Immigration

Early this morning, Nan and I took the ferry over to Cancun for another visit to the immigration office. We were there last Thursday to exchange our Residente Temporal visas, which we secured through the Mexican consulate's office in Denver before leaving home, for our Residency Cards, which will entitle us to many benefits including eligibility for the national health plan. We were led to believe it would be an easy process, but we were presented with a daunting list of additional requirements, including face photographs and letters in Spanish explaining why we wanted to live in Mexico. Naturally, this took a few days to pull together, and we were still not certain if we had it all right when we showed up there again this morning. It was raining steadily, as it has been since Saturday afternoon (Thank you, Hurricane Barbara!), when we took our places in line with the other hopefuls outside the office. Thankfully, there was an awning, ostensibly for sun protection but also serving adequately to keep us all dry.

After an hour's wait, outside in the rain and then inside in the chilly air conditioning, we were ushered up to the same officer who had assisted us last week. She took our passports, noted us in her ledger, asked if we had all of our documents, and then gave us a number in line to see a processing officer. He looked through our stacks, had us sign in a few places, and then gave us numbered forms showing how we could look up our processing statuses online. He told us processing would take about three weeks, which will delay us in returning to the U.S. to get Scout because we can't leave the country until processing is complete except in an emergency. Nan and I miss Scout terribly and want him here with us as soon as possible. We exited the office into a downpour with smiles on our faces knowing we are almost there.