# Rant - Tired Of Begging



## Nelly87 (Jul 3, 2011)

I need to vent somewhere hoping that maybe someone might read it and understand. 

My partner and I met in 2010 - he is an Australian (born) citizen, I am a Dutch (born) citizen. We're not perfect people - not by far. Neither of us were extremely successful in our own countries - he had been unemployed and when we met finally found production work in a factory that was very well paid, I was student who had failed too many classes and was rounding off a 3-year bachelor's degree after 6 years with a part-time minimum wage-job.

To be together, he gave up the job he had finally found to come over to The Netherlands and stay with me while I finally finished off my education, so that we could after that start over together in Australia. If we had done it the other way around, I would have wasted 5 years of university and loans to get nowhere, so he sacrificed his chance for mine - without even as much as almost a second thought. I can't imagine someone doing that for anything other than love. The best job opportunity he's ever had. 

He came to The Netherlands to live with me in my student housing room (one room), while I was studying and working, on my minimum wage part-time, barely being able to eat properly. He got rejected by Dutch job after Dutch job because he did not speak Dutch and the economic crisis was pulling in at full force. For 11 months he sat in that one-room student apartment and waited for me to finish my affairs so we could leave. He took job rejection after job rejection, in a country he did not speak the language of, half a world away from his family. But we made it to the end of that year.

Early 2012 I said goodbye to my family, my friends (two of whom have since gotten married and/or pregnant, which I will not be there for to see), my cat (who was like a child to me, sad as it sounds) - in a way even my degree, which won't be acknowledged in Australia until I pay a load of money to get it officially acknowledged. I gave up everything happily - for love. I had never cared much about Australia - I did not dislike nor like it. I was indifferent. But for the love of my life I'd move anywhere. We'd move to the middle of a deserted desert wasteland somewhere if it was the only way to be together. This is my first serious relationship because I take my commitments very seriously. This is the real deal, and we both are willing to give up anything else for it.

We planned to move in with his parents since we were both starting over and this way we could save up money to get a visa and then get our own place. Once in Australia, it started hitting the news that companies were going bankrupt and shutting down in our area - of course the labourers and factory workers go first. James has not found a job since he started his search in February, also partially due to two injuries (bad luck) he's had over the past year. A month ago, I finally found a job. Casual contract, a nice job, a night job.

We want to register our relationship and we got rejected, because we had both not been in Victoria continuously for the past 12 months. Immigration advisers have told us we will have a hard time having Immigration acknowledge our de facto relationship if we do not have proof of shared rent or utilities - I was in student housing, he was not a student and not allowed to live there on paper, so he was not on the bills. Here, we do not have rent or bills as we live with his parents. We have nothing. We are being punished for not being successful, for sacrificing to be together.

Someone once gave me the advice; just get married. We refuse, because getting married for a visa is as good as lying in our opinion. It would be very obvious we are not big on the ceremonials and traditions, we wouldn't be able to sell it without full on lying and we won't lie to Immigration. 

And so we are stuck. We're not successful enough financially to have joint bills, we do not have the spine to get married to help ourselves, we can't even register our relationship - we can have a child or get married any day we like, but apparently being in a registered relationship is too good for us.

I am so tired of begging.


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## Nelly87 (Jul 3, 2011)

I guess sometimes I just wish I could say - I'll refuse any payments or support from the government, I'll get my medical stuff done in my homecountry, I'll pay extra taxes on everything, just let me stay with the man I love. I really don't give a crap about 'standard of life', I had a good one at home, I just want to be allowed to be with the man I've spent every day with for the past year and 7 months.

Anyway sorry about the rant, I was just frustrated and had nobody else who had even the slightest chance of understanding.


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## lukeleon9 (Jan 15, 2012)

This is not nice to hear me and my wife have been together nearly 3 years and applied for a visa over 2 years ago and still not got a decision. We were told when we applied that the visa would be rejected but we could apply for the mrt which took 2 years since then we have had a child together and got more than enough evidence to support are case of living together. 
It would be probably best to speak to a professional like we should have done from the start 
Good luck and i hope it works out for you.


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## Boboa (Mar 24, 2009)

Hey Nelly,

It is alright to rant from time to time. Life is not easy, at times it is difficult and at times it just makes you feel showing the middle finger to the world and giving up. But remember what French say? C’est la vie. You had a lot of hardships on your way and it does look like lady luck just keeps putting sticks in your bicycle wheel… but instead look at the positive side. You managed to get your first job, hooray! This is your break to Australian experience. Your partner should find one eventually, if he tries hard. Might be worth studying at TAFE part time meanwhile to kill the boredom and gain some qualifications.

