Cherry Blossom Adventures

Yesterday I left work a little early to visit the Passport Office (The building next to my work luckily!) and then the Japanese Consulate. Earlier in the day I rang the registry of births, deaths & marriages office (and waited on hold for 35 minutes) to inquire about how to go about a speedy name change. I did ask if I could change my name before we were married to get my passport changed to my married name before the wedding (instead of running around like headless chickens afterwards) and apparently you can change you name before marriage to your married name (you can change it to whatever you want!) but then when a marriage certificate is issued it would state I had married someone with the same name as myself.

But luckily it turns out that if I book flights back to Japan in my “new” name and take them with me to the births, deaths & marriage office with my forms and certificate issued by the celebrant then they will our proper marriage certificate to us within 2 working days.

The passport office will then let me change the name on my passport and reissue it with the new name if they see they marriage certificate and because I will have flights booked they will also get my new passport back to me within 2 working days (and they will transfer the six remaining years on my current passport to my new one and only charge me $80 or so for a speedy return of it)

So far things were going well and I had time up my sleeve before I had to meet Shun (for the cricket) so I wandered down to the Japanese consulate, just making it in before the cut-off time (3:45pm) and asked exactly what I would need to apply for a Japanese spouse visa so that I can return to Japan. I explained that I would be getting a marriage certificate a couple days after the wedding, and then a new passport and that I wished to have my spouse visa put in my new passport.

Firstly they explained that we would need to register our marriage first (got explanations in Japanese for Shun to read through as he will have to get a few documents brought over from Japan when his parents come), and then I could apply for a spouse visa. They explained however that Shun could not be my guaranter since he hasn`t worked in Japan this year…even though he still has a job there and has been paying tax, pension and health insurance every month while we have been in Australia. So I will need to ask his brother if he will be my guarantor. I would ask Shun`s dad but he is retiring this year so Shun is not sure if his company would issue the documents I would need for him to be my guarantor.  They would be able to get my visa ready in 4 working days according to the consulate lady.

We were hoping to leave to go back to Japan on the 25th or 26th of May but I think it will need to be the 29th. Even if we went to the birth, deaths and marriages office on the Monday after we get married (unlikely since we will have Shun`s family in Oz and a lot of our friends visiting so we were thinking of going to Australia Zoo which would mean an early start), we leave for our honeymoon on the Thursday morning meaning the certificate might not be ready. So the plan is to go there the day after we get back from our honeymoon, pick it up, head to the passport office and put in my application (will need to make an appointment if you are doing an application- they don`t let you just rock up like they used to).  That would be Tuesday  19th of May…we could pick up my passport on Thursday at the earliest but more likely that Friday 22nd of May. Once that was back in my hot little hands we would walk to the consulate, register our marriage and apply for my visa. If it takes four working days then I am hoping I could get it back on Thursday 28th of May and then leave on the 29th. Will I be cutting it a bit fine? Probably!!!

May is going to be a crazy crazy busy month in the Lulu & Shun house!!! What with me finishing up work, friends and relatives arriving, getting married, a honeymoon and visiting all the fun places like the registry, passport office & consulate while trying desperatly to pack everything we want to send to Japan up in boxes and getting it sent off. I feel better having things sorted now though, at least I know what I will need and have a bit of a timeframe.

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