Think Green

Approximately 1.5 years after our first arrival in the US, we are in the last and final stage of our Green Card application. The last step before approval is the fingerprinting, which we were called for in March. We had heard horror stories of huge lines at the INS offices, long waits and endless frustration, so we showed up 20 minutes early for our appointment. We would not do anything that could jeopardize our progress now.

The place was deserted. There was one kid sitting in the vast sea of empty chairs, and us. The workers were just sitting around picking their noses, so they took us early. Upstairs, they introduced us to these funky scanning machines that take an optical scan of each finger. The software in the scanner tells the operator if the scan is successful or not. No more messy ink.

Scott is an automotive technician. He wears gloves these days, but his hands are beaten up quite regularly. I am a software engineer. I type all day, every day.

Well, darned if Scott was out of there in 5 minutes flat, while my technician took forever scanning and rescanning my fingers. The machine failed my scans over and over again – not clear enough ! Put more lotion on ! Roll it again ! I swear he did my middle finger on my right hand 15 times before he got it right.

Occupational hazard, I guess. Those keyboards are a killer. I wonder if I can get worker's compensation for it ?

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