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Posted by Izmayil_Bound on September 28, 2003 at 21:50:19:
In Reply to: Re: Travel back to Ukraine after getting married posted by Jonathan on September 27, 2003 at 19:25:55:
On our last trip (the first after getting married) my wife was traveling on her old USSR-style passport. We were there for the two-week New Year/Christmas period and managed to get a new passport issued with the name change included. It cost around $700 in bribes to expedite the process and it was delivered literally an hour before we headed back to Odessa to catch our flight. Take multiple official copies of your marriage certificate *with* the county seal (or whatever seal makes it official where you're from). The folks at the translation office kept one of ours and I had to show a second one to the passport control guards at the airport. (it wasn't like they could read it but they seemed to like running their fingers over the raised seal while looking knowledgeable about such things!)
Start the process at OVIR immediately upon arrival. We had to "deregister" my wife at city hall ($100), get a new internal passport (I hear it's not needed since she was emmigrating but still cost us $150) and then the Zagrande passport ($400) plus a $50 tip to get the papers typed up while we waited. You may want to have someone from her family make contacts within OVIR if possible to see who's palm needs greased before you show up.
All this, plus other incidents, made me insist on no more trips until Natasha was on a US passport. We're headed back Christmas Day this December with her traveling as a true-blue Yankee!
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