Valley of the VISA

Today started out great!  Woke up on time, was ready to head out the door on time and take Alex to school, no lines at the gas station and it even had my favorite Dunkin Donut flavor of doughnuts.  Hit no traffic between home and Raleigh, even traveling at 8:00.  Found my way to the Authentications Office and a parking deck with available spaces was only a block away.

I had gone to Raleigh today to have our medical letters authenticated.  I checked repeatedly that I had all the papers I needed and a check to cover the fee.  I had packed cards to write, book and magazine to read, computer to write a newsletter, and a few other odds and ends.  The perfect plan was to drop off the documents off by 9:30 and pick them back up by 3:30.

I walked in to the authentications office and first discovered that all four letters had been notarized wrong.  Pit in my stomach - but quickly put at ease because was told there was a Wachovia half a block down that could re-notarize the forms.  Walked in to the bank, no wait for notarizing, and back to the authentications office in less than 15 minutes.  Dropped off my papers, paid my $40, and was told to come back at 2:00 to pick them up.  Yeah!  Day was continuing to be good - documents would be ready 1 1/2 hours early.

There is a park beside the Secretary of State (which is beside the Capital), the weather was cool, and there was lots of shade - so I pulled out my book and read for awhile.  I then walked back and got the laptop and walked around downtown, did some window shopping, had a great lunch with free wi-fi, found another shady spot to finish my book, and headed back to pick up my documents at 2:15.  I was going to make it home before 5:00 traffic!  A great day!

When I asked for my documents I was told they were not ready, but would be ready by 3:00.  I had a funny feeling, but couldn't push it because it was just a hunch.  At 3:00 I was told they still weren't ready so I pushed for a time they would be ready.  She then told me the documents were lost - they had no idea where they were.  She suggested I get a new copy and come back (yes, she actually said that).  It had taken me 3 weeks to gather all the documents - no way was that an option.  I asked to speak to a supervisor - which I was told was on vacation today.  So I asked for the supervisor's supervisor.  Finally someone acting as department chair came and explained they had no idea where my documents were and they were doing their best to find them, but he couldn't promise they would.   So I asked for the next supervisor that was in the office.  Apparently that was the Deputy Secretary of State. 

Before she came down, the "acting supervisor" told everyone that they could not leave until the documents were found.  In addition, three more people had come in to get their documents and been told they were lost.  The employee who had handled our documents left work at noon and was almost in Charlotte by this time.  She had no recollection of ever handling the documents.  She was told to return to the office since she was the last to handle all of these documents.  Every envelope, folder, trashcan, etc was being gone through.  The Deputy Secretary of State, Haley Haynes, came down and began to oversee the search.

One employee finally made a comment about another task the employee who was driving back had been given to accomplish and wondered if perhaps these documents were mixed up in those papers.  They called the department where that had happened and you could tell immediately they had our documents.

Here's the hitch - it was on the other side of Raleigh.  We'd now have to wait on someone to drive them over in the Friday afternoon traffic and someone would have to wait with us to do the authenticating - because yes, they were lost before the work was even done. 

Finally, at 5:15 - 3 hours after I arrived to pick up  my documents - I was ready to head home.  Two hours later I was home and the day was over.  And good news about our VISA was on this side...

• Our letters of invitation from Spain had arrived!
• A dear friend who lives in Washington, DC had come to our rescue regarding Scott's birth certificate and he had emailed that he had received it and would handle the authentication on Monday morning.  Yeah!

Keep praying - we still have one more set of documents that we are waiting for.  The FBI checks were sent to the US State Department 15 business days ago and should be on their way back to us by Monday.  I sent a pre-paid FedEx envelope with them and it has not shown up in the system yet.  So the paperwork is still in Washington.  We need them in hand by Wednesday to get them translated by Friday so we can leave Sunday the 12th to apply for our VISAs.  Otherwise we will have to wait until the 27th to apply. 

Whew!  Never imagined the VISA process could be so complicated!