US visa interview 2026: questions and 10 real stories

• In what field are you extraordinary?
• What is your education? What degree? What major?
• Do you have a second citizenship? Which countries have you lived in?
• Where is your hometown, and how many people live there?
• Do you have brothers or sisters? What do they do?
• What is your wife's or husband's mother's maiden name?
• How old are you?
• What year did you finish school?

• How many years of experience do you have in your field? How long have you worked in it?
• Tell me more about your career.
• What exactly are you responsible for in your current job?
• What is your relationship with the Russian government? What ties do you have to it?
• Who is your direct manager?
• What is your salary at your current company? What was it a year ago?
• How much higher is it than the pay of similar specialists?
• Where have you worked? When did you start, and when did you leave?
• What is your job? What exactly are you responsible for?
• What did you do at each job? What were you responsible for?
• Were there any lawsuits at work?

• Why do you think you qualify for this visa category?
• Why are you extraordinary?
• What makes you extraordinary? What are your outstanding abilities?
• What awards and achievements do you have? In what year and month did you receive them?
• Which professional associations are you a member of? How many members do they have?
• What major events have you taken part in? What was your role? Which well-known professionals were there?
• At which conferences did you speak? Where were they held?
• Which projects exactly did you carry out? Why are you a leader of your organization?
• What is your contribution to the field?
• Have you written books? Where were they published, and how are they distributed?
• Which well-known experts wrote your recommendation letters? How do you know them?
• Where did you serve as a judge or jury member? Which well-known professionals were on the jury with you?
• Where and how is your work or research used?
• Do you have scientific articles? Where were they published? What did you write about?
• Where were articles about you published? In what month and year?

• Where exactly in the U.S. do you plan to go?
• In which state do you plan to work? In which city will you live?
• What will you do after you move?
• What is this company, and what does it do? Is it American?
• Why don't you have a job offer? / Where did your job offer come from?
• How did the company find out about you?
• Who is your employer in the U.S.?
• What job do you plan to do? What exactly will you do?
• Do you plan to work in your field in the U.S.?
• Do you know anyone in the U.S.? Who are they, and what do they do? What are their names?
• What will your spouse do after the move?
• What is the exact address you are going to?

• Are you married? Do you have children?
• Is this your first marriage? When was the wedding?
• Where did you meet your spouse?
• Have you met each other's parents?
• How many guests were at the wedding?
• Where do your closest relatives (parents, brothers, sisters) live?
• Do they plan to follow you to the U.S.?
• Do you own property, a business or other assets in Russia?

• Did you serve in the army? Where, at what rank, with what duties?
• Did you attend meetings with military leadership?
• Did you attend military training camps or meetings?
• Have you ever fired a weapon? If yes, at whom?
• Have you ever driven a tank?
• Did you receive pay from the army?
• What is your military rank?
• Why do you hold an officer position?

• How long have you been in the country of the interview? Why so long? How long have you been in Warsaw?
• Have you had problems visiting the U.S. in the past?
• Do you speak English?
• Will you do the interview in English?
• Do you know English, and why do you want the interview in Russian?
• What is the purpose of your trip?
• How did you learn about the EB-1 visa? Who advised you to apply?
• Did you prepare the petition yourself, or did someone help?
• Did you go to immigration lawyers? Why? Who is your lawyer? How did you find them?
• Do you have a resume/CV?
• What has changed since you filled out the DS-260?
• What do you think about the political situation in the world?
• Why is your name spelled differently in different documents?
• Where are your medical exam results?
• When was your I-140 petition approved? How long did you wait?

Here are the same kinds of questions in English. Practice answering them out loud in English: even if you choose an interview in your own language, the officer may switch to English.

Extraordinary ability:

• What makes you extraordinary?
• What exactly do you do? (describe your work)
• You claim to be very successful, but I've never heard of you.
• I'm still not quite clear on what exactly you do and what makes it so outstanding?

