In my quick attempt to catch up my readers on the past three weeks, I got caught up in the visit to the Federal Police and how it involved fees for not extending our tourist visas. However, the whole point of why we went to the federal police got lost in that story. So for the purpose of an accurate update, I thought I'd quickly include the rest of our visits to the federal police the past three weeks. The Federal Police offices are at the airport in Recife, which is a little under two hours away.... if all goes well. There is one office for Foreigners and one for Residents of Brazil.
So as I reported, we went to the police to apply for our permanent residency and found we needed to include our children in the process, as well as have every page in our passport copied and certified. So the next week we headed back with everything we needed. Upon application, if you have all the required documents, they give you something called a protocol number, which you can use while you wait for the actual permanent residency documents. Then she told us to head over to the Federal Police for residents of Brazil (on the other side of the airport) and get our Certificate of Legal Status (Certidao do Estado Legal). We hadn't heard of this before, but by this time it was almost two o' clock in the afternoon, so we thought we'd grab lunch before we headed there. Our kids had patiently been waiting for almost three hours. By the time we headed back to the Federal Police they were closed for lunch. No worries, we don't need this cerificate we had never heard of.... or do we?
Shaun eagerly set out the very next day to open a bank account. We had Everything We Needed. A contract or an electric bill for proof of residency, passport for identification, and our protocol number saying WE BELONG HERE IN BRAZIL. Hmmmm, two days and two banks later....no can do. Apparently our magical protocol number means nothing. Shaun was ready to throw in the towel. I felt absolutely no surprise. I knew it wouldn't be as simple as that.
Shaun returned to Recife airport to exchange the Dublo for a five-seater car a few days later, as it was a quarter of the price and we have found in general we use the car for groceries and running errands that don't require all of us to go. Shaun and Hazel had an enjoyable time together, and stopped by the other Policia Federal to see about this Legal Status in Brazil, whatever that was. They told him that I had to do it separately, so Shaun said he would just wait until we were in Recife together. Doing further research he found that the Policia Federal should have given us a number called a SINCRE (don't ask me what that stands for), at the same time as the protocol number. Well, guess what, that number, the SINCRE has been replaced by... you guessed it.... the Certidao do Estado Legal. Which of course you need to go to the other Federal Police for residents to receive. I guess they decided the Polica Federal for residents needed to start doing more work, or maybe the Policia Federal for foreigners needed to do less. Whatever the reason, the number is now issued by the opposite Policia Federal than we were expecting.
Shaun has gone up to Recife a couple of times for work and to exchange our rental vehicle one more time to a cheaper version that had air conditioning. They both still had five seats, so we could not all head up. And this last car is a tiny little hatchback that doesn't even fit four of us comfortably. As an aside this is why having a car with five seats does not work if we ever want to head to Recife or Maragogi or even our friend's house a five minute drive down the road. And here they do have similar car seat laws and occasionally police that want a bribe, so even if I felt comfortable driving the six of us in a five-seater car (which I don't), there are often police check points on the road. Anyways, a few days ago we dropped Seth and Hazel off at a friend's to go see about this number....
Poor Lyla gets carsick, so we had to stop and run around the car a few times, but it isn't really that effective. She ended up falling asleep moaning about how sick she was. She awoke super happy and we spent an hour or two at the airport, applying for the legal status. Fortunately Shaun brought every document we owned, because they needed Jonas' birth certificate. We thought we just needed our protocol number (from the other Federal Police) and our ID, so that was a relief. We should be able to pick up our certificates of legal status on January 2nd for everyone! The kids need it to register in school, and we need it to open a bank account (these were the reasons she told us to write on our application). And we just need to bring Jonas in to pick them up! Well, it's not exactly like that, but Jonas appears to be like a little card we carry around to say we can stay in this country.
So while this may only be an interesting post if you are trying to live and work in Brazil after having a child here while on a tourist visa, it may be interesting to know that we are still busy with this concept of opening up a bank account. And it looks like we are only two weeks away. Notice that there is no real excitement in my voice.... because I'll believe it when I see it. Also notice that I'm not really disappointed or frustrated.... this is just the way it is. But when we have a bank account open, I might just buy a bottle of champagne!
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