Since we had never traveled outside of the country, we had no idea where to start when it came to paperwork... A friend of mine had gotten his passport early last year so he directed me to start our journey at our county courthouse, so I found myself asking the deputies where I should go to talk about a passport. They pointed me to the passport office of all places and I picked up the document each one of us needed. They were laying in a stack on a table for the taking. I didn't even have to talk to anyone. Later that night I began to fill out the necessary paperwork, it turned out to be only about a page worth of your parents and your personal information. You have to include a certified copy of your birth certificate and a fee when applying for the passport. So I paid $22 for a certified copy of my birth certificate at the courthouse. They can come up with a copy as long as you were born in the state of Texas. Michelle was born in California so we had to get in touch with her county of birth and have them send us a certified copy of hers. This cost considerably more and took awhile. Since it took so long for hers to come in, we ended up having to expedite our passports. If you need to expedite the process, you have to schedule an appointment at the Federal Courthouse in Dallas. You can do this by calling a number provided on the document we picked up at the courthouse. Be sure to bring your passport form, the trip confirmation ( we used our itinerary provided by the travel agency), a photocopy of your ID, a copy of your flights and $195 for each passport to be expedited. Oh and you have to have your reason for going to Cuba ready. The travel restrictions are still in play, but no one ever seemed to take them seriously. It was very lax. The lady behind the glass at the federal courthouse asked us our reason for going and we told her to "help the Cuban people", which was not a lie, we spent money thus helping the Cuban economy. You must find yourself traveling to Cuba for at least one of the 12 reasons which are listed all over the internet. But for your convenience here they are:
1.Family visits
Advertisement
2. Official business of the U.S. government, foreign governments, and certain intergovernmental organizations
3. Journalistic activity
4. Professional research and professional meetings
5. Educational activities
Advertisement
6. Religious activities
7. Public performances, clinics, workshops, athletic and other competitions, and exhibitions
8. Support for the Cuban people
9. Humanitarian projects
Advertisement
10. Activities of private foundations or research or educational institutes
11. Exportation, importation, or transmission of information or information materials
12. Certain export transactions that may be considered for authorization under existing regulations and guidelines.
When you arrive at the Federal courthouse in Dallas, please... Remember to take out all weapons you may carry. I am a certified peace officer and I have my LTC, but I know no one cares there. So I de-armed myself before we exited our vehicle. As we were nearing the building my hand brushed my pocket knife I had over looked in my pocket! Not wanting to walk all the way back to our vehicle Michelle had a bright idea, There is a little park just about a block east from the courthouse and between the sidewalk and the park is about a 4 foot tall concrete planter. I hid my knife in the planter very casually but not expecting to see it again. Anyway, we made it into the courthouse and started our strip to enter the metal detector. Well... I had completely forgot about the credit care knife I also had in my wallet placed and forgotten there years ago. They found it though and bam! It was like a movie. The world stopped and all attention was on me... They walked me out and told us to get rid of it. So we went back to that park and collected my knife that was still hidden thankfully, and we went back to the vehicle and I unloaded the rest of my weapons.. It was then, this time we made it through security and found the elevator we needed to take to the passport office. Since we had an appointment we walked in and were lead to the line for folks with appointments which was just a line to cut in front of the people without an appointment. We did not wait before we were called up and we were asked for all the required paperwork. There she organized our papers and verified everything, gave us a number and sat us down. We weren't seated for 5 minutes before our number was called and we walked up to the lady behind the glass and forked over all the paperwork we had. That is when she asked our reasons for going, we filled out a few more lines of info, and paid our bill. She said our passports and the required certified copies of our birth certificates would arrive 1 week from now. And they did! During this same time, the travel agency we used sent us our Cuban visas, our copy of the itinerary and other papers. The same time, our check to pay for the itinerary and services landed at the agency. It was all falling into place! And it was feeling more real than ever!
No comments:
Post a Comment