Yay! It's Official - I'm Official! - Dominique Hurley

Yes, indeed! After 5 months of uncertainty, stress (totally my responsibility, I know), time, and money, I finally have my Austrian Residency Permit. I’m now legally allowed to stay in the country until July. Finally!

If you’ve been following my story, you’ll remember that the school was waiting for its certification – for 8 months! Being able to stay here until the end of June, as planned, depended on that. Well, they finally got their certification at the end of December, and so I filled out all the forms, sent to Canada for a renewed Police Record Check (my old one had expired while we were waiting), got all the extra paperwork ready, paid the 100 Euro application fee, and then today, paid another 60 Euro fee for the actual card, and voilà – it’s done. What a relief! And what an experience!

This was the first time I took the subway at 7am on a workday – rush hour! Jam packed! So glad I don’t have to commute to school – love being a walker. When I got to the Magistrate’s Office at 7:30am, half an hour before they opened, there were already about 100 people in line. Yikes! I really didn’t want to be late for today’s workshop with Vera and Kuba that started at 10am. By the time Florence joined me at 8:07am (she graciously offered to help again – the letter asked that someone proficient in German accompany me), I had already made great progress towards the front door. We actually made it through the ticket line, elevator line, 5th floor waiting cue, initial interview, 6th floor cash, back to the 5th floor for card pickup by 8:30am. Wow!

Florence had other business to take care of there, so I took the tram downtown until I saw St.Stephen’s cathedral in the distance and jumped off. What fun! I had time for some exploration – and I hadn’t approached the core from this direction before. I spent more than half an hour walking around enjoying the sites, including an organic baker (where I got myself a celebratory whole wheat pain au chocolat) and a a Viennese confectionery where I found the perfect thank you gift for Florence – dark chocolate. Even with all that, I was still the first one in class.