Greek Odyssey: Part II

As I began this post I searched for quotes from Greek philosophers in my Bartlett’s about overcoming obstacles, succeeding in the face of adversity, and on how exactly you get Greek consulates to return your phone calls. I didn't find much in any of the three categories in Bartlett's. There were scant quotes about triumphing over obstacles unless I was wiling to count Anthony Robins or Napoleon Hill as honorary Greeks. And, in regards to the third and most important category there was zippity-dip-opolis, that, my friends is Greek for bubkis, squat, nil and nada---or so I hear.

What I did find was a quote by the poet Horace, or Quintus Horatius Flaccus as his mother called him when he was in trouble, or the name his possy called him, i.e. Virgil and L.V.R., Hory-Master Q. Okay, okay, I know what you are going to say. 'Belette, Horace was Roman and not Greek.' True enough. But, he was educated in Athens and he had Greek long stay visa---and that makes him more of a Greek than, say, Zig Ziggler, Wayne Dyer or Stephen Covey. I mean, can you imagine Covey in a toga?

And, as my adversity and obstacles are Greek in nature I thought it best to seek inspiration from someone who has actually lived in Greece not just from someone who may occasionally enjoy a Greek salad at the Hilton before there seminar on "Million Dollar Sales Secrets."
Hory-Master Q said: “Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant.”

Word, Hory. That is absolutely spot on. In my personal Odyssey with the Greeks I have learned that I have enormous perseverance. Like I have said before, I have had to call the consulate every day for almost two weeks and they were not returning my calls. I remember at one point I said to He-weasel as we were both growing increasingly frustrated with the process, " I will prevail. They will return my calls; oh, yes they will." I was taken aback by my tone; it sounded like a line from the show Heroes. I was also struck by the way He-weasel responded, "Yes," he paused, "I know you will." There was something about the certainty in both of us that gave me a keener insight into my gifts of endurance and perseverance. I will not be stopped. There is a record somewhere in the world that proves that He-weasels's grandfather is Greek and I will find it with our without my super powers of perseverance. Hmm, a red cape with the letters "LBR" emblazoned on it might be nice.

A few weeks ago we hit a dead end in regards to proving He-weasel's Greek grandfathers nationality. The problem is that he was born in Smyrna, which is now a city in Turkey called Izmir. And, as I have explained before, according the Greeks, even though Smyrna was Greek when He-weasel's grandfather was born there it is now a part of Turkey and that makes He-weasel's grandfather a Turk. Um, well, not really. So then what? With that logic or lack of it, we were told our only other option is to find a place in Greece that is now and always was Greece in which He-weasel's grandfather was registered as a resident. Sounds simple? Ha-ha-ha-he-heee-ho-ho-ho.... No, not simple. We called every remaining family member in the He-weasel family tree. As close as we could get to the name of a village in Greece where He-weasel's Grandfather resided is when we talked to a great aunt and she vaguely remembered that the family had once lived on the island of Samos in a city that means deep in Greek. But, she didn't know how to say "deep" in Greek.

This was a moment when my beloved weasel thought it was all over. That was such a vague and random clue. But, this is when my weasel whiskers got to wiggling. I went to Babelfish and I typed in the word "deep." Then I translated it from Greek to English. The result was "βαθιά." I then copied and pasted that into the Google search engine. As soon as I found a result I asked Google to translate the page and that is when I found that βαθιά means Vathi. He-weasel's grandfather had lived in the town of Vathi, Samos.

I immediately sent an email to the registrar of Vathi expecting that she would write me back, as is the custom. Nope. I have since sent an email to almost every person who has an email address at the Municipality of Vathi, including but not limited to the Webmaster and the dogcatcher. As of yet, I have not received a reply from anyone. Okay, maybe it is a language issue. Maybe my English email is Greek to them. So, I decided to call. For a week, each morning I was getting up at 4 a.m. to call every number on the Municipality of Vathi web page trying to find someone who could tell me how I could get a hold of the person who could help me get He-weasel's grandfather's registration records. I found no one who could help me.

Finally, the Greek consulate returned my call. For the sake of the consulate worker's privacy I will call her Helen of Houston. Helen apologized profusely and told me once again that she could not help me as He-weasel's grandfather had lived in New York City. I explained to her that New York had said that they couldn't help me because we live in Texas. This is one of the many things that suck about consulates that each get to set their own policy. I suppose the easiest solution would to be to move to NYC.

I somehow managed to talk Helen into requesting grandpa's registration records from Vathi. I figured that was a start. Once we get the records I will then need to somehow see if I can get the NY and the Houston consulate to talk to each other and decide which of them can help me. That task will require negotiation skills that I am not sure I have. But, as Hory-Master Q said, “Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents....” If it turns out that I don't have the necessary negotiation skills I will resort to crying.

Helen of Houston told me we should hear back from Vathi this week, which probably means we will hear anything for a month or more as the Greeks seem to be running on antiquity time and not on the Eastern European Time Zone as is reported. While we are waiting there is still much to be done.

We have received all the birth, marriage and death records that Greece requires. However, we now need to get all the U.S. records apostillated. For those of you who don't know what apositillation is please do not feel bad, I didn't either. What apostillation is the process of a documenting the seal and the signature of a birth certificate, marriage license or death certificate.

We got our marriage license aposillated. In California the secretary of state does the entire apostillation process. Sure it cost us almost $100 to do so, but in the scheme of Greek citizenship that ain't nothing; a drop in the Agean, so to speak. However, as the bulk of our records come from New York it is going to be harder. In New York we need to get each and every record apostillated by the city, county and state. And, they will not do all three at once. So we have to send the records to the city and wait to receive the apostillation and then resubmit it to the county and then again with the state. Or, we can pay a processor $200 per document or we can just fly to New York and get them all done in one day.

No matter how many calls I have to make, how many papers I have to order, and how many checks I have to write--- I will not be stopped. There is an EU passport with He-weasel's name on it and all I have to do is keep at it---even when it feels as if I have lost the track of how to find it. Inch by inch, Greek citizenship is a cinch. Yard by yard dealing with bureaucracy is hard. Or as the famous diplomat, inventor, and philosopher Benjicus Franklinoplous said, "if at first you don't succeed, call, call, call the consulate once again."