 How does student life in USA really feel like and how do you prepare for the entire process right from applying for the university, getting your right mentee, getting your visa and finally landing in the US. Today's video is a really fun chat with Ravi Raj who is going to be explaining everything that he did and he is particularly talking about funding and how he prepared his funding since his parents were not his main sponsors. So let's get started and keep on watching. Hi guys my name is Shachi and I am a travel and visa coach. On this channel you will find lots of useful videos on the US visa process especially the F1 process. I have a whole new playlist for spring 22 so make sure that you subscribe to the channel and check out all these videos. So today's video is going to be a fun chat with Ravi Raj and he is spilling the beams on everything that he did to finally land in the US. Now before we get into his experience here is a quick snapshot of Ravi Raj's profile. So he has done engineering and computer science, work experience, he has worked as a data analyst for two years with Cerner which is a healthcare company, his admitt is from University of Texas Dallas and his funding was through a loan and his uncle being his sponsor. So if you too want to prepare for your F1 visa interview with me just like Ravi Raj did then feel free to get in touch you can either book a one to one consultation session or you can take a mock interview. The link for both of these is in the description box below. And now let's jump into the conversation with Ravi Raj. Hello, how are you? Good to see you again. Yeah. So I wanted to talk to you to basically understand the entire preparation process, I have a few questions and also now that you're already there to also ask you a few questions about how your experience there has been so far. So my name is Ravi and I'm from Bangalore and I did all of my education in Bangalore and I graduated from Southern Business University of Tech in computer science and I graduated with an 8.3 GPA. Then I have two years of work experience in Cerner which is a healthcare emergency and I worked there for two years as a data analyst. So that's where I come from. The course that I joined is MSCS in UT Dallas. So starting with the interview prep, the visa interview prep. So what was your thought process going into it? How many days or months before did you actually start planning for it? And so the planning for it went on for almost like 45 days before the interview where it began with the rush of you know them opening up the slots and you know all of us applying on the same day. Yeah. After that I think slowly everything started falling into place but once I got into that a couple of weeks in and I'm like you know very skeptical about stuff and I'm pretty sure you know what was going on in my mind because I think we met like three weeks before my interview and then one week before my interview. So it's like there's uncertainty, there's a ton of questions about what to carry, what not to carry, what to say, what not to say and you know you start reading reviews of other people and how their interviews went and then people are like you know I got a reject, I got an admit and you don't know why they got a reject right? So I think that that paranoia kind of takes over you like the closer you are to the date the higher the paranoia irrespective of the number of documents you have ready because you never know who's the kind of person who's going to couldn't be right. So yeah getting the finances together, getting the financial documentation and then getting the copies of my, at a point of time even getting Xerox copies of my own documents felt like a chore. So that's that's probably the nerves that we're talking but yeah. So we did I think mock sessions right before the interview so how did that help with the entire journey of you know just feeling confident. I'll be honest with you like yeah technically you kind of calm down the nerves that were like you know on the verge of breaking so yeah I mean yeah your our discussions were more or less along the lines of the finances most of it because that's my weak spot and I didn't really know how to take care of it but I mean the answers which we prepared on I think you know that sort of gave me a little bit of a confidence. So I think it's it's a lot more about how you handled it than what you did and I think that kind of helped me kind of know that actually did help me a lot right so it's I think it's all about those calming nerves like somebody needs to be there who knows what's going to happen and tell you like listen calm down right and I think that's exactly what you did and that's that's kind of I'll lock you my visa to you. So anyway coming to funding that was my next question for you right so for you the funding was not by a parent okay and this is something which freaks out a lot of people you know when the parent is not the main sponsor they are really scared that I'm not going to get my visa which is not the case which we see repeatedly and also for you so from a funding perspective what would you like to tell people who are in a similar boat you know parent is not funding but you have the legit you know the documents everything prepared so how to handle this just to set the context for you funding was your uncle right immediate uncle right yes yes an immediate uncle right and it could be your so from what I understand is as long as you're able to show somebody who's paying their taxes regularly and who you know has a steady enough source of income I think you should not have a problem once I had all the documentation ready I I didn't really