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I received a letter from the USCIS the other day. My citizenship ceremony is scheduled for April 30th!

So, on May 2010 I will be considered an official citizen of the United States of America; I’ll be applying for a US passport the very first week of May, so that I can fly to my honeymoon as such. Exciting times!

I had an appointment with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today. On the letter they sent me about it, they told me to be prepared to be there for approximately 2 hours, and they included a study guide for me to prepare. It didn’t say exactly what I was going there for, but the hints were pretty heavy, and it sure sounded like I was about to have my citizenship test.

The occasion was set for 10:30am, so I showed up a good 15 minutes early because that’s how I roll.

At 11:10, I was finally called in for my interview. The lady that helped me was very friendly, and had me come into her office. That was nice, because I’d been trying to get mentally ready for an interview room with a chair and a lamp. However, there was a bit of an “official” moment when she had me hold my right hand up and swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth.

After verifying paperwork, the questions came. If I recall correctly, they were:

1. Who wrote the U.S. Constitution?
2. Name a state that borders Mexico.
3. Who is the commander in chief of the U.S. Armed Forces?
4. What is the political party of the President?
5. Name the two main political parties of the United States.
6. Name three of the 13 original colonies.

My answers were:

1. Jefferson.
2. Texas.
3. The President, Barack Obama.
4. Democratic Party.
5. Democratic Party and Republican Party.
6. Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina.

Of course, they were the right ones. In the last weeks, Kelly helped me study, and thanks to her teaching skillz, I had no trouble remembering all this valuable information.

After the interview, I was told about the next stages. I have to wait to receive a letter about my naturalization, but I’m pretty much already on the path and they just have to finish processing the last part. After that, I’ll surrender all my Argentine documents (like my passport) and then I’ll quickly rush to get myself a US Passport.
This is all to happen before July, so that I can travel abroad using my shiny new passport. And when I come back into the US, I can take the short line into the country that I will soon be calling my official home. Yay!

2010 is going to be a good year.

My resolution for this year is to become a US Citizen.

I looked into dual-citizenship, but apparently that kind of thing doesn’t fly anymore, so I’ll have to swear to forget all about how much Argentine government sucks, and promise to treat the flag of the United States of America as my own.

After thinking about it, it doesn’t seem like something impossible or impractical for me to do. In fact, it makes sense.
I’ve lived in the US for a while now, and I have a bigger sense of citizenship towards the USA than Argentina. I’ve never even voted in Argentina, and I probably never will because I’m not familiar nor personally involved in the politics that are going on there. However, I would like to be able to vote in the country that I live in, and that I will continue to live in.

The process is pretty simple:

1. Fill out a long form with lots of uncomfortable questions (Do you have the Taliban in your backyard?).
2. Taking a naturalization test (samples here).
3. Paying a lot of money ( $600 ).
4. Waiting.
5. Take the oath.

I’m freshening up on some civics knowledge, but lucky me, my fiancee is a US History teacher, so I have a good resource to study.
Forms are filled up, and the process will be officially started when I stuff them in an envelope and send them away, probably by the end of this week.

Oh yeah, I also have “secondary” resolutions, which are much more along the lines of the typical promise: Do a Century ride on my bike (like the Chico Century Ride), have a six pack by summer our honeymoon, maintain a positive attitude and continue to be a key member of the day to day operations at work.