IGSA @ UIC

Tips for Maiden Voyage

If you are travelling to US for the first time, knowing the following information will help you.

Please be a bit prepared for this. You are going to travel for a straight 20 to 24 hours. So don't eat a lot of food before you board the flight. This might sound silly but believe me it helps. You will be served a lot of food on board so you can eat there.
Drink Loads of water and after boarding the flight, set your watch to US time and sleep accordingly. It will help get the jet-lag out of the system soon.
When at airport, try and get the seat of your preference. It's a long journey and you wont be spending all the time looking out of the window. Your comfort is more important and most of the flights barely give any leg room.
If you need vegetarian meals mention that you need AVM(Asian Vegetarian Meal) when you book the tickets. Dont get onto the flight and demand a vegetarian meal.
More practical reasons we would recommend you to take a flight across atlantic rather than pacific, for its a little comfortable, less turbulence and you can usually do it with two flights.
A question that people ask: can I have a port of entry other than chicago ? Well technically there should not be a problem. I know people who have done this and didn't have an issue with it. But we recommend you land in chicago straight. Its easy for you. You will have lots of holidays to go meet people you miss. Other thing, for the people who have to look out for GA, for your best intrests come look for a GA, as the later you come the probability that you get aid before the deadline decreases... think about it and plan.
We recommend you block, NOT book your flights before your visa interview. Generally, Air India is cheaper but now that others flights are coming up like Air Sahara, Delta etc., find out the rates. Lufthansa is better if you can afford it. Dont take some crazy flights through China/Korea just because it is cheap. Its better spending the extra money to have a comfortable flight.
Try to get into some sort of frequent flyer program and stick to their partner flights. for example United/Lufthansa/Air India all have something called star alliance. if you get into one of them say you travel 4 times to and from India you will have enough miles to take a free trip to europe or even India. Think about it and ask your travel agent when you pay for the tickets. You can even do that after you come here, but enroll into one of them in india itself so that your onward trip will be counted.
Keep emergency contact information handy. We have Madhu Venkatesan, Nalin Makar and Nikhil Jalgaonkar as emergency contacts from IGSA. There addresses and other information are given in the information document and in the FAQs.
Please conform to the baggage specifications, some airlines might allow extra baggage so find out from them. And have all valuables/documents in the hand luggage.
Have some kind of tag to uniquely identify your baggage say some weird coloured tag like bright orange or green on the suitcase.
When you land in US you will be asked to fill up a form called I-94, fill this up carefully. It will ask similar questions as in the DS 156 and your personal information. Use your common sense and fill it up. For address related stuff use the address of OIS or that of your department.
When they ask you how much money you have you need have to tell them about the cheque/DD of the fee amount. Just fill in whatever additional amount that you have. It is not advisable to carry a lot of money with you.
Have some loose change in quarters when you land. You might want to call one of us if you have any problems. Again telephone numbers are their in the Information Document.
You will have quite sometime in frankfurt if you take lufthansa, you can send an email to home just in case you have some anxious parents....!
Last but not the least..... Enjoy it all.... it's ur first time and take in as much of the whole trip as possible.