have to worry more about it because at the end of the day family is still family right so that's the thing they did ask me so did she ask you why not parent she didn't ask me why not parent but she did ask me what my uncle did and how much you need right so I think that is something that you need to be very clear on you can't go out there and say I think he makes so much that's not valid and if you are asking somebody to be your sponsor you you need to have their details clear right and you can't have fudge numbers and be like you know I think he makes around so much a year like he also has so many other sources of income they don't really care about right you just give them a number and can you substantiate that number with some hardcore proof so as long as it is some family member it should be that that person is an immediate relative and should be able to sign an affidavit saying and have the resources yeah I have the resources for it yeah exactly yeah these are my resources that I've attached and this is my guarantee that I will fund them and fund correct yes so that's like very clearly put this is what I try to explain to so many students that the way to there is a way to do the correct thing right yeah yeah yeah so now the next two months a lot more people are up here for the interview you know for the winter intake so what the preparation advice would you give them with respect to the visa interviews I think one thing is to be very clear on why you're doing your course right especially when you're a spring admin they will ask you why you didn't go in fall or why you didn't apply for a fall either right or why you deferred if they have that but if you directly applied to spring then you will face a question key why spring why not fall right and that is something you need to have a clear answer on at least in my view any quotes from your for this so you've got to be like a lot of people the reason why they take up spring admin is because they did not get the fall at it right I'll be honest but that's not necessarily the case and that's not something they will like to hear as well because to them you're somebody who couldn't make it in one go so you're trying the second time right so I mean the most tactful way to apply to it is because I wanted to make sure I had everything ready and get confidence in my ability to pull through with this course and once that was done is when I chose to apply and hence the spring admin so you need to make it seem more like your decision actively that shouldn't be like circumstantial or you know or just key somehow I'm trying to get in yeah yeah it shouldn't it should seem like spring is your obvious choice or else it could even the complete thing like you know I had a healthcare procedure to be done or like you know I had some work at home which I needed to complete before I even applied or before I was sure of applying don't tell them keep funding or engineering over because again then they'll start grilling you on the funding just make it seem more of an academic and long-term plan perspective thing about how you thought your life through and that's why you're going now first that's primarily what you would have to do great that helps all right so now that we've got the visa interview but I'm so about your experience of one and a half months there right so I have a little expectation versus reality scenario for you so I'm going to tell you what it is and you tell me what you expected and what the reality is right so first starting with the course the course whatever your expectation is it'll be better than that okay respect before that is because uh in India it's specific we are used to a certain set of a curriculum or a certain style of teaching right which is not going to be the case here they will not teach you like that they won't schedule you like that and for all I know and care half the time the professor won't even tell you what to do he'll just assume you know some basics and he will pick up from that right so it will need a lot of additional effort from you outside which is why masters here is no joke right like you come and a lot of people have this complaint my friend went to the US and then lost contact with me and I can personally vouch it's not because your friend doesn't want to talk to you they cannot yes no time they have to do exactly right so and the course work will exceed your expectations like you know okay you will expect to learn some stuff and you will learn and you will learn more than just that okay that's great yeah okay second one is expenses uh the first one month be prepared to spend twice whatever you're okay like if you thought in a month you would spend you mean like on everything even on rank utilities or do you mean like the most setting up courses yeah the setting up costs are highly respected whether you take a furnished house or a unfinished house the set up cost will take you a while because you might be able to get like you know every college kind of has this thing where they give away free furniture and stuff like that or the people moving out kind of give away their stuff oh is it okay yeah but without realizing you have a lot of expenses that come your way right and you he probably you might have experience living alone in a hostel or something like that or in a PG or somewhere where you cook alone but coming to a new country you take a while to get used to the options available to you and to be able to make use of them right so and also I think to make sense of spending in donor right yeah getting used to that yeah you need to actively pursue to not do the translation from rupee to dollar or dollar to rupee and vice