Adopting while living abroad

It has been a hot minute since I have written on this blog. It is not that we have not had things going on, but rather those things tend to be of a somewhat sensitive nature that lend themselves to private email updates rather than shouting out for the whole interwebs to hear. Things like growing unrest in Cameroon and adoption updates. But I feel like this blog should be on the internet because I myself have been searching for a blog posts like this: a post about adopting a child while living abroad. If there is anyone out there adopting while living in a foreign land: you are not alone! Bon courage!

The adoption process is pretty much always complicated and tedious. There is sooooo much paperwork! And personal questions! And checks to be written! It is like running a marathon, but with hurdles. Ya’ll, there is a reason that the “long distance hurdle race” is only a ¼ mile and not 26 miles- it would be impossible. Imaging jumping over a barricade on mile 22 when your legs are like jelly! Yet, adoptive families look at the race course and say, “Yeah, it is going to be tough, but we can do it!” The joy at the finish line is worth the pain and sacrifice.

Now, if the standard adoption process is like a marathon hurdle race, adopting while abroad is like a marathon hurdle race American NinjaWarrior style. At first, you look at the track set before you- a flat marathon with prepared stationary hurdles. Yes, it looks hard but doable, so you start on your way only to find that the hurdles are in fact not stationary- they move and then more pop up unexpectedly. You trip, fall down, but get up again. You still have momentum and strength. Oh and then there is a detour you have to take that you didn’t see on the planned route and this detour doesn’t just have hurdles. Noooooo, you have to jump on a swinging pendulum over a pool of water to get to the net wall which you then have to climb. Once on top, monkey bar your away over the hungry crocodiles to jump through the hoop of fire. Then and only then can you go back to the marathon of hurdles. Oh and there will be more unexpected detours with daunting obstacles like this to overcome.

Case in point: getting O’s passport. If you yourself want to get one yourself, here are 31+ steps to follow:

1.       Ask a local person familiar with the local bureaucracy how to go about obtaining one as you are a foreigner and have no idea what the process is and there are is no handy online guide to help you. Get told you must go to the capital city.

2.       Drive 9 hours on awful roads with 2 kids to that capital city. Get car sick. Take care of your child that is also car sick.

3.       Pay for the transport and then also pay for a hotel for your family. (As it happens, there was heat wave during the hottest part of the year. The place we were staying did not have ac and we could not open the windows because there were no screens and we would probably all get malaria.)

4.       Sweat a lot.

5.       Hire a taxi to go to wherever it is that one obtains a passport. Thank God that this taxi man is a saint and he will translate for you, guide you to the three different places you need to get signatures and stamps, advocate for you, and sit with you on crowded, hard benches outside in a heat wave.

6.       Wait and wait on those benches. Ten hours over two days to be exact. With a toddler on your lap. A toddler that must eat every fifteen minutes and pee every ten. Oh and there are no bathrooms, so you have to beg someone to hold you spot while you take said toddler out to the street to squat and do her business.

7.       Finally get your name called, enter the air conditioned office (give those people hogging the cool air while you were sweating major side eye), and be told that they cannot process the application there and that you must do it at the town where you came from- 9 hours away.

8.       Cry. Ugly cry. Plead with the person. Show them every paper in your adoption notebook. Ugly cy your way out of the office talking about how ridiculous everything in this country is.

9.       Embarrass your sweet taxi driver as you act a fool.

10.   Take the 9 hour drive home and start all over again.

11.   Find a friend that knows the commissioner.

12.   Make an appointment.

13.   Drive an hour to the office, wait two hours in the office past your appointment time.

14.   Hand over your paperwork and pay for the passport.

15.   Sigh a sigh of relief that, “Wow, that was so easy!”

16.   Wait.

17.   Wait.

18.   Surely it is ready now?!

19.   Get a call that there is another paper needed.

20.   Organize that paperwork and drive an hour to the office to do it.

21.   Wait.

22.   Wait.

23.   Get evacuated due to near civil war.

24.   Ask your taxi friend if he knows how to get the passport while in the capital city so it doesn’t go back to the town 9 hours away.

25.   Have the taxi man go every week to talk to the people that print the passports to ensure that it does not get shipped to the other far away city.

26.   Cry when you hear that they shipped it to the other city.

27.   Copy passport receipt and write a letter authorizing brother of that amazing taxi man to pick it up in that distant town.

28.   Cry again when you learn that the brother has seen it on the desk, but the one person that is allowed to hand it over is sick in the hospital in another part of the country and not sure when he will get back.

29.   Pray that the during the chaotic presidential elections the building where the passport is sitting on the desk will not be burned or destroyed.

30.   Rejoice when the new building where they moved the passport office is safe and that the brother is able to travel on the roads again.

31.   Slump over in defeat when you hear that the commissioner will not accept the letter you wrote and will only accept a verified and stamped copy done at the police station.

This is where we are now. We started this process in January and mind you, this passport will only be used one time to get one US visa. How many more obstacles will there be? There is no telling. And this is only one of the foreseen hurdles. We are simultaneously tackling similar issues with our fingerprint/ FBI clearance!

Specific ways you can pray:

·         That we can get the passport ASAP!

·         That the crisis in that town remains stable and that the roads are passable so that the passport can physically get to us.

·         For quick resolution of our criminal background clearance.

·         For strength to continue the marathon. I feel like I am “hitting the wall” and feel overwhelmed when I see the rest of the race ahead of me.

·         For peace in Cameroon. Honestly, my struggle is so small compared to what so many people are going through here.