Employment in the United States:

• What will you be doing in the United States?
• Who is your employer in the United States?
• How much will you be paid in the United States?
• What do these companies do?
• Who signed the engagement letters / petition letter?
• How did these companies find you and make an offer?
• Why do these companies want to work with you?

US Petitioner:

• Who is your petitioner (NAME)?
• What is his status in the United States?
• Why did he file for your visa?
• How do you know him/her?
• Where does your petitioner live?

Ties to Home Country:

• Where are you currently residing?
• When was the last time you were in your home country?
• Since the war started, did you move anywhere?
• Why are you applying at our Consulate?
• What do you have left in Russia?
• Where do you plan to return if the war is not yet over?

Additional Questions:

• Why are you not applying for an H-1B (work) visa?
• Where do you plan to live in the United States?
• How long was your longest trip to the United States? What did you do in the U.S.?

Questions to Spouse:

• When did you get married?
• What do you do now?
• What will you do in the U.S.?
• Will you be working in the U.S.?

I wrote up my interview, maybe it will help someone.

Embassy in Yerevan, interview in December 2025. The officer was a young American. When they took my documents, they asked which language I would use for the interview: Russian. About the case itself I got 2 questions: what makes you extraordinary, and how many years you have been in this profession (special education teacher: 25 years in teaching, 10 of them in special education). That was all.

Then he opened my medical exam results (done at IOM) and asked: "What are you going to do about your health problems?" I told him I have no chronic illnesses, even though I am overweight. He said: "Are you sure?" I said: "Yes, I am sure" (I really don't have any; I brought all the needed documents to IOM, and by the way they did not take any of them). He said "Wait a minute" and went to talk to someone, where I could still see him. He came back and asked the same question. I gave the same answer. And then once more.

Next he asked: "And how will you support yourself if your English is poor?" I said: "I am learning the language and will keep learning it. I have enough money for a comfortable transition period. Can I show you the documents?" He said: "I don't need them. Wait a minute," and again went to talk to someone. He came back and asked the same question again. (I understood he was trying to get me to say that after I arrive I will work with Russian speakers.) When he did not get that answer, he left again, came back and asked the same question a third time. By then I was furious, of course, and gave him the answer he was pushing for. He jumped on it: "So you will work with Russian speakers in the U.S.?"

I said: "At first, yes. But... I am learning the language, and I plan to work at American centers."

He asked: "Which companies will you work for, which corporations?" I was stunned and said: "What corporations? I work with children." He was getting angry and asked: "No, where exactly?" I told him: "There are letters of intent in the case." He said: "I don't have your case at all." I gave him the letters. He said: "These are dated 2024." I said: "Yes, I filed my case in 2024."

Then he turned around and went to get a 221(g) form: administrative processing (they have a rack right on the wall, with a top row labeled "Russian" and three slots for forms: approval, 214(b), 221(g)). After that I was not really listening. I know what a 221(g) means; I was just gathering my documents.

I understand very well that this is the promised public charge check in action (when he opened my IOM results, he mentioned "Class B").

Result: Yesterday I got an email from them: send everything on the case again and confirm the employers again.

I'll describe my situation too.

O-1 visa, Armenia. I was born in Armenia, lived in Russia all my life, and for the last 3 years I have lived in Armenia. I have Armenian and Russian passports. All my achievements are from Russia.

My petition got an RFE, and in early September I had the interview at the embassy in Armenia. They asked about my achievements and my profession (DevOps engineer, software engineer with AI; probably because of the TAL, the Technology Alert List). Then they gave me a form where the "administrative processing" box was not checked, only that I had to bring my resume and send digital copies of the evidence of my achievements. The same day I sent an email with what the embassy officer asked for.

But it turned out I was supposed to wait for their email first. They wrote to me about two weeks later with questions and a request to send my CV, as if they had not read my first email. I answered in early October, and the next day they wrote that my administrative processing had started.

They gave me my passport back on the day of the interview; they did not keep it.

So far there is no news from them. The status check site shows "Refused", last updated on the day of the interview.