While above is happening you realize that you are the bread earner at this moment, it is in the interest of Australian government to keep you here. Write to your MP and let your partner do the same See if they can endorse you. Write to Chris Bowen as well, seek his approval. Appeal to their human side, talk about your partner injury and such. They are human and believe me at times their hearts do beat.

While you are waiting for their response (which will take forever), pull out all evidence that you have. Who cares you don’t have lease/utilities bills. Was he registered in gemeente? Get a copy of that or request your family to do that. As long as it shows the same address as yours. Did your student accommodation manager know that you leaved together? Get them to write a letter. Get declarations from your family and friends. Mobile bills, bank statements, insurance statements to same address all that is sufficient proof. Plus you need to prove only balance of time that you didn't leave in Australia, so that can be your last 6 months in Holland. That is sufficient. You being an income earner is one massif plus in your favor, DIAC values that and they should accept your alternative documents. Centrelink statements to your address and your payslips with same address are the same. Joint bill doesn't have to be the same bill with two names. It can be multiple bills with same address.

Don’t give up, hold your head high and remember, liefde schiet pijlen over honderd mijlen


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## Dexter (May 5, 2010)

Nelly. A word of advice from someone who had to get married to get his wife to Australia.

My wife is Chinese and we did not live together prior to getting a visa, we did not have any bills or properties together. We got married because there was no other choice but we had some supporting documents

- bills for hotels where we stayed together
- money transfers from me in Australia to her in China
- statements from families and friends confirming that they recognize our relationship and are aware of it
- pictures together and with family
- email correspondence

That worked for marriage visa since we got our marriage certificate in China. We got married after only 6 months of knowing each other and Immi did not have a problem with it. 

If you want to go via de facto you need to have that documented 12 month relationship. The easiest thing is to open joint bank account in Australia. Did the student house give you any receipts? If so - can they put names of both of you on it? Or write a statement that the two of you lived there and paid that and that much? Or both? This is a good thing to start with. 

Let me know how you go.


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## Nelly87 (Jul 3, 2011)

Well we do have flights since December 2010 (the first one he paid for my ticket) and we've had a joint Dutch bank account since August 2011. We have some paper trails but nothing feels solid. 

I guess the problem is that we aren't big marriage people and then doing it now - after registration just failed and just before the visa, we'd feel like it was so obvious... we should have married a year ago. We should have put the phone on both our names. We should have used our joint account more, we should have saved every receipt and should have had all kinds of people and institutions mail stuff for both of us or each of us to the same address. I would have felt so much more confident in the application. It's pathetic that we should have been force-creating trails in order to be allowed to stay together.

Today is actually our two year anniversary. We may not have the money to go out to dinner and book a room in both our names to look legit but we'll be together... it's sad that that's not real to immigration.

Do they do interviews anymore? In the movies I used to watch as a kid/teen, couples would get followed around by immigration officers and their families would get interrogated. See, we'd nail that.


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## Dexter (May 5, 2010)

I had a phone interview and so did my wife. I actually stood up and complained to them about giving me wrong information. They were quite ok and there was no problem to get the visa.


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## Nelly87 (Jul 3, 2011)

@Michael: what do you mean?

@Dexter: that is good to hear. We did just get printed confirmation from Flight Centre confirming my partner booked and paid for my flight to Australia in December 2010, which hopefully is good proof. I'm also hoping we'll get a chance to just give a personal impression as well. Thank you for your grounded advice, it really helped.


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## Dexter (May 5, 2010)

Nelly, read this

What is a de facto relationship?

Most important parts:

1. Since June 1999, the definition has been widened to cover ALL relationships between two adults (over the age of 18) who: live together as a couple; and
2. The law lists a number of issues that must be considered in assessing whether a de facto relationship exists. These include:

- how long the relationship has lasted;
- whether you both live in the same house;
- how the household duties are done;
- how far your finances are intertwined;
- whether you own assets together;
- the care and control of any children of the relationship;
- whether outsiders see you as "de facto";
- whether you intend the relationship to be permanent etc.

It goes in line with what I showed to Immi in order to prove my marriage to be genuine and continuing. For this visa purpose you will need to prove that you have been in de facto for at least 12 months.


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## Nelly87 (Jul 3, 2011)

That is really handy, thank you so much for that!

I think we'll be okay along those standards, we have been living together and share household duties, outsiders see us as de facto partners, we're making very long run plans, we own a car together (since Feb 2012) which is a start if nothing else, and my pay comes into a shared bank account so we completely share all our money basically. 

Thank you so much again, it's nice to finally have a list to go by as to what we should be able to show rather than the rather general description in the visa application itself.


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