Three Weeks from Today

Three weeks from today, we will be flying to Austria.

Three weeks from today, I will leave my family, my friends, and everything that feels familiar and safe.

Three weeks from today, I will be jet-lagged, haggard-looking (hey, if I'm lucky), and confused by all of the announcements and signs in German.

And three weeks from today, I will finally be able to search for a job and meet potential employers! and we will be living together as a married couple!  and we can decorate and set up our little slice of heaven, however small, in whatever way we see fit! and we will be able to go to Germany, to Italy, to Switzerland, and to the countries where our ancestors came from!

Every choice comes with consequences.

Every choice made to do something is also a choice made to not do something.

Months ago we made a choice, and three weeks from today, our choice to go is our choice not to stay.  

Can we talk about the paperwork?

Just a couple documents

 

Have you ever wondered what it took to move to another country?  Me neither.  I never thought this would happen to me, but alas, it did, and I am still picking up the pieces (of aggravatingly extensive paperwork).

Oh, the Austrian residency permit.  Where to begin?  Oh, yes, the list of requirements:

1. A completed application form for each person, available only in German
2. A valid and signed passport that does not expire for three months beyond the expected return date
3. A fee of $100 USD when the application is hand-delivered to the consulate, in our case, in New York City.  There is another fee once we pick up our residency permit in Salzburg.
4. A recent, passport-esque photo (no smiling allowed!)
5. An original, authenticated birth certificate with apostille (I'll get to that later.)
6. An original, authenticated Certificate of Good Conduct/Criminal Record with apostille (a great reason to chat up your local law enforcement!)
7. Proof of health/travel/accident insurance in the form of a letter from an insurance company confirming coverage in Austria
8. Proof of sufficient financial means (In my case, with no confirmed job in Austria, it was authenticated copies of my bank statements.)
9. Proof of lodging in Austria (our rental agreement)
10. For my husband - the original letter stating his job and his salary
11. For me - our original, authenticated, and apostilled marriage license to prove that I too have a purpose in Austria (hausfrau-ing it).
12. Photocopies of all supporting documents

That's a bit much, right?  We thought so too.

Many of these documents were easy to obtain, but most were not.

For instance, let's talk about my birth certificate.  My "birth certificate;" the one that I have been using for all of my life in the United States to gain employment, to prove my identity, etc.;  was not sufficient.  Why, might you ask?  The reason is the document was actually a registration of live birth document, and not a birth certificate.  A quick trip to the local vital records office in the town where I was born yielded not one, but two birth certificates (I didn't want to have to do this again in the future).  Once in my hands, I walked that baby over to the county office building and had it authenticated.  This means that the county employee needed to verify that the notary public who signed my birth certificate was, in fact, a notary public.  After those errands, I sent my birth certificate (an original and authenticated one, mind you) to Albany to be apostilled.  An apostille is a cover letter that accompanies documents so that they can be recognized in other countries.  I waited about a week for my first apostille request for my birth certificate, or should I say "birth certificate" because my registration of live birth certificate was denied an apostille.  The second time, it took about a week and a half.

My husband, on the other hand, was born in California, and could not do all of his birth certificate and other document-related errands in person.  Everything was done through overnight mail to California, with a fax done in our local library and a web-based document request form thrown in the mix.  

What else did we have to do to apply for our residency permits?  Oh yeah, get married.

We had been planning our wedding for the end of July, but because of the cranking of the residency permit machine, we had a justice of the peace perform the ceremony a month before.  We were driving into our hometown from our grad school apartment, and realized that in order to hand-deliver our residency permit applications to New York City around the beginning of July, we needed to be legally married ASAP and get that license authenticated and apostilled.  It wasn't enough that we had a wedding date; the requirement was that we needed to show proof of marriage when we submitted our paperwork.   Two days after we got into town, we were exchanging vows, and the ink on our license wasn't even dry before it was sent to Albany.

Once all of our paperwork came back with apostilles, we were set to do the final chore - deliver it all to the Austrian consulate in New York.  I'm going to go ahead and interject, and say that the last time I was in New York was when I was early elementary school-age - an age when you remember events, not so much because they are imprinted in your mind, but because your family has reconstructed and retold you of them many times.  Not having been to the city in fifteen-plus years and having family members weave stories of dirt, filth, crime, and other illegal happenings into my psyche, I was a bit nervous.  But, neither of us were physically or mentally unable to make the trip (the only two reasons for not appearing in person at the consulate), so to New York we went!

(Source: Gryffindor)

We boarded an early morning bus - a three AM bus, to be exact.  After a couple stops along the way, the bus began to fill with people on their commute into the city: security guards, office workers, businessmen (with the accompanying business suits).  I remember checking the time at each stop.  Five AM, Six AM - these people have to do this commute every day.  I know it was ridiculous that we boarded the bus at three in the morning, but it was for a one-time errand.  Commuting every day like that - wow.

Anyway, we arrived at Port Authority at a quarter to seven in the morning, and against my relatives' advice, we walked to our destination.  And, I'm happy we did.  As uninspired at it sounds, it felt like we were part of something, walking with everyone on their commute around the city.  Coming from a relatively small town in upstate New York and having only lived in two smaller college towns in the same state, it felt invigorating to move at a fast pace and to know that everyone else had places to be too.

Once at the consulate, which is only open from nine in the morning until noon (hence the need to be on the three AM bus), we submitted our documents and quietly giggled as the man leafed through them.  All of our frustration, all of the fees, all of the bureaucracy led to that moment, and when we submitted our $200 USD payment fifteen minutes later, it felt like a joke, like a let down from some manic high.  We ran around for a few weeks, sweating whether our apostille requests would be granted, and getting progressively angrier as the fees added up.  And it took fifteen minutes on East 69th Street one July day.

But, we were done.  And I am glad to say we received an email last week saying that our residency permits were ready to be picked up in Austria!              

To Start it Off

Hello, reader!

Settling into Salzburg is my attempt to chronicle my experiences moving to and living in Salzburg, Austria.  In April of 2012, my husband and I discovered that he had the opportunity to teach English in Austria and that Salzburg would be our new home.  As of today, we are forty-three days from our departure date. 

Am I nervous?  Of course.  I have never lived in another country, let alone another state, and as of right now, I don't speak German.  But, my lack of language skills and my inexperience with other cultures pales in comparison to the greater question: What am I going to do there?

I'm the type of person that has a hard time relaxing; I need to have plans and I need to work.  Vacations are great, but only for a few days.  Before long, I want to get back to "real" life.  So, when he is off teaching, what am I going to do with my time? 

What will my purpose be while in Salzburg? 

Through this blog, I hope to share the answers I find and to have some fun along the way.

(Source: Newdecade)