I plan to wait until a full month has passed since the processing started and then send them a polite email.

Follow-up (another applicant, same officer):

I also applied in Armenia, and it feels like I got the same young American officer.

My interview was in English, and he did not ask about the language. But he asked several times what my extraordinary abilities are, and I answered every time. Just in case, I had also printed my whole petition (500 pages). It really came in handy, even though I had read many times that you do not need to bring the petition. He asked for different documents from it, and I gave them to him. That is how I realized he did not have my petition. Unfortunately, the one thing I forgot to print was my resume. When he heard I did not have it with me, he gave me a white form with several checkboxes.

Of those boxes he checked only "send additional documents: resume", and wrote that I should also send all the evidence of my extraordinary ability. The form also had an "Administrative processing" box, but he did not check it. He also told me not to worry, that this was not administrative processing. I only learned I was in administrative processing when their email came saying it had started for me.

Takeaway: If I understand it right (if that can even happen), at first they did not plan administrative processing, then they looked at the case more closely and decided to start it.

Hi everyone! I decided to write a long post about the IOM medical exam in Moscow and the interview in Warsaw. I think my experience may help many people later.

A bit about my case:

I filed for EB-2 NIW (National Interest Waiver). My field is science: electrical engineering (power). I have worked as a chief engineer, and when I filed the petition and filled out the DS-260, I was the head of a research lab. I have more than 150 articles, books and patents, including in top-quartile journals. I am also an editor and reviewer for scientific journals (Scopus).

Priority date (PD): early October 2023. I expected the interview only in early 2026, but the jump in the June bulletin caught us off guard. In mid-May 2025 we got an invitation to an interview in mid-July 2025. We decided to go.

Schengen visa:

It turned out that getting a Schengen visa in summer is very hard: all appointment slots were taken. The only option was a "fast track" visa to Spain. We bought tickets Moscow - Istanbul - Barcelona - Warsaw two weeks before the trip, as soon as we had the visas in hand. By the way, at the same time we got second Russian international passports, and that turned out to be very useful!

Medical exam (IOM):

We did the IOM medical exam in Moscow. Everything was standard except one thing: our younger son's IGRA test suggested possible tuberculosis. Three days later we had to come back for a chest X-ray. Getting an X-ray of a two-year-old is quite a task! The doctor looked at the image, said everything was fine, and we waited to hear from the central IOM office. An hour and a half later, the central office sent us for one more X-ray view. We did it (so in the end our child had two X-rays, and I had four in the last three months). Another hour and a half of waiting. While we waited, the doctor said they had noticed a "small shadow", most likely from a recent cold. But IOM was not satisfied with the images and asked for sputum samples. The doctor let us go home and promised to call back and try to sort it out, because getting sputum from a 2-year-old is very hard.

The same day a nurse called and said the sputum samples were needed after all. She admitted we were the first such patients and she did not know how to do it properly. So we were sent to a tuberculosis research institute that works with children from 18 months old. The samples had to be given three days in a row. At that point I thought again how lucky we were to live in Moscow and not need extra days off work! The funny part: the "well-tested" procedure at that institute goes like this. The parents pour water into the child's mouth, and while he screams and struggles, they turn him upside down so the water from his mouth runs into a test tube. The first time they showed us how; the second time they told us to do it ourselves and just bring the tubes. Two tests are done on the samples. The first showed no tuberculosis. The second takes eight weeks, and its results go to IOM: we had to wait until early September.

The interview at the embassy:

The interview was set for 8:30. We came on time and entered the embassy with the second group (the first group were people who came before us, even though their interviews were at 9:00).

Inside we handed in our documents, and they strongly suggested I do the interview in English (as I understood, all interviews were in English, and an interpreter joined only when needed). I got a number and was told to wait. We were called to the officer much later than our turn: our number was I906, and we went in after I912. I don't know the exact reason for the delay, but we think they spent a long time checking or reading my case.

