Slovenia Bog Blog

At the moment we are in the middle of re-organising our visas. Everyone who desires to live for an extended period of time in another country must give reasons to the government for why they should have permission to stay in that country. I can understand their concerns. You do not want people just turning up and taking benefit of your country, taking up space or jobs, not contributing to society (i.e. paying taxes), and so on. For a start this usually annoys current inhabitants who vote you into government. Consequently, there are usually processes for people to apply for visas - the official government tick of approval.

Visas usually come in a variety of forms. Most tourists get their passports stamped with a 3-6 month tourist visa when they arrive in a country. There are visas for permanent residency, temporary residency for work purposes, voluntary work visas (for when you are financially supported outside of the country), visas so families can be united (i.e. spouse and children can live with their working spouse/parent), and no doubt numerous other options. Since Slovenia has a long history of Roman Catholic association and influence, there are nice categories for religious work visas as well. I fit into a sort of mix of all these. For the past 8 years I have had a temporary residency visa because I am a voluntary worker who has been invited to work for a Slovene religious society (and that in itself tells you a lot about Protestant Christianity in Slovenia). Rochelle and the children have had temporary residency visas based upon the unification of families.

Now visas tend to be issued for varying lengths of time. My current visa (which expired last week) was for 3 years - its still a shock that it was for so long. The rest of my family seem to have had a very random duration for their visas. It has basically meant that every year I have submitted applications for someone in our family.

So you would expect that by now we would know the application process back to front. I wish it was. Unfortunately, there seems to be an on-going communist influence in the Slovene bureaucracy. Despite the Office for Foreigners having a marvelous new, clean waiting room and a superb ticketed and calling system (I think its more simple than the NSW Roads and Traffic Authority system), you still need to get your application past the person at the front desk. They make the decisions on what is acceptable and what isn't, despite everything being processed in the back-offices.

So my recent visits to the Office for Foreigners has turned, metaphorically, into a light-bulb joke. How many visits does it take for your visa application to be accepted at the Office for Foreigners? Hmm .. once to get the forms; another time I was rejected because I needed to have the whole family present; another time because I assumed that upgrading my visa to a more permanent form would be possible, but it isn't, because I need to have the old form of visa more current than a month, even though they don't accept applications earlier than a month, so I had to fill in forms and apply for 2 different types of visas at the same time and our mission organisation isn't going to like the look of that expense next month....argh!

Even though I have submitted a huge collection of forms and documents, I have been told my passport photo does not fit their required dimensions (yeah .. I don't get that one either). So I'll have to take in a new photo. Plus I am still waiting on birth and marriage certificates to come from Australia with Apostile Stamps no longer than 6 months old in validity that have been officially translated into Slovene... I trust you get the picture.

Here is the point: while it can be a bureaucratic nightmare to organise our visas, I am very thankful to God that we have the possibility of obtaining them. We fit into a category which allows us to do solid gospel work full-time, rather than seeking another form of access. It is a stress and time consuming for a few weeks, but so far we haven't faced any major hurdles or been asked to leave. Hopefully our current application will be the last time we need to apply (we're all trying for permanent residency).

Thanks for giving me a shoulder to cry on. I trust the Office for Foreigners don't read too many blogs .. I would hate to have to go in again for the purpose of bursting into tears.