Now I have an American visa!

Prosper Assegbede thought the message was a hoax. His name had been picked out in the American GreenCard lottery. But three days later the confirmation Lay in his Letter box in Berlin: a letter of congratulations from the Kentucky Consular Center in the USA. Now he knows where he will go after finishing his studies in Germany – somewhere in America

”That’s my luck”, Prosper Assegbede said laconically shortly after receiving in the post a six-month visa for America, ”now I can now realise my dream.”

Just over a year ago the student from Benin faced an uncertain future; he knew that as soon as he completed his course in Environment Sciences at Berlin’s Technical University he must leave Germany. But where could he go, other than returning home?

Then at the end of May last year he recei ved an email from the Berlin-based compafly The American Dream. His name had been picked out in the US GreenCard lottery. The door to America was open to him.

”At first I could not believe the message,” Prosper recalled. ”I read just the heading – ‘News of a GreenCard Win’ – and I thought so meone must be playing a joke on me. But then I read on. The email said I should keep a watch out for my post in the next days. I would be receiving a letter from America saying my name had come up in the lottery. Then my worry was: ‘could this letter get lost in the post?”

Prosper was at this time in the German state of Brandenburg. Three days later hewas back in Berlin and there waiting for him was the letter from the Kentucky Consular Centre in America. Attached was a long form to fill out and return to continue to take part in the GreenCard lottery.

Prosper’s feeling of luck was dampened with a twinge of anxiety. The letter from America warned him that 100.000 had been in ormed that they were still in the running for a GreenCard – but only 55.000 visas would be issued for the year 2003. The letter was no guarantee he would eventually win a visa on the so-called ‘Diversity Immigrant Program’.

”I was in a state of hope and fear,” Prosper remembered. ”I called The American Dream and they reassured me. So long as I was a High School graduate everything should be all right; four thousand people had won in the lottery using their services and only 10 had finally not taken up the GreenCard. ‘Your chan ces of getting a card were 99 percent certain,’ they told me.”

The company then gave him an appointment for filling out the form to be sent back to America. ”Small mistakes were corrected – the spelling of Technical University and the translation of the title of my studies Environmental Sciences – and it was returned by registered post”.

Nothing was heard from the American officials until June this year when Prosper was given the all-important appointment with the US Consulate in Frankfurt/Main. It was here that a final decision would be made on whether he would be granted a GreenCard.

In the months before The American Dream had sent him by email a regular newsletter keeping him posted on roughly when he could expect officials to deal with his case number.

With an appointment date fixed in July, Prosper called The American Dream for a meeting to prepare for the interview with the immigration official. He also collected up the documents the consulate wanted, including certificates from the German and Beninpolice that he had no criminal record.

The actual interview with the immigration official in Frankfurt passed off in ten minutes. ”What’s your plan?” the official asked me,” Prosper recalled.

”I said I was still studying. But after this I would go and work in the US.”
”What are you studying? Have you some thing to show you are now a student?’ he asked ”I brought out my student card.” Then followed a three-hour medical examination.

”Three weeks later I called the consulate and was told a visa had already been sent out to me.” It was the end of July. The visa which arrived is for six months. Within this time Prosper must visit the US and apply for his GreenCard to be issued to him there. With this he can work and live in America for as long as he likes.

It was purely chance that set Prosper on the road to his GreenCard. ”I asked a friend from Benin: ‘How can you get a visa for America?” he recalled before making his application in September 2001. ”I thought it would be easier to integrate there than here in Germany. He said it was very difficult to get a visa but you can win it.”

Prosper’s friend took the initiative for them both. He surfed the Internet and found the name of the firm The American Dream which offered to advise on the bureaucracy and the filling out of the forms. It also offered their address for any post. A small mistake in filling out the forms would make an application invalid, Prosper was warned.

”I thought that if there was a company that would control everything it would be easier for me,” Prospers explained. Prosper’s friend collected up two forms, sent them off to The American Dream and even paid Proper’s subscription fee for the service they were offered. ”I was so busy with my studies at the time.”

Prosper is not certain where he will eventually settle in America. Has the goal which first brought him to Germany in 1994 now changed? ”No. It was always my dream in Benin where I studied geography that I would work internationally for developing countries. Now I have an American visa I can still work for developing countries – in the field of water management, for example – but from America.”

And his friend from Benin who suggested he try his luck on the lottery but was not one of the 134 from Benin who won a GreenCard last year? ”He’s going to play again!”

”Twenty thousand GreenCards for Africans”

Holger Zimmermann heads The American Dream, the firm thousands use in Germany and abroad when entering the US GreenCard Lottery. He answers the following questions about the unique immigration scheme:

 

TAC: Why is the US GreenCard Lottery so at tractive?
Zimmermann: It’s simply the best way for normal people to emigrate to the USA. That’s you don’t have excellent US connections or exceptional academic qualifications. It’s a pure lottery. And there are fifty-five thousand winners every year, besides the wives or husbands of the winners and their children.

TAC: Why do many people turn to your firm when they enter the lottery?
Zimmermann: Millions apply every year. But about a third of these are disqualified; they’ve made some kind of mistake. There are so many possibilities of doing something wrong. When they apply through us we worry about everything. We can’t guarantee that they’ll win, but we do ensure that everything is correct and that they are not disqualified by some kind of error.

TAC: How and when does one apply to enter the lottery?
Zimmermann: You can telephone or write to us and we’ll send you an applicati on form. You can also visit our Internet site (www.americandream.de) which is in five languages. There you can read the instructions and 1,111 out and print out a form to send to us. There are 20,000 GreenCards for Africans every year; that means for people born in Africa whatever their nationality today. They can apply through us here in Germany or wherever else they live; we have some clients in Africa. Eight hundred and fifty-two of our clients won in the last lottery. Forty-five of these were Africans. Some of them live in Africa.

TAC: What happens when someone wins?
Zimmermann: The news of a win comes th rough us because our address is used – wherever the applicant lives. We inform each of our winners. That’s our job. A winner receives a mass of instructions in English which we have had translated. We help the winners in the who le process after this. We help them fill out the forms, advise them on how to prepare for the consulate interview before they are issued with a visa. We hold seminars here or they can call us or communicate by fax. If one of our clients has won, it’s 99.9 percent certain that they will eventually get their GreenCard.

TAC: When is the next lottery?
Zimmermann: The final date for applying through us is October 15 We need to get the applications to America and posted off there to the right addresses before the end of October. There’s a date before which they must not arrive and a cut-off date.