Our officer was a young man, and it seemed everyone left his window looking upset. We were "lucky" to get him too. He asked me to talk about my work experience and what I do. After my three-minute monologue, as soon as he heard the name of my lab, he stopped me and focused on my specialization: power supply. I confirmed it.

Then came the "torture" about whether I work on machine learning. (A side note: when writing the petition, I thought mentioning "machine learning" would help my case get approved. Only later did I hear that it often leads to administrative processing.) First I tried to explain that research often uses machine learning methods, and that I have co-authored papers on the topic (quite decent ones). Then came a series of follow-up questions, and "we arrived at this": I know how ML models are used and can apply them in research, but I cannot develop the algorithms themselves, because that is not my expertise. He was fine with that.

Then there were questions about the army and something else minor that I no longer remember. In the end he said he was approving our visas, but we had to bring translations. I had done the translations myself and signed them myself. The officer said they were all OK and I could translate myself, except for the police record. He asked us to get that translation done and bring it the next day. He also promised to find out about our child and let us know (I describe the problem below).

About the translations:

Two pages. In Poland, as we were told, the certified translation had to go from Russian to Polish and then from Polish to English. Most agencies take three to four business days. We found one that agreed to do it in two days as a rush order.

Four days after the interview I picked up the translations and took them to the embassy. I forgot to say: they had given me a 221(g) sheet saying to bring certified translations specifically. An interesting detail: the staff member taking documents did not know which documents I needed to bring and at first asked for all the translations. In the end they accepted the police record translations and told us to wait for the passports. I also asked that staff member to take our second passports and give back the first ones, with the Schengen visa.

That day I also saw a young couple with a child who had their interview at the same time as me. It turned out their visas had been approved, but the next day their passports came back empty, with a 221(g) form and a request to send an updated CV (yes, administrative processing). When I handed in my documents, I asked whether I could end up in administrative processing like that couple. They calmed me down: "If you have not heard about administrative processing by the second day after the interview, most likely everything will be fine." Right, given that officially I was already on administrative hold over the translations.

My wife's status and mine were "Refused" with a long text, the children's were "Ready", and the case updated every day. That Wednesday we decided to wait until Friday and then leave (Warsaw - Antalya - Moscow). We figured we would find a way to get the passports later; maybe that would even cost less than waiting for them and paying for hotels. Yesterday the status changed to "Administrative processing", and today it is already "Issued". For our younger child: "Refused".

Our child's situation:

Our child's IOM medical is not finished, and he will not get a visa until the negative tuberculosis result comes in. So his visa can be issued only after early September. But my visa category has retrogressed, and in August our date is not current. So he will get his visa in October, if our priority date becomes current again. I worry that the bulletin will not move back and he will not get a visa until next year (anything can happen). Then we would have to fly to the U.S., go through the border and return home the same day. I can't even imagine who we could leave our child with for that time. Of course, this only happens if our visas are issued in the next couple of days; otherwise we will not be "current" either, and the problem solves itself. We could have chosen to get the visas all together after the missing medical result, but that looked even worse to us: with the bulletin moving back, the medical exam's validity and a high chance of administrative processing, you cannot plan a departure, and I can't see how we could wrap up our affairs in a few months. By the way, we were told that because of the extra TB check, our child's visa will be valid for three months after the last test, so until early December.

Hi everyone! Time to share a long success story, to cheer up those who are on this hard but very rewarding road to life in the U.S., and to motivate those who are only weighing it!

I am a software engineer. General background: full stack; for the last 5 years my focus has been Flutter mobile development. For both the O-1 and the EB-1 I worked with a lawyer, and for the O-1 specifically with, let's call it, a "service". I will not name any of them, because I am not willing to recommend them at all. That does not mean everything was bad (nor that everything was good): in the end I reached my goal, but 90% of the success is my own work, and in every case it will be the same for you.

The O-1 story:

Most likely it was laziness and a silly hope for luck in the DV lottery (I entered every year since 2011, at some point together with my girlfriend, later my wife; spoiler: we did not win). But I was always interested in sharing knowledge and experience (in scientific, or rather technical, articles) and in solving my own problems (by creating many open source projects).