versa yeah because you're sending money back home or getting money from home right like except in that instance I think you should not be doing the translation because then like for example let's just talk about milk right at our place we looked at what milk for 25 bucks for half liter or 50 rupees a liter right yeah whereas here you're looking at almost 75 to 80 rupees a liter right and that's still okay but then you look at stuff like onions right where you're going at 75 bucks a kg yeah you know you're going at 75 bucks a pound not even a kg right so when you do the translation you're looking at like almost 200 it's like your mother back home would get a heart attack right yeah if you told your mom she would genuinely judge you right so that's the thing yeah it's it's tough like that so you you cannot afford to do the translations but overall the expenses are going to be more than what you're expecting it to be so in the first month only in the first month first month after and in the first month you're in a new country so you want to experience stuff so you're on that you were tourist wide so a lot goes into your cabs and it goes into like you know shopping for stuff souvenirs this that college hoodies are you already buying souvenirs no no I mean you visited there that's your first like that okay okay yeah this is the first restaurant I went to so the other tip the first month will be a little hard on your pocket but from the second month once you've gauged how expensive things are and once you've planned out like how much you need for cooking for a week or you know you would have figured that out in the first month and then once you start optimizing whatever math you did you're looking at a plus minus 50 dollars which is I think accepted okay that's good okay and the third thing I have to ask you is the campus and the accommodation right I mean there are two different things so first let's talk about the campus why the environment what sort of life did you imagine you would have and what is it in reality the vibe that you get from shows Netflix is it like that how universities look it is exactly like that oh that's great yeah that chill life belongs only to the undergrad okay not to the master so you will see all these events happen like you will genuinely see all these events happen but you won't be a part of it because you're running to study you are shifting classes or you're going to your they are there but not there it's yeah so you get to participate in a lot of stuff too I won't deny that so the campus is great like you will see a lot more than what you've bargained for and the labs are huge and then the classrooms are huge and not many institutions what do I say most of such populations as utd because utd takes in a lot of people but I mean depending on the college's size and the bat size I think you will be actively involved in a lot of stuff and I haven't heard of any university being very miniature and small huge ones and involve a lot of walking so be prepared for that but yeah okay okay great so accommodation is something which worries a lot of people I'm not sure why because on the face of it it would seem like it would be pretty straightforward right so where are you staying are you staying on campus or what's your accommodation I'm staying off campus off campus okay so yeah so how does one it terrifies us yeah specific the reasons unless you are coming with friends you don't know the kind of people you will be living with right and that's a big surprise right now I think pretty much a lot of people have already undergo this when they begin their undergraduate studies into hostels but the difference is here you don't have hostel so there is nobody cooking for you right nobody is cleaning up after you you are the one who's doing the cooking and the cleaning right so that kind of terrifies people and then another thing that comes into the picture is the necessity that you need to you know optimize your travel time right now there are many of us have classes that like like one of my roommates has a class from 7.30 in the evening to 10 in the night right because that's when the professor's there so it depends and accordingly so if it's 10 in the night you need to figure out a way of coming back to your house and then you need to look at the safety issues because you I mean it's not that there is a ton of crime here but you are never immune to crime either right you never know what can happen so you need to pick a safe neighborhood which does not have a history of violence you know you need to look up the crime rates in the city and look for places which are affordable as well as not so bad for living right so that you need to figure out so I think your biggest and the most important concern for you is safety of the place second thing is proximity to resources right now you can't afford to travel to a Walmart that's 40 miles or 30 miles away you need a Walmart in 3 to 2 miles so that if needed you can walk the distance right you shouldn't have to depend on additionally like transportation routes right so you need to check your connectivity to the campus that's another thing what are the bus routes available which bus or which tube should you pick to get to that place right so I think second thing should be utilities that you prioritize how far away this from campus and how far away from other resources and then finally comes the third part being affordability as well because you can't afford to spend like 800 bucks only on the rent right depending on the city slash state that you're in now 800 for rent for two people for one person 600 for rent in California seems reasonable but 600 for