explorer
United States
I applied to US visa through their Consulate in Erbil!
​
first time was back in 2016, when one of my good friends told me about an opportunity to visit the united states through a conference! but it will cost a fortune hahha so i kept thinking for a while then said yes!
they prepared all documents for me, and i took everything to the US consulate,
the visa consul asked me couple questions and i answered him happily so randomly!
after minutes from the visa interview, he handed me a paper and said your visa got denied!
i left in shock! because i already visited 43 countries so whats their reason to deny someone already visited that huge amount of countries!
​
​
years come and go, in 2018 i said let me try again, because my travel history got richer! by now i visited 64 countries!
​
donald trump decided to ban some muslim countries from traveling to United States, later on he removed iraq from the list because they fought together against isis.
​
some friends advised me to not apply now, but i said there are no reasons to deny. and i wanted to travel to united states along with some central american countries, because i already experienced Asia, Africa and Europe. so its time to experience America!
​
but after applying for tourism visa at the US consulate in erbil, i got denial! i was in shock!
i wrote a post on my facebook page to the US consul in erbil, and also to my people! here below you can read it:
​
Hello from sunny Srilanka with Love, my country number 65!
A while ago I applied for the USA visa, during the interview with the consular officer, after looking into my passport then he asked me 4-5 random open questions, without even asking for my documents. There was 3 different colored papers on the wall close to his head, he looked into them 3 times and then picked up one of them(cuz he was confused which reason to choose)
Then he handed me the yellow paper, he said sorry we cant give you a visa!
I asked for his reason, he said it is confidential, cant be shared, u have to change your circumstances!
Me: circumstances!! Only number of countries which i will travel to will increase!
Him:
Me: can i say something?
Him: yeah sure
Me: you are jealous of me, cuz i have been to 64 countries with my iraqi passport which is more than the number of countries u have been to with your American passport!
Him: true yes true!
Dear friends, Listen up, never lose money by applying for USA visa! On daily basis they are giving random refusal to almost everyone! For them, its just a daily routine job! Getting around $200 from each applier, and they even do not think about that each application represents a human being! And that random reasonless refusal affect our psychological being and makes us depressed!
My beloved Friends, instead of the USA there are a lot of countries®ions you can visit. more beautiful, exotic and also cheaper!
Srilanka is one of those places! Its an Easy online visa for iraqi passport holders and almost all other nationalities, all u need to do is to fill out their simple online application form and then pay $35 visa fee then you will get your eVisa within minutes!
Btw, according to Lonely Planet, Srilanka is considered to be the top travel destinations for 2019!
When one door closes, there are hundreds of other doors & windows you can use! Or maybe you can kick off the door
More doors will be smashed soon, keep enjoying my adventures with my iraqi passport!
​
​
​
Later when my bro Drew Binsky recorded some videos here in kurdistan, i talked about my experience, you can find here:
video one, skip to 04:55
video two, skip to 04:00
​
​
this is not the end of the story! i will try again but later hahha see you later United States!
​
​
website of the official USA tourist Visa for iraqi citizens:
iq.usembassy.gov/visas/tourism-visitor/
​
​
Consulate of USA in Erbil:
tel: 0662114000
website: iq.usembassy.gov/embassy-consulates/erbil/
address: 413 Ishtar, Ainkawa quarter
​
Embassy of USA in Baghdad;
address: Al Kindi St. – International zone
telephone: 07600303000 – 07600302539 – 07600303433
email: baghdadniv@state.gov / baghdadirc@state.gov
website: iq.usembassy.gov/visas/
​