So, we came to the consulate, went through the entrance line (without the "child pass", but still very fast), then waited in line for the window (for some reason the "child pass" did not work there, but we waited only about 7 minutes). The officer was the nicest, kindest person: a few routine questions, mostly about my extraordinary ability, and it all ended with "your visa cannot be approved right now, but you can leave your passports". The idea was that the problem was purely technical, and if we could leave the passports, all was well. But it was not at all clear whether that was true or just a very soft and friendly way to refuse. We left our passports and went to the hotel.

My memory of this part is a bit blurry, so I'll skip ahead: a couple of days later we were invited to give biometrics, and there I found out whether we would get the visas. The answer was "you will, but wait". A day later they sent us a link to book a slot to pick up the passports. As far as I remember, it was a Thursday, and the earliest date was Monday. That meant 3 extra nights in the hotel, which we really did not want. So we booked Monday (to have at least some booking), and on Friday early in the morning, right when the consulate opened, we went there hoping they would not send us away.

And they didn't! This time the "child pass" worked 100%: they walked us past the line, through a hall that already held about 100 people (20 minutes after opening), straight to the window. There we got our passports with visas and were simply overjoyed! In the end we moved to the U.S. only in mid-April 2023, after wrapping up everything in Brazil.

The EB-1 story:

About the EB-1 I thought roughly like this: I have an O-1 now, with plenty of time on it, 2.5 years, and in that time it will all somehow work out by magic and we will get green cards. Almost a year passed. By early 2024 there was still no sign of a green card showing up by itself, and I started thinking seriously about EB-1.

Since I had only really looked at my O-1 petition around that time, I did not understand much about what to do and how. So, by inertia, I decided to work with the same lawyer as for the O-1, but this time directly, without the "service" in the middle. The whole time the lawyer worked on the case (about February 2024 - February 2025), I studied the subject myself, so that if it failed (and I thought failure was the most likely outcome), I could rebuild the whole case and file on my own. That experience helped: by the time of filing I could already see what was wrong with the case the lawyer had put together and fix it. So the filing was close to the "ideal" I was ready to build myself if this attempt failed, rather than a "maybe we'll get lucky" try.

Probably the main thing I learned in that time: "every fact you claim in the case must be proven". As if I were a prosecutor proving someone's guilt: for every charge (accusing myself of being extraordinary) I had to attach rock-solid evidence. And second: there are quite clear standards of proof for every criterion, and you need to follow them as you build your "case for the prosecution".

I also think it was very important to separate the wheat from the chaff and not stuff everything possible into the case, hoping to win by volume. My assumption was that as soon as the officer finds something that gives even the slightest hint of stretching the facts, he will become biased against the whole case. So I simply left out everything that was too weak. As a result, the overlap in content between the O-1 and the EB-1 was about 70% (some things from the O-1 were dropped from the EB-1 case, and of course the EB-1 had a lot of new material that did not exist when I filed the O-1).

By criterion:

• Leading or critical role: The easiest one to prove in my case. With 8 years of experience I had about 7 jobs (full-time), and at the last 6 I always had a leading role in every project. I am a "regular developer", not a manager, but with "Senior" / "Staff" / "Lead" titles, and my decisions usually set the technical direction of the projects.
• Judging the work of others: Many (~10-12) hackathons and competitions "around the world", plus several all-Russian ones in 2020-2021. I did not consider this criterion especially strong, but not so weak that I would mention it only in the final merits.
• High salary: No big problems here either: even in the U.S., my salary was more than 2x the "average" for my group, above the 90th-92nd percentile for sure. If my current salary had not been enough, I would have used past salaries, which were even 3-4x the level in the places we lived (Brazil / Russia).
• Articles about me in the media: There were "natural" articles (people just happened to write about me) and interviews for some YouTube channels. I did not use any PR services from anyone, and IMO using them is digging a hole for yourself for the future.
• Authorship of articles: Probably my favorite and a fairly easy one for me. In total I have about 12 technical articles about my experience, my open source projects and a bit of everything else. Usually writing an article meant building a demo project for it: about 20-30 hours on the project and another 10-15 hours on the article itself.
• Original contribution to the industry: My open source projects, open source projects I contributed to, and my own tools that I brought into the companies I worked for (usually just my own open source, put into use). There is also an improved fuzzy search algorithm I have been developing since my master's program and have used for its purpose in several places.
• Awards: Mostly awards to projects or products I worked on, where my contribution was the main reason they existed at all. I had no personal ones.

