It seems it is necessary to have a visa to enter and live in the Dominican Republic legally. Since we prefer being legal, we had to fill out some paperwork, renew a passport, and get some pictures. This was not really very difficult, but provided some adventure right from the beginning.
The envelopes containing our travel instructions were sent to Kansas. To prevent just such a thing, we called the missionary department as soon as we received our call letter to have them change our address back to Utah. Apparently that message was filed in somebody's inbox.
The travel instructions said the visa forms must be in Salt Lake by July 28, but that instruction didn't arrive in Kansas until after that date. Even then, there was still the problem that Sherrie's passport was going to expire 2 months after our expected return date. The travel office insisted that this was not adequate; the passport had to be good for at least 6 months after the return date. Hence, we expedited (at great expense) a passport renewal. Thankfully the new passport came quickly and we mailed off all the visa forms, pictures and passports on Monday, Aug 5. Whew.
A number of questions arose in filling out the visa forms. Suffice it to say that we crossed our fingers and pressed on through the vague and conflicting instructions.
Judging from others' experiences with visas, we are a bit anxious about the timing. We're still crossing our fingers. Stay tuned for more on this . . .
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