I had my oath ceremony at Cadman Plaza on April 5th, 2007. Reached there around 7:45 AM when they had already begun seating people inside the court room. Once they seated everyone, they had people come in and sign their Naturalization certificate and verify their information (date of birth) and sign their full name. People were seated and also called in the order in which they had arrived. First come - First serve basis.
There was an Old Japanese couple who had actualy signed their names in Japanese and the IO made it loud and clear to everyone that people need to sign their full names on the certificate in English and not in any other language.
Once the signing was over (which took more than a couple of hours), the Judge arrived to lead us in to oath. We were asked to stand up when the judge arrived and also stand again when the Judge left. The Judge made a short, but nice speech about how his grand father came to this country as an immigrant from Russia 100 years ago. He also mentioned the fact that everyone here must have their own story of how they made it till this point. After reading the oath of allegiance, we were asked to come in the same order to pick our Naturalization certificates up. The IO congratulated each person when handing out the Naturalization certificates, which I thought was a nice gesture.
Once I had my Certificate with me, I drove to the post office, filled up the orange form to get my passport. I made it expedited and paid the amount as a postal money order (Thanks to Teddy Bear for his experience). I read his post before going to the Post Office. Hopefully the passport gets home soon.
Good Luck to everyone on this board and thanks to everyone for sharing their experiences here.
Teddy Bear, Congratulations on becoming a Citizen !! Enjoy your new status. Hope you get your passport soon.
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