Criteria summary: I considered these rock-solid: leading role, high salary, authorship of articles, original contribution. The other three were strong enough to include, but each of them certainly had some weak spots.

I also had ~18 recommendation letters from very different people in Russia and the U.S., and collecting them took a very long time (the first list had about 30 people; about 18 got to signing). The full EB-1 package was ~1,450 pages; the O-1 was ~700.

What I would do differently with what I know now: I would probably have started writing an EB-1 myself right away in 2021 and cut all the timelines a lot. Still, I am very happy with the result.

Thanks: When I started digging into the topic, this chat and its knowledge base helped me a lot. To level up, I also read about 5 cases from other people who dared to publish their petitions as examples, and that was very useful too.

If you have any questions, I'll be glad to answer (as far as I can). The one thing: I will not share anything more specific about the case itself, the lawyer, the "service" or prices, in any form.

Today I went to the embassy for my interview again. The officer was friendly at first, but as soon as we got to the case, her friendliness was gone. She was quite tough and pushy.

My whole interview was really about one question. The officer said she had no questions about the petition criteria, but asked why I did not have a job offer. I was ready for this and answered that, according to the USCIS website, an EB-1A visa does not require a job offer. I also cited section 204.5 of the Code of Federal Regulations (8 CFR 204.5) and the immigration law, which say a job offer is required for EB-1B, "Outstanding Professor or Researcher", but not for my type of visa.

The officer said she needed to check this and stepped away for a couple of minutes. I took out a copy of my Form I-140 from the petition, and when she came back I showed her that the first page marks the visa type I am applying for: "Extraordinary ability" (EB-1A), not "Outstanding researcher".

The officer agreed, but still insisted on asking why I had not applied for other visa types for scientists and researchers. I explained that it is hard to find a job without a visa while in Russia, because many job applications ask right away whether you have a visa. This seemed to make the officer even angrier. Looking me in the eye, she said this was not true and that the U.S. has had programs for 10 years that bring scientists in to work.

I answered that I want to work and live in the U.S. and be useful, and that my visa type is meant exactly for that. The officer asked whether that meant immigration, not work and research, was my main goal. Then she went quiet and started typing something quickly.

At the end I added that I wanted to stress once more: I am one of the top experts in my field in Russia, I have many research papers and a published monograph, and my skills will be useful in the U.S.

The officer reached for a sheet of paper, paused for a moment and said that my visas were approved.

Takeaway: My impression: the officer's question was a kind of test of whether I understand what is what, and what the requirements for the visa and the petition are. If I had not stood my ground and had agreed with the officer because of her pressure, I think I would most likely have been refused. Good luck, everyone!

First they asked the usual standard questions: what do you do, who are you, how many children, where do you work (and where did you work before), in what role, how long have you been married, and so on.

Then they asked my husband (the dad) to step aside with the children and started questioning the mom, the main beneficiary of the EB-1 petition.

Note: at first I tried to answer in English, even though the officer had asked earlier which language to use and we said Russian was better. Only when I said in the middle of the conversation that I did not understand a question did they call an officer who speaks Russian.

