Travels to Toronto, Part Two!

The morning of our appointment at the French Consulate dawned not too early, and we all dressed in something other than our standard blue jeans and t-shirts. ;) (A friend commented to me that she would be tempted to arrive at the interview in cut-off shorts and a ratty t-shirt, as a way to thumb her nose at the French 'establishment' and their rules and requirements.) We actually arrived on time, an appropriate 10 minutes early for our interviews, and thus started the "interview". In reality, our documents were slid through a drawer to the other side of the glass partition, we were matched to our passport photos, my husband answered a couple of questions, then a couple more, we retrieved most of the documents we brought to the Consulate back from the drawer, and then we waited, and waited some more as the children counted construction cranes seen and sirens heard from the 22nd floor of the office tower. After a grand total of 65 minutes in the French Consulate office, we left our passports with the official, and left the building.

I felt flat. Let down. Such was the anticipation of booking tickets and hotels