Have you ever visited the US Embassy while travelling abroad? What for? Were the workers nice and helpful?

Question

I have never visited one, and was reading an article about the new one going up in Iraq. What services do they typically provide? Are they nice and helpful to Americans or kinda mean (official and stuffy)? Military or non-military?

Answer 1

I worked at two American Embassies - and I can tell you that staff "bend over backwards" to accomodate the Americans that either show up with problems or have general questions.  In addition to this you may meet some interesting people that will be happy to give you a brief tour; however, it depends on the person and it depends on the country you are in.  If you get a tour you will not be authorized to see any classified areas; however, it would give a good sense as to the American display of freedom abroad.  The DS (Dept. of State) personnel are decent, hard working, committed people to ensuring their country is placed in the best light at all times.  This really comes across when you are an American experiencing difficulties.  People are people and have their bad days as well - if this should happen to you then I apologize in advance for any bad experience that you may have.

Have fun, stop by an American Embassy, spark a conversation with someone and see where it takes you!

Best of luck!

Answer 2

I have been to the US Embassy in Hamburg and the experience was interesting. The German Police were guarding the gates outside the Embassy and it was rather hard getting past them even when I showed them my passport. Once past them, it wasn't too much of a problem. The amusing thing was that all the people that I had contact with were not Americans, they were either Germans or Australians. They were very helpful though,  I had arrived a little past closing time and they still let me come in to have some paperwork processed.

The services the embassy provided were fairly vast, however I was an exchange student and just needed to turn in a piece of paperwork telling them where I was studying.

Answer 3

I was at the American Embassy in London just a couple of months ago.  I'm an American living in the UK and my passport was about to expire, so I had to go to the embassy to get it renewed.  There are a number of things people could go there for- British people seeking visas to go to the US, Americans in the UK who had a baby reporting the birth of an American abroad, etc.  There was a lot of standing around and waiting in lines, which was annoying, but really everyone was quite nice.

Answer 4

I have visited several Embassy's while traveling abroad  and have found them very nice but, not very informative and they tend to execrated to much , other wise okay

Answer 5

My wife got her passport stolen in Amsterdam several years ago.  The Consulate there was very helpful and very friendly.  She was issued with a fresh passport within a few hours.  It will probably not surprise anyone to know it took longer to replace the contents of her purse...

Answer 6

I visited our Consulate in Seoul back in the mid 80's, it was a government building with government workers

Answer 7

the US embassies abroad offer alot of services for US citizens while in another country ,here are some of the services provided :

Child Custody Information

Information for American citizens traveling to and living in the United Kingdom

american organizations

banks

colleges

death of an American Citizen

death of an American Citizen : Report of Death

marriage

medical practitioners

members of the legal profession

studying in the U.K.

Judicial Assistance

Entry requirements for the United Kingdom

notary information

serving legal papers & process in the U.K.

Tax Information - The IRS’ London website

Voting

the same services in other US embassies in the world :

it has been a long time since i have been in a US embassy ,employees are somewhat like federal employees, the services provided by them is mostly very good and polite , i think .

they are guards watching the embassies as most embassies have .

here is an article about the embassy in Iras if you are interessted in reading it ?:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,...