New birth certificate and Colombian passport!

Hi all,

Not much to report on the weekend. We just mainly hung around the hotel and took some small walks. On Saturday night we went to Archie's Pizza, where Andy got to make his own pizza again. We went with Jan, Hella, Casper, and Katrine as their trip to Cartegena was delayed by a day. The food was excellent and it was great to get out of the hotel and not eat their food.

Yesterday (Monday) was Andy's adoption day anniversary, and we celebrate every year by getting ice cream. So we walked to Unicentro Mall and went to Crepes and Waffles, and had lunch. Allan, Sidsel, and Johnathan joined us and we had a nice time. It is a really great restaurant, and cool in concept as well, as they only employ single women who have children. Of course in the US this would be discriminatory, but here there isn't any problem employing all women, and women who need good paying jobs to support their children. The food and ice cream is great as well!

Today was a good day, but a long one. We got the call from Cecilia last night that our 5 day waiting period expired at 5 p.m. last night, and that our attorney would be retreiving the Sentencia this morning. I was informed by her to sit tight in the morning and that she would come and pick me up when she got the call from the attorney.

I got that call at about 9:45 and she was at Las Palmas at 10 to pick me up. We didn't have our normal driver Santiago, but a nice older gentleman that she has used in the past. He looked like he was about 90 but when I asked him his age he said 68 (Jodie thinks he is lying about his age). Anyhow after running a red light or two, and praying a few times for our safety we made it to the Notaria downtown safe and sound.

If you read our prior blog about last week and signing the Sentencia at the Court #20, the notaria was just about the same. Kind of a chaotic experience. Anyhow after waiting some time to get to the 1 clerk on duty, she just couldn't understand why Jodie's passport only had her married name, as all the Colombian people use two surnames, fathers first and then mothers second. So Jodie's name would be Jodie Suzanne McCoy Krekowski. Anyhow after about 20 minutes of bantering between Cecilia, the attorney's assistant, and the clerk they printed out a new birth certificate. Yahoo (or so we thought for the moment).

At about 11:45 we picked up Jodie and the kids and went to the passport office, which was only about 6 blocks from the hotel here. With the traffic it would have been easier to walk. Anyhow, we went in and got Dana's passport photo's which turned out great, and I got in line. My number was 400, and they were in the 280's when I got there. I thought that this is going to be a long time to get my number called, but when Cecilia and Jodie joined us, she marched us right up to the next clerk and had them handle the paperwork. Unfortunately, the clerk in the Notaria that was so helpful forgot to put Jodie's maiden name in parenthesis on her line, so we had to go and discuss this with the Manager. She told us that we needed to return to the Notaria and get this fixed.

So off we went. We of course got there when the clerk that helped us was at lunch, and had to wait another 45 minutes to get to the window. Once there, the supervisor on duty didn't know what to do either, so she cut off the official stickers that are part of the birth certificate, and then made the 7 copies of a changed original, and then pasted (literally) the stickers back onto the copies. I don't think this would have flown back at home, as it was obviously not the original and the sticker was tampered with, but she assured us and gave us her phone number if the passport office had questions.

So again off we went back to the passport office. Jodie took Andy back to the hotel since it was about 2 then and he was pretty hungry for lunch (so was I), and I took Dana with Cecila back in. Our driver, while Cecilia was helping Jodie out, moved the car forward as we think he thought we were all out, and rolled over Cecilia's tip of her big toe. Boy was she pissed, and she let him have it when we were in the office waiting. Anyhow the second time was the charm and we walked out of there at about 2:45 with Dana's Colombian passport.

The driver dropped us off back at the hotel at about 3ish, I scrounged some food for lunch, Dana had a bottle, and he was back at 3:30 for the Dr. visit. That went just fine and no issues there. Dana is in great health, per the Dr. Back to the hotel we went and just in time for dinner at 6! A long and productive day!

So tomorrow at 9:30 is our US Embassy trip for the VISA. I believe that we will pick that up on Thursday, and then it is pack up and wait for Sunday's flight! As much as we want to come home on Friday or Saturday, it will be nice to have a down day to get packed up and do some last minute souvenier shopping for Dana's gotcha days in the future. We have a suitcase full of gifts and things already. I think Jodie is secretly hoping that I will donate my clothes to charity so she will have more suitcase room! ;)

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July weekend! We were there in spirit.

Here are some random pictures.

Dana and Moses (pr. Moises in French) making eyes at each other. Moses is 1 and is being adopted by a Belgium couple. They also have a 4 year old adopted son Juan, who is from Colombia.

Bath time. Dana is always on the go with her legs and feet!