Woke up at 5am to be in the hour-long call. Waiting half an hour for a representative. "You expected wait time is between 30 to 35 minutes". 5:25am right now in the morning. And I have been calling since yesterday, god knows how long this will last until we get somewhere.
Nowadays getting an American passport renewed is this crazy. Booked an international flight, then rebooked different dates according to the situation. The situation is, you won't be able to get an appointment in the San Francisco area, the closest is Colorado, Seattle, or Los Angeles, at least every time I called, we are getting closer. For a 5-year-old, parents have to be present for the passport renewal in-person appointment, but I can't take my whole family to Seattle or Colorado on one of the weekdays for her interview right?
There is some way to get to the system, and you would have to know exactly what date of travel to book and when to call, and I am using all the morning hours to figure out the system. Some of the representatives are cold, you won't get any information from them, some of them are sweet, you can piece together more clues through seemly casual conversations. It might take me weeks of back and forward, and still nothing. Should I wait until our December trip is up to do this? Trusting any system that blindly is simply stupidity. If this is the only way for my daughter to renew her American passport, then I will go through with it until she gets a passport!
And since when does a first-world American citizen getting a passport become such a nightmare?
However, the hassle has always been there for me, a third-world refugee. From September of the year, I would start getting crazy with applications for passports and visas because we usually travel back home in December. Except for the year 2020, a quiet year, people were banned from going places.
American visa/green card for me and my husband, Indian visa/OCI (Overseas Citizen of India - equivalent to a green card) for the kids and me, Chinese visa for my husband, Chinese Travel Document for the kids, and our respective passports.
American visa for Chinese passport holders only valid for one year (except business and tourism). Every year when I visited China, I had to go to Guangzhou, which is 500 miles away, stay there for 3 days and apply for my American one-year visa. The cost each time was immense, my parents always companied me and my children and covered all costs.
From here, the most difficult ones are the Chinese Travel Documents for kids, oh lord. When my children were born I didn't have an American green card, thus my children could only apply for Chinese Travel Documents which could be changed to passports when they turn 18. And the Travel Document has to be re-applied every two years. For one child, I would drive at least three times to the San Francisco Chinese Consulate, spend a whole day waiting there. No need to mention the weeks-long preparation of documents, notarizations, and proofs.
The Indian OCIs were a huge pain in my ass too. For myself, I applied two times, roughly 5 years in total, 800 dollars, 15 days worth of work on documents and applications, 20 times notarizations, 2 attempts in the Chinese Consulate for proofing documents, 2 interviews in the Indian embassy, all got sank into the ocean, the red tape of India prevailed. A Chinese passport holder and their child and grandchild would never be granted an Indian OCI too easily.
Till today, I still haven't got the OCI of India. Each time going to India, I go with a tourist visa on arrival, online application. The application is easy, just an hour-long, but I can stay no more than 30 days, sometimes no more than my returning flight indicates.
For my children's OCI, thank god they are permanent for life. Each kid applied once, it was multiple times going to San Francisco, staying there for hours, got sent back because of more documents and notarizations. Eventually, both of my children got it, when they go back to India anytime in the future, just American passport and OCI, no more documents are required.
My husband got the American green cards for us. For him, it was the "Most Crucial" among all the other visas and cards because we could have been kicked out of America anytime. Many people now left America because 15-20 years of green card wait is simply unacceptable for settling down. Why? Because only after 5 years of holding a green card, one can apply for a passport, with citizenship only, one can apply green card for one's parents. Can anyone take care of their parents if they know they would never be able to get green cards for them? We were seriously considering moving away, during the Trump administration, we were researching Canada, Australia, Singapore, and all.
Whenever we talk about visas, my husband would brag about how he rolled his ass on the ground, shit tired, applying green cards for us. I mean, it was the lawyer hired by the company who did the job, charged tens of thousands of dollars, all he did was comply with documents and answers. "But it was the tension! It was the tension!" Now my husband naturally takes credit for the millions of visas and applications we had, proclaiming to be the king of visas.
Talking about husband, on the very first days when Raj and I were met, there was an American boy, we talked several times, I met him prior to meeting Raj. Nice handsome boy, he assisted IT work in the I-house, a Berkeley student in a master's degree program. White American, the "Standard American", for Asians. He kept sending me messages asking for a date, I turned him down with clear nos and sorries, for an Indian. He couldn't help send me a message via Facebook once my photos with Raj were out: "wtf Momo? Are you serious?" Seemed like not only Asians understood the unmatchable value of a white American passport holder. Well, what he really meant, I would never know.
Coming out from China, one of the most prominent online content was about visas, green cards, and how to get them. Which countries belonged to the EU? what's the policy in each country to get a 5-year permit? Did you need to get married or just claim to live together as partners? Among all the first-world status, the ultimate one was an American Green Card, worth a million. How to get one as a man? The category of different works and their timelines? How to get one as a woman? What men to aim for? How long the wait? What documents?
You think I wouldn't know? I knew it all.
But living under the third-world shadow doesn't mean I regard myself lower than anyone. You can go fuck yourself with your green card scenarios. Well, just a figure of speech, most people I met were nice and sweet.
Well, I wish I could get done with my daughter's passport renewal soon enough...
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