most of the poor north indians who were harrased belonged to the lower classes of the society and were mainly cab drivers or petty businessmen and daily wage earners. People started getting harrased and beaten up for no reason at all and the 'Gundagardi' continued.

The most surprising part of all the drama has been that, the Maharshtra Govt., has behaved as a puppet in the hands of the MNS and Shiv Sena, though it is run by Congress, with NO support from the above mentioned parties!

To sum it up finally, the Maharashtra Govt. recently announced that all new cab drivers have to be Marathi to get their licences(they have to have a domicile and should know to speak marathi).

In the most funny way, the CM was seen changing his statement TWICE DAILY, sometimes with pressure from the centre and sometimes from the GUNDA'RAJ'.

They have proved it that Maharashtra, specially Mumbai is under a GUNDARAJ!

5 idiots

Way back in 1988, Mohinder Amarnath had called the Indian cricket team selectors as a bunch of idiots. 21 years later, they continue to prove Jimmy correct..!!
After the Indian cricket team lost the home ODI series to the injury hit Aussies, the selectors had the tough task of uplifting the morale of the down players and the team on the whole and at the same time select a 'good' team for the home series against the in-form Lankans, but what they presented can easily be called as more of a joke than team selection. Except for the selection of Sreesanth(Dhoni finally seems to have forgiven him for his running around act after taking his wicket in the IPL) and Zaheer Khan in the team, the rest of the team selection seems like a joke.
-Three spinners were picked up viz. Harbhajan, Mishra and Ojha.Now we all know that Dhoni prefers to play a single spinner in his lineup unless the wicket is too spin friendly and given the quality of spinners in the Lankan side, it will be a foolishness if they decide to make such a wicket.
-The out of form Ishant was again given a chance with the likes of Nehra and Munaf ignored.However, the selectors cited the reason that Nehra needed some rest and himself opted out of the test series.
-Given India's 'strong' batting lineup with Sehwag, Sachin, Yuvraj, Laxman, Dhoni, Gambhir and Dravid, it seems completely pointless to pick up Tamil Nadu's Murali Vijay and Subramanium Badrinath in the side with no likely role for them..!
-The team was chosen with the match between the Board President's XI and Sri Lanka yet to start, so it could be thought what the players would play for, as cited by the BP XI captain Rohit Sharma.

so... the selectors proved their critics right.... once again..again and again...!

the magician.... is back

Maybe he has got more critics than fans....but he remains the undisputed master of world cricket.

Almost 600 international appearances and 30K international runs later, a man who will celebrate his 20 years in international cricket on november the 15th 2009 perhaps won't regret anything in life more than the fact that after a splendid act of scoring 175 against australia at 36 years at a strike rate greater than what he did against the same opposition at sharjah when he was just 25, could not make his team win the match and eventually the series from a very commanding position.

Seeing Sachin Tendulkar play on the 5th of november 2009 at the Rajiv Gandhi international stadium, Hyderabad was something everybody would compare with his act against the aussies at sharjah more than 11 years ago, where the same man took his team from a position where they were even thinking if they'd qualify for the finals to winning the series.The only difference in the two acts were that on the former occasion Sachin made his team win, but on the later one his heroics went in vain as the Indian team once again proved that there is no resurrection of them without the little master.

To me, as a fan of indian cricket, it was a more heartening loss than the WC'07, T20WC'09, or CT'09 exits, and will continue to hurt me as long as i watch the indian team play.

Lets hope that the master decides not to retire from international cricket for quite some time now, otherwise god save the Indian cricket team.