April 15, US Citizenship Day (well, at least for me)

Apr 15 - Mountain View
Wake up about 3:30AM. Can't sleep. Finish extracting all my trip pictures to date and putting them onto my home computer. Take last look at immigration questions befored heading off at 6:15AM. Homeland Security Office is loced in south San Jose and I am to meet my attorney at 7AM prior to a 7:25 appointment. I arrive 20 mins early. It is really cold (60 degrees - back less than a week and I've become soft like most Californians) and the coffee shop owner, who is set up outside, moves a table and chair inside for me. He asks whether I am waiting for Richard and it turns out that Richard handled his immigration case. Coffee-guy says Richard is very good and his cases breeze through.

My inspector is sick and they hastily find an officer from a different branch to fill in. He is apolegetic and my attorney knows this officer quite well. It makes for a quick interview, especially as he can see that I speak English, uhh, somewhat decently (although he is still required to see me write a sentance, probably so they have some written record of my having passed a written English test. A key part of the test is when they hand me a page with 10 written questions about US Government. My questions are easy, the hardest one being "Who said the words, "Give me Liberty or give me death." (Patrick Henry) I confess that I did not know the answer until going through the 100 questions prior to the exam and seeing the answer. Having all the questions available ahead of time makes it easy for people like me that are good at rembering a bunch of facts for a short period of time.

They will schedule a "swearing In" ceremony for me sometime after I am back in the US, June 2. I found it anticlimactic to be through this phase of the immigration process. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting, perhaps I wanted to see the wizard behind the curtain???? In any case, I felt happy and a bit smug and finally treated myself to a moca at the end of the day.