After a wonderful Christmas break back home in Canada we
were looking forward to returning to our warm little island. We left from Calgary bright and early...
well, dark and early as it was 12:40am on January 6th. It was, of
course another very emotional goodbye.
During the flights the Fay and Eden were miserable. I can’t
really take a guess at the ratio of pleasant and brutal, all I can say is that
when they were brutal, it was nasty. So other than sad little girls, the flight
from Calgary to Toronto was uneventful and so was our layover there. Our flight
from Toronto to St. Maarten had left a little later then scheduled which
resulted in our plane having to wait on the tarmac in St. Maarten due to heavy
volumes of flights that were unloading and loading passengers. So once we
finally got hooked up to the terminal and left the plane the lines for
immigration were huge. So all of that resulted in us missing our flight back to
Statia that evening. We were told we could attempt to wait for the next flight
as standby passengers. We were desperate to get home so we checked our five
suitcases and stood by. Evidently the flight was full and everyone had checked
in. We collected our five checked pieces and dealt with “customer service”
representatives. So Westjet put us up in a hotel and we had a much needed good
night’s rest at The Towers hotel in St. Maarten. (Luggage in tow)
Luckily we were able to catch a flight to Statia the
following morning at 11:00am. Here is where the story starts to get…
interesting. We had finally got to Statia! We could see the Tidmarsh family and
Steve Beckett waiting at the gate to pick us up. We were so glad to be back and
the cool breeze felt so good. We waited patiently as we were the last in line
for immigration. The immigration officer told us that we were not permitted on
the island, that we had been there too long already with out having residency
papers and would have to leave on the next flight. We pleaded with him, spoke
to another worker, spoke to the manager, had the manager call to ask the person
that he works under if he could just grant us 24 hours to figure everything
out. Nothing. Josh asked for the number to call the person whom the supervisor
works under. He called and the man hardly gave Josh the time of day. I begged
the supervisor to please allow us to stay, there we were a family with two
small children, who’d been travelling since midnight the prier day, exhausted
and hungry and desperate to get home. Josh was supposed to start school the next
day. He told us that he understood but that there was nothing he could do. Of
course I was a mess. Thankfully, they let our friends take our luggage to our
house for us so we didn’t have to haul it all through St. Maarten. We changed
the girls diapers and thankfully Meg Beckett came down to the airport, gave me
a big hug (which I so desperately needed) and gave us a bag of snacks for the
girls to eat.
And back we went, tired and down trodden, to St. Maarten. –I
must add as a side note that in retrospect it was a blessing that we missed our
first flight to Statia, because we both would have been way too exhausted to
have dealt with the situation.
So what had happened with the residency papers?
When Josh was accepted to the school there were certain documents
that we needed to have for immigration purposes, which he handed in. The admin
building lost the forms before they go to immigration. By the time the school
found the forms the police checks and the bank statements had expired. Josh
knew this before coming home for Christmas and was planning on getting the
paperwork done while home. He forgot. How ever he had called the school to ask
if it would be a problem for getting back on the island and he was told that it
would not be a problem. SO… that’s the paperwork saga.
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| Fay and Eden with Bro+Sis Wright. (side note: that is wall paper in the background...St.Maarten doesn't really look like Alberta) |
Back in St. Maarten, we called the Brother and Sister Wright
who are serving a mission there. They are from Raymond. We told them our
situation and asked if we would be able to stay with them for a night or
two. After renting a car we saw three
students from Josh’s school and picked them up. Daksha, Mumtaz and Ali. We all
we for gelato, Mumtaz treated us. That seemed to help our moods. Then Josh, the
girls and I headed to the Wright’s home where they graciously aloud us to stay.
Luckily for
us, the Bridge’s flew in the next day and thanks to Jenna, they brought our new
police checks. They took our papers back to Statia with them and gave them to
the lady who works for the school doing immigration. She had an appointment
with the immigration people to file our paper work that Thursday, but
unfortunately the fax of our bank statement had arrived late, so she couldn’t
proceed with the appointment. Her next appointment wasn’t until the following
Monday. BAH! NO! We needed to get home like yesterday! Josh was already missing
days of classes, now he’d be missing an entire weeks worth! We pulled out all
the ropes and our family and friends here and at home did what they could,
weather it be providing some financial help or praying for us our just helping
us stay sane. Haha. Might I just add here again, how grateful we are to all who
helped us.
The most disappointing part of our status now was that no
one who had a say in the matter seemed to care. Many phone calls and emails to
the school admin were ignored and when answered, the responses were not
anything close to, “I’m so sorry for this inconvenience! We’ve/I’ve done
everything in my power to try to sort out this mess. But now we will just have
to wait. Again I’m sorry.” Nope. Nothing like that. In fact the responses
included round-a-bout excuses and phrases such as, “I don’t do favors.” It is
most disgruntling because the school lost our papers. We did not. So alas, we
just simply had to wait. After imposing on the Wright’s for four days and nights,
and how grateful we were for their kindness, we decided we would impose on them
no further and thought we’d be able to better ‘try to relax’ if we had our own
space. So we got ourselves a hotel room. Just let me insert here the caliber of
husband that I am blessed with, he did all our laundry in the bathtub of our
hotel. Now that’s a real man. I must say that I remained in a bit of a mood for
the most part… (Sorry Josh) until early Monday afternoon, when we had received
the good news that our paperwork had finally been submitted. However I was still holding my breath, and
would continue to do so until we had successfully crossed through immigration
in Statia. We did find time in St. Maarten to enjoy ourselves under the
circumstances.
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| Our little fam. |
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| Eden :) |
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| Fay :) |
Our brains were restless with the thought of the possibility
that we might not be able to return to Statia soon enough and would have to
return home for a semester, and what all that would mean. We ate lots of pizza
and pasta and gelato. I read my kindle. We played at the beach and at the pool.
(Freezing) We did a big grocery shop at Cost-U-Less on Monday evening that
would ship to Statia that Wednesday. Tuesday morning came and we got ready to
make that familiar trip back to Statia. Off to the airport we went, checked in,
through passport control, through security, waited at our gate… and waited… and
waited… until we finally boarded our little 20-seater puddle jumper, which
contained four passengers other then ourselves. It’s such a white knuckle
little flight over the ocean; thank goodness that it’s only about 20 minutes
long! Well we landed, de-boarded made it to immigration second inline this
time… they turned us around AGAIN!
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| Statia, sweet Statia. |
Just kidding J
HEHE They let us in this time! AND the lady even apologized for the
inconvenience. What a relief it was to walk on through and see Katie and Lucy
Bridge waiting for us. The feeling of happiness that we felt after finally,
finally arriving at our home away from home, was indescribable.
Now here we are getting back into the swing of things and it
is wonderful. Of course we miss home, we always do, but there’s something to be
said about being in your own home. (Insert sigh of relief here.)
… And you’re welcome to come visit anytime J
