Trying to leave the country

It was easier last time. All Anne and I did was visit a travel agent, buy our tickets on the Marconi, follow the agent’s instructions re vaccinations, passports etc. and off we went. Nothing booked ahead. We alighted from the ship in Genoa, asked the way to the railway station in faltering Italian, and caught the first available train to Heidelberg.

I don’t remember having any trouble with passports.

My husband, Colin, has been hassling me for weeks to arrange for my passport. Nothing to it, I thought. Oh how wrong a person can be.

I took a day off work, dropped into my local shopping centre, and sauntered in to a photo shop that had a ‘passport photos’ sign outside. “Our camera’s broken,” an incompetent-looking young man told me. “Is there anywhere else in the centre I can get passport photos?” I asked, annoyed at such carelessness. “Big W,” he told me.

O-K … off I went to find Big W. A lady who checks your bags directed me to the photographic section, “But,” she said, “I think their camera’s broken.” She was right.

This time I was re-routed to Harvey World Travel where a blonde glamour-dolly told me that those cameras had been broken for 4 months. She obligingly took my photo. Without a word of a lie, I can tell you this was THE WORST PHOTO ever taken of me in my entire life. (Melisanda: What about that one with the towel around your head and no make up? Carmel: Shut up!)

Swallowing my pride, I took it along to the Australia Post Shop, believing I could just fill out the application, hand over the photographs, produce multiple identifying documents and that would be it. Not so.

You’d think Colin, who got a passport only a couple of months ago, would have remembered (and warned me accordingly) that you needed someone other than family, who has known you for 12 months or more to sign the back of one of the photos, and fill in a guarantor’s statement, wouldn’t you? But he didn’t.

This meant I had to wait till Monday because nobody who lives near has known me for 12 months. Nathan, the PR guy at work, agreed to act as guarantor. I produced the photograph. “That doesn’t look like you!” he said convincingly. I hugged him.

The following Saturday, I fronted up to Australia Post again. I was there when they opened at 8.30 because I had a meeting to attend at 10.00 on the other side of town, and I had to vote in the State election on the way. No margin for error here.

There were 3 people ahead of me … a family, all putting in their passport applications. There was some problem with their photos. Listening in to the conversation, I just knew my photo was going to be rejected too. I was not wrong.

Now I had two options here. I could go back to Harvey World Travel and insist they take a ‘proper’ photo (which hopefully would be more flattering than the last), or I could get Colin to take it – following the directions in the application (if I had got the application form BEFORE having the photo taken, I could have done that in the first place). Either way, I was going to have to get Nathan to sign it again … or find someone else to be guarantor and fill out a new application.

I chose the do-it-yourself path. After a few practice runs with the digital camera set on self-timer to ensure that I was going to look human, I engaged Colin in the role of photographer.

The resulting photo didn’t look much like me either … it ranks amongst the BEST (non-smiling) ever taken of me. Nathan was sensitive enough not to refrain from pointing this out when he signed the back.

Early Tuesday morning, I returned to Australia Post. I recognised the lady ahead of me as one of the group who’d had their photos rejected on Saturday. She recognised me too and gave me one of those ‘fellow-sufferer’ smiles. Good thing I didn’t go back to Harvey World Travel like she did … her second photo was rejected too.

I produced my photo … absolutely perfect. (They don’t check to see if the photo looks remotely like you, by the way.) I began displaying my documents – driver’s licence, Medicare card, birth certificate, marriage certificate to show why my name is no longer Sherman. “Oh,” she said, in genuine dismay, “this isn’t a FULL marriage certificate.”

I don’t remember clearly, but I think I screamed in public.

Apparently the church certificate (which has sufficed for all other official purposes my entire 32-year married life) is no longer acceptable. “It used to be until quite recently,” she said apologetically.

Colin stepped in at this stage because he could see I was going to make a major scene. I don’t do this very often. In most of life’s circumstances I’m fairly cool, calm and collected. I’ve even been called ‘serene’ by those who don’t know me very well.

That was all nearly a week ago, and the horror of it has faded a little. Anyway, to cut a long story a little shorter, I now have the required full certificate and am about to embark on my third attempt.

Wish me luck.

Footnote: For those of you who may meet me when/if I make it to the US, remember this is only a general likeness.