Legal Residents

On September 28, 2007 I stepped off of a Continental Airlines jet into the Tegucigalpa airport. I had done this many times before, but this time was different. It was now home, not just a place I was visiting.

After getting luggage and clearing customs, we headed immediately for our lawyer's office where we began the residency process. Not an easy process, you can bet on that. We had to have money up front. Then we needed birth certificates, marriage license, copies of passports, copies of driver's licenses, fingerprints, health records, bank statements, etc., etc. I was so diligent. I had most of this in my possession when we walked in the lawyer's office. Or so I thought. All these things had to be on certain forms and signed by someone from the state of Texas. I started over.

By early March, 2008 all of our paper work was finally complete and we had paid more money. But nothing was happening as far as our residencey being complete. What was going on the Honduran government is much too complicated to even try to explain. We called our lawyer about once a month, which soon turned to once a week, which turned to at least once a day.

Friday we were suppose to meet our lawyers at immigration and finalize all the details. An adventure in itself. After more money and more lines, we walked out of there at 3:30(one of the many reasons we did not leave for Choluteca at 3:00) and now are legal residents of Honduras. Not to be confused with citizens. I have no intention of giving up my U.S. citizenship.

What does being legal residents mean? It means we do not have to leave the country every ninety days. And when we do leave, we save $1.00 each on our exit fees. In about 100 years we will recoup what we paid for this residency. It means we can continue to work here as long as our income does not come from Honduras.

We are legal residents, but we only have temporary cards. Our permanent cards won't be ready for 60 days. If I was a betting person, I would bet they won't be ready in 60 days. After all, we are in Honduras.

Terri