We spent much of the summer out East in Boston. More of the summer than expected, in fact, because of the French government and its mysterious ways. We were initially told we would have our visas by the end of June. This timed well with heading East for my grandfather's funeral (98 years old!) over the July 4th weekend. In mid-June, however, we were told the visas would not, in fact, be ready by end June. So we canceled our appointments at the San Francisco consulate and figured we would just do it all in Boston. Naturally, just after we had canceled our appointments, our visas were magically ready, but by then there were no more appointments to be had. No worries, we thought. There's a French consulate in Boston, too.
We made appointments with the French consulate in Boston, only to be informed as we got closer to the date that we would not be allowed to do it in Boston after all. Anthony and his company's lawyers pleaded the case for a while, but the French government does not get intimidated -- or pushed around -- that easily. "Non Monsieur, you must go back to San Francisco!"
Luckily, Anthony's company footed the bill. And even better, in some moment of bureaucratic mercy, the consulate told us in personal messages that we did not have to bring the girls with us, since they were under 12. This caused us great anxiety however, as the website itself said anyone 6 and over had to be present, and G was already 7. Worse yet, if we showed up, and they decided G did indeed have to be there in person, we would have to reschedule. But if we had to reschedule, P would then celebrate her 6th birthday (which was just days after our planned appointment), so both girls would have to fly out and join us in San Francisco -- six hours each way for a 20 minute appointment. This did not happen, but you can see why we were anticipating the worst.
Of the 20-minute appointment, only 2 minutes were spent actively with a consular employee, who never once looked at us or cared about our answers. We are truly not sure why this couldn't have been done in Boston, but that's all water under the bridge. The one thing he did say was to stress -- repeatedly -- that we should get our mandatory medical appointments done within the first week we were in Paris because it is absolutely imperative that we get our cartes de séjours (residence cards) within 3 months, by law.
The lawyers at Ubisoft have been on top of our immigration issues from minute one. However, even lawyers cannot budge the French government, whose motto should be "French Bureaucracy: We're Not Infamous For Nothing!" The lawyers were informed that my dossier has been lost, though it is theoretically attached to Anthony's dossier, which is not lost. Therefore, we must go to the prefectural police across town. Today I meet one of Ubisoft's lawyers there, and we wait in a cattle-car line for two hours in order to enter the building, where we are given a numbered ticket so that we can wait again, inside. It takes 45 minutes for them to go from ticket #56 to #59 at which point I can be seen at the "pré-acqueil" desk. "Pré-acqueil" means "pre-welcome," if you're wondering, so that after two lines and three hours, I'm still not at the point where I can be officially welcomed by a person who might just possibly be able to help me.
But of course they can't help me. What was I thinking?! If this works out and they can locate my lost dossier -- we are told once we are pre-welcomed and, later on, actually welcomed -- we will have to return twice more to this building, once just to have the right to make the medical appointment and then, again, after the appointment to get the cartes de séjours . However, after another very long wait, we are instead told that we are in the wrong building altogether. Even the lawyer cannot argue her way out of this one.
Anthony, the girls, and I have now been in the country for almost four months, and we still have not been allowed to make the medical appointments we need to get the cartes, let alone get the cartes themselves. On the positive side, the lawyer finds out later in the day that it turns out my dossier was never really lost in the first place.
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