Questions about the case:

• What does the company do? Import/export of goods, 25-27 people.
• What is your role? I consult, sign contracts, go to meetings.
• Since what year has the company existed? Since 2012; I have worked there since 2014.
• What do you plan to do in the U.S.? We will open a consulting company together with my husband.
• Whom will you hire, and how many people? We will hire 4-5 employees in the U.S.
• Which companies do you work with? What do they ship? I named several; equipment.
• Alcohol? Gas? No.
• Do you know anyone at the media outlets that interviewed you? No, I do not know those outlets. I was interviewed at conferences and trade shows, or the media called and asked if I could give an interview.
• Do you know that people who apply for this visa have international-level awards? Yes. I do not have international-level awards, but I am one of the best specialists in my country.

Officer: We searched Google for the company where you work (the one listed under the "role in the company" criterion) and found nothing.

Comment: I proved the company's importance with its contracts with large companies and the importance of its partners.

About salary: The business plan said employees would earn $4,500 a month. The officer said this was a very low salary for a person getting this kind of visa. I answered that this was the employees' pay; I would have income from the company and would also work myself. They said it was still very little.

More questions:

• What grades did you get at university (2003)? Normal ones.
• Which countries does the company work with? CIS countries, China, Vietnam; until February, also the U.S. and Europe.
• Why didn't you file a petition in 2012? Because I am at the peak of my career right now.

Last question: Is there anything else you would like to add?

Yes. I want to say that exports matter for any country, whether it is Russia, China, Vietnam or the U.S. Many countries want quality American goods. I can help manufacturers go international, and I know how to do it.

Result: "Thank you for your time. We cannot approve your visa. Questions will be asked and documents will be requested."

We asked how long it might take. The answer: the case will be reviewed not by the consulate but by a department in the U.S.

They gave us a sheet with 221(g) and said there would be administrative processing and we would need to answer a request they would send by email. They asked: will you take your passports? "We advise you to take them."

At the first window:

1. Are you married?
2. Do you have children?
3. Have you lived in countries other than Russia for more than 6 months?
4. Do you have a second citizenship?
5. What is your professional education?
6. Have you been to the U.S.?
7. Do you have a military ID?
8. Did you serve?
9. Do you have a job offer?
10. Who is your contact person, and why did you list their address?
11. Do you know English, and can you do the interview in English?

Officer:

1. Tell me about your work.
2. Tell me about your plans in the U.S.

Result: Visa approved.

Interview questions:

• How many years have you worked in the field of your talent?
• How is it that your first degree is in one field and your talent is in another?
• At the company your role is Customer Service. That title is not really related to the field of your talent. Can you explain?
• What did you do at the other company?
• Did you arrange your future job with anyone in the U.S.?
• Do you work with the company now? Don't they want to keep working with you after you move to the U.S.?
• What salary do you expect in the U.S.?
• How will you use your experience in the U.S.?
• You studied at a London university. Was it an additional master's degree or a PhD? Did you attend classes in person? What was the program?
• How much money do you have for the move to the U.S.? Cash in your accounts, specifically?

We waited a month for the interview invitation after DQ (documentarily qualified), even though local chats had scared us that EB-1 cases wait 8-9 months.

My husband was the main applicant; the officer asked me nothing at all. Though at the start he asked whether we all speak English, and my husband said he and our son do, and I not so much. All the questions were clear. He spoke clearly, even I understood. At first it felt tough and long. The officer had the case in electronic form. He scrolled through it and asked questions straight from the case:

• What was the award for?
• In which journals were your scientific articles published?
• Where did you work? Where did you work before that?
• Do you have a job offer in the U.S.?
• Where are you going to go?

They asked for the diploma with a translation and the resume. Good thing we brought the diploma with a translation: it was not on the lists. There were also a few personal questions about our older child (he is not coming with us). At first it felt long, but then we realized it all took about 15-20 minutes.

Result: The officer said the visas were approved and to wait 2-3 business days.

Advice: Good luck to everyone who has this ahead. Honestly, the waiting is very stressful. That month was unbearably long. Meditation and a positive attitude helped me a lot. Don't let yourself think that something will go wrong. Make yourself think positively. Visualize it, and I hope it all works out for you.