rent in like a Texas you're being loaded or you're being unreasonably luxurious right so you've got to do your math in that case about accommodation any specific resource or a website where uh you know such accommodation or is it just random Facebook groups and you have to figure out why at least that's what I did so I assume that's how everybody gets them like Facebook groups and you had your accommodation like booked before you reached or did you record there you had it don't do the mistake of trying to come here and figuring things out because hotels are retard expensive if you land a $50 a day on an average and if you are in a hotel you can't do cooking and shit also so your food also needs to be from outside so expenses just snowball very quickly yeah so unless it's absolutely unavoidable get yourself an apartment before you come here but also depending on how sure how sure you are of the apartment because sometimes people just give you pictures they don't really show you real-time stuff right when they give you pictures the pictures could be old you could be scan through right so you need to also validate the legitimacy of your resources don't just take up some sketchy deal that you found like on crazy right so you've got to be smarter than that and you've got to figure out what is good what appears to be good and you know what are the amenities that these guys actually provide and whether they are completely legit or not but yeah it would be a lot more sensible to book before coming here because if you want to come here and book by then a lot of the good apartments would already be taken you'll be left with the bad ones or the relatively not so good ones right and that I mean you've got to live there and you don't really have your parents to take care of you right yeah so you've got to get back to the place and set it up by yourself still and it can be a little straining both physically and emotionally so it's good to you know have a plan and then come here okay great any last-minute checklist for spring 2022 especially coming to utility if you're coming to utility please make sure at least to carry two sweaters sort of things because you get really cold and at that time the problem is here it rains at that time to fetch you need your waterproof stuff carry carry an umbrella mandate really whether you come here and immediately buy your from India but an umbrella mandate a couple of sweaters are mandatory get yourself a good pair of boots and I think the rest of it will be sorted you can at least with respect to you to do like there's Indian stores here so even if you forgot like a pressure cooker you could buy one yeah it's okay but yeah it'll be a little more expensive so anything steel related please get it from India because like Kapde at least you can get them in a sale and you won't feel really bad about spending I think especially the heavy duty winterwear will be much more affordable there right yeah yeah but as you tend sales and all these things will be cheaper back home so because the people here use a lot more of oven related stuff than not the way we cook yeah and please get everything that's induction compatible that's mandatory because here no gas stove is used at least I haven't seen anybody it's either coil based or induction based right so get all get everything that's non-stick get ladles like silicone ladle all right thank you so much this is a really fun chat and one of the best I hope you do really well bye bye bye bye bye bye bye bye so I hope this fun chat with Avidaj has helped you and cleared out a lot of things in case you want to speak to him feel free to get in touch with him he would be happy to help his LinkedIn profile is mentioned in the description box below and in case you want to work with me for your F1 visa interview feel free to do that we can either book a one-to-one consultation session this is an in-depth session where we will structure the answers and prepare you for all possible interview questions we'll also get the funding plan in place check the documents and everything else that is there so the link for booking the consultation session is in the description box and one more thing that's really really useful is a mock interview so remember that F1 visa is an actual visa interview right so how you perform an interview your body language your confidence the structuring of your answers also play a very important role and this is where a mock interview helps because it gets you the feel of an actual visa interview so this mock interview will be done by me on a one-to-one video call and it's very very similar to the actual visa interview tons of students have found it useful so if you do want to take a mock interview with me just like Ravi Raj did again the link for that is in the description box thank you so much for watching I really hope that you stay tuned for all the videos that are coming up also the next F1 workshop is now live so if you want to be part of the next F1 workshop the link for registering for the workshop is also in the description box before I end I also want to tell you about the F1 prep course so this is a video course which many people have used to prepare for the F1 visa interview and it's a very compact concise way consisting of 11 different video modules sample answers and templates and you can prepare for the interview at your own time and pace so if you want to check out this course do check the link in the description box all right so this is everything that I had to share with you in today's video stay tuned for a lot more useful videos coming up in the spring 22 series and signing off for now I'll see you in the next one bye