Despite
the fact that vast problems exist in many American systems, the United States
really has nothing on the disorder that is applying for Spanish residency. In case anyone out there has just encountered
a horrible experience at the D.O.L. or is feeling particularly angry about an
outrageous wait at the post office, I am here to tell you: at least you’re not
in Spain.
Applying
for residency in Spain can be anywhere from a 3-15 hour process. It spans multiple days, and all actions take
place at the comisaría de policía (police station), which is of
course a 45 minute walk from the center of town. The comisaría opens at 9AM, but we were told
to be there at 7AM. Luckily, I had met
several people from the program, so a group of shared a taxi cab across town so
that we wouldn’t have to walk in a strange city in the dark. We arrived shortly after 7AM at a small
building sporting several Spanish flags.
There were a few people lined up in front of the gated entrance, and
several more across the street. No
police officers were in sight.
A
girl named Megan from my program had been told that we were supposed to wait
across the street. No signs gave any
indication if this was correct or not, but it was the only piece of information
we had, so we ran with it. We stood in
the cold trying to joke about the situation while cursing the fact that we
hadn’t brought jackets. At 8:45, four
police officers emerged from the gates and came to our line across the
street. They separated us into European
Union, United Arab Emirates, and United States passport holders. Eager to be making the first step in the
process, I handed the officer my passport.
He shook his head gravely and said “Ustedes son los últimos.” This means, “your group is last.”
So,
we waited again as all of the other immigrants received slips of paper,
regardless of whether or not they had arrived after us. By the time the officer got to our group, he
was holding slips for future appointments that would take place the next
day. He handed each of us a reservation
that only had the date printed on it, and warned us to be there early. Lather, rinse, repeat.
The
next morning we rose early, caught a taxi, and waited in front of the comisaría
once again, this time for only about a half hour. However, when we were finally called into the
building, all that we found was a crammed waiting room filled with impatient
people. I had the first number out of
our group, but still we waited about an hour and a half until my name was
called. At that point, I was ushered
into a small room where I sat at a desk and handed a clearly overworked woman
all of my documentation. She asked me
short questions and clearly desired only one-word answers. “Passport?” “Address?” “Insurance?”
After
she had copied, stamped, and stapled three copies of each of my forms, she
handed me a piece of paper and told me to come back. This was rather confusing and of course she
didn’t speak any English, so I sheepishly tried to clarify why I would need to
return. She waved her hand toward the
door while she spoke in rapid-fire Andalusian Spanish. I gathered that I needed to go to a bank with
my form to pay the fee for the residency card, and then come back to return the
receipt.
What
bank? Where was this bank located? Of course, none of that information was
provided.
Tremendously
long story short, I wandered around with a group of other auxiliares until we
found a bank, paid the fifteen euro fee, and returned to the comisaría to wait
for another twenty minutes until they allowed us to turn in our receipts. We were then given a tiny slip of paper with
our resident number on it and told to come back in 5-6 weeks to pick up our
real identification card. Such
gratification.
Opening
a bank account was a similar process—two hours of sitting at a desk and signing
forms resulted in bank card that looks like this:
American
names are strange to Spaniards because everyone here has two last names. Children are given both their mother and
father’s last names, and when a woman marries, it is traditional for her to
take her husband’s last name in place of her mother’s (oh, patriarchal
society). While I explained during this
two hour process that I only have one last name, apparently this was too
bizarre to handle.
I will
probably save this card forever
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