Do Not Not Pass Go

We've been stymied for so long, even the semblance of progress feels good.

A lot has happened since the last update though we still don’t have a ton to show for it just yet. I’ll let Amma corner start the story, recapping a bit of the previous updates in a little more detail (and from her perspective having been there):

Amma’s Corner

As for forgiveness, not for permission.

As Nishi mentioned, I ended up going to the passport office Friday morning to see if I could plead my case directly. We utilized every connection we have through family and friends¹ to start lighting fires. I got connected to someone at the office who ultimately just waved me into the office. There, I got to play a fun game of bureaucratic telephone in my broken² Tamil. I would explain to the staff member in the front what the issue was; he would walk 3 feet and talk to the passport officer handling our case who was sitting 2 feet from me (but through an open door). She would then look up at me, say something to the staff member, and he would walk the 3 feet back to me and reaffirm that they needed an apostilled copy of my current passport. I explained to him that I was not currently in the US as evidenced by the fact that he was looking at and talking tjik;/.K,. me.³ He went back and we did the whole dance again a second time. Finally, on the third attempt, the officer agreed to make a call and asked me to sit and wait. Of course, during that wait, the orphanage finally reached out saying they’d contact me soon. Oops. I decided to wait to respond until I got some direction from the Passport Office…which came in about 15 minutes. That direction was to get the orphanage on the phone since they were the one who submitted the application on our behalf. I had no choice but to contact the orphanage and come clean that I had gone rogue. I apologized profusely saying that I was told to go and meet someone there and I was desperate and didn’t know what else to do. He told me they were on their way and told me to return to the hotel, after having thrown in a “But we didn’t ask you to go”. We spent the next few hours worried that I’d squandered the goodwill Nishi had just generated; I don’t think I tasted much during that lunch. Finally, around 1:15 PM (almost two hours later and over an hour after the Passport Office is scheduled to close for standard hours), they made contact again and asked that Nishi and I come there at 2:15 with our current passports and without our kids. It seems they finally got the officer over whatever concern they had and were willing to have us sign a copy of our current passports (which is what we asked them to accept the two prior days). The hotel - which has become our home at this point - helpfully offered to send one of their front desk staff people that the girls recognized and would be comfortable with with us to accommodate this ridiculous request. When we got there, we were called in after about a 10 minute wait and Ayana started crying, so they just waved us in with the two younger girls while Akila bravely and helpfully stayed back to read her book with our impromptu babysitter. 2 signatures later, we were out of there with the assurances that the passport was finally, mercifully, being processed. While it’s a little frustrating to have lost a few days because our orphanage wasn’t aggressive enough, we’re thankful to have gotten to this point. As of this writing, they are verifying the Police Verification after which the passport will finally be dispatched and we can leave Madurai. We’re hoping that happens tomorrow, we pick it up Tuesday, and we depart for Delhi Wednesday. Nothing’s guaranteed, so tomorrow’s progress will be key. I’m just relieved that I didn’t screw this up.

Madurai / Family Life. The last few posts have been light on non-process updates, so we’ll provide a little more on our travels in forthcoming posts. As Nishi noted in her video above, we’re all ready to come home but we’re also trying not to live the rest of our time here under a countdown and miss out on the experiences we could be having here. We did manage to actually be tourists today for a few hours, visiting the Thirumalai Nayak Palace and taking a boat around the water tank at Vandiyur Mariamman Teppakulam. The girls survived an entire morning without screens! It was glorious. Anika is getting more and more comfortable (and mischievous) by the day. We are nowhere near child-proofed at home enough for her, so that’ll be a fun first 24 hours or so. Her first English words may very well be “no thank you”.

1. Thank you to all of you reading this who have reached out with offers of help and connections to local contacts. Each one has had an impact in some way and I’m convinced we’ve shaved days, if not weeks, off this process.

2. Didn’t have a lot of practice with references to government entities and paperwork growing up.

3. The condescension was limited to my thoughts and maybe a little in my eyes.