A Midsummer Night’s Blog

Boy gets girl, Boy gets kicked out of country…

Filed as General on December 3, 2008

12/3/2008

My life is basically a sappy love story with a lot of background noise.  My wife is an amazing, intelligent, beautiful lady with amazing drive, and a heart big enough to forgive all my many flaws.   She is studying Spanish at one of the top universities in the country and even there she excels.  She’s currently in Spain doing research on a Fulbright grant for Spanish swordplay and honor in Golden Age Spain.

 

We had always intended that I would spend the year with her in Spain, and my company (Digi International) has been really wonderful working with me to try and get a work permit and visa to enter Spain. It’s unprecedented how much they have done to assist in this goal of spending time in Spain with her while she digs through the libraries of Spain looking for clues.

Everything was going very well and in November, I returned to vote in the election and finish the final stages of the paperwork for my work visa.  Unfortunately, between the time I submitted my application and November 4th, the global economy went into a rocketsled-powered deathspiral into the nether regions of Hell. Spain already had a huge population surge due to immigration and they stopped issuing any new work permits for foreign workers. 

Article on European Work Visa Restrictions

On Friday, November 14, 2008 my work permit was denied.  My company asked for another meeting and an appeal with special consideration. 

On Friday, November 21, 2008 that appeal was also denied, which triggered a new plan to travel there on tourist visas for up to 90 days in any single 6 month period.

On Wednesday, December 3, 2008 I was informed that this also could be an issue and Digi didn’t want me to do this.  In the space of three weeks I’ve gone from spending my dream year with my wife in Spain, to being:

• wifeless
• homeless
• dogless
• carless

It’s a tough break for us and I’m a bit glum about the whole thing.  Seriously, I married pretty well and when you get to go home to a girl like that, losing her for 10 months is pretty painful.  Fortunately, my life is a cheesy love story so if the boy loses the girl, we know how it is going to end.  

P.