bringing interpeter to interview

[jdwhite21]

Having an translator and our interview negatively impacted us...

My husband and I communicate in English and I speak some Spanish but he gets very nervous and his English skills go down greatly so we thought that it would be better for him to just be comfortable and speak spanish. Also with his accent a lot of people have trouble understanding him when they first meet him but I've never had any problem, it probably didn't help that our VO had a strong accent as well. But she deemed that we were not able to communicate, it is to bad that she didn't do what babynsyx's officer did and asked us to hold a conversation to see that we have in fact no problem communicating.


Good luck at your interview though... try not to worry too much, I'm sure you guys will have no problem.

 

[Bangkokcanuck]

The more I read about stuff like this the more flawed it appears the system is.

If a couple has ample proof they have lived together, I mean real proof, bills mailed to home in both names, people in their area attesting to seeing them coming and going etc..etc.. and it's been a reasonable amount of time, say a couple of years how does the VO think these people are able to cope if they can not manage to communicate??

My wife's English is fine she works a lot with Non Thai's and my Thai is enough to get by, but when we speak at home we speak what we like to call Thinglish as it's quite a mix of both languages as we want our son's to keep up their Thai to have a second language... no VO would ever understand us if we spoke to them in our language... I guess they must base their opinion on the ease in which the couple seems to communicate...

What a process.... thank goodness Canada is worth it... ;D

 

[babynsx]

Having an translator and our interview negatively impacted us...

My husband and I communicate in English and I speak some Spanish but he gets very nervous and his English skills go down greatly so we thought that it would be better for him to just be comfortable and speak spanish. Also with his accent a lot of people have trouble understanding him when they first meet him but I've never had any problem, it probably didn't help that our VO had a strong accent as well. But she deemed that we were not able to communicate, it is to bad that she didn't do what babynsyx's officer did and asked us to hold a conversation to see that we have in fact no problem communicating.


Good luck at your interview though... try not to worry too much, I'm sure you guys will have no problem.

Jdwhite21,

That is truly awful that you were not given a fair chance to demonstrate you and your husband's ability to actually communicate despite the fact that you both have difficulties in each other's mother tongue.

My wife and I are very much like you two and communicate in our own cryptic language that is mostly Mandarin but heavily modified.

It is sad that there is no one clear standard that all offices stick to when conducting interviews. Considering the consequences of the VO's decisions it behoves them to be sure all concerns are justified. With you both present a simple communication test would seem just obvious in this case.

It may very well be that the translator did not help you “enough” through the interview but if your husband's English is truly not great then not having one would have, in my opinion, been even worse... but one never knows...

Very sorry to hear about your troubles and wish you both the best of luck with your next application.


Edit: jdwhite21, Just read through your story and have to say that I'm very very sorry to hear about what you and your husband have gone through. Seems like you had major issues with your VO that extended beyond the interpreter question but just the same... I can't believe they could have been so careless and clearly biased.

Best Regards,
Doug

 

[jdwhite21]

My husband and I definitely have our own version of the english language but hey it works for us and he was enrolled in a english course here but he got sent home before it started. But people that know him as well as I do, like my parents and friends have no problem understanding him, its more so the people that just meet him.

I think it would be fantastic if there was some set standard for interviews. Reading everyone's experiences on here it almost looks like no 2 interviews are alike. It's quite sad that there is so much responsibility put into VO's hands and they decide the fate of people's families. I'm sure had our VO asked us to do a communication test or even seen us talk for a few minutes it would have become clear to her that we have no issues whatsoever.

Well and I'm not sure if interpreters help just for the simple fact that things get lost in translation. Like the interpreter keep saying his wife even though Jose was calling me Jessie and than the VO said he doesn't even use my name and I told her he was saying it but she wasn't paying him attention, just listening to the interpreter. So that didn't help in any way. But hindsight is perfect, at least we know for this time around. And despite a few flaws in our application our lawyer still feels we shouldn't have been denied, all of this trouble because of a biased VO that doesn't have an open mind.

thank you for your good luck wishes, I'm sure we have nothing to worry about this time.

Jess.