Belgian Bureaucracy 2

Trouwboekje
As I'm sure is normal everywhere, you need to register a baby when it is born. Here there are special papers to fill out if the parents are not married, but since we are married it seemed to be easy. We just needed to show our trouwboekje (marriage book) at the city hall.

We began to think and realized that we don't have a trouwboekje! Why not? We got married in America. We figured it would be easy to get one, so we contacted the city where we live. They said they needed our marriage certificate, an apostille and a legal translation. Well, in the city where we previously lived, we had already given a marriage certificate and apostille, so it seemed easy enough to just ask our record from there.

Since the beginning we had troubles with the woman working at that city hall. The hubby called her and she said, "No, we can't give it to you, because we sent it to Brussels." Period. No go. No further help. No explanation.

I was highly annoyed, because I knew that my record was SOMEWHERE. It doesn't get randomly sent to Brussels and then thrown away. Also if the woman was smart enough, she could've offered 2 years ago when we brought in the papers to make the trouwboekje. Ok, maybe it is our fault for not asking, but still... It was also annoying that now we are required a legal translation! It is expensive and not really necessary.

The process I figured I needed to follow was call Whatcom County, ask for another marriage certificate, have it sent to mom, have her send it to the State of Washington, then they send it to me. A process of a minimum of a few weeks. I told the hubby to just email a few people again, because that was easier than doing the other option.

Not sure what happened, but lovely city hall lady contacted the hubby today to say that the papers were ('somehow) at her office and I could pick them up TODAY. I go tomorrow to get them. I am not sure what to expect, but I am thankful if she even has just the marriage certificate. I have my own special thoughts of how yesterday it was impossible for her to get them and today she had them in her office, but whatever...I am thankful for what she has waiting for me!

I hope our experience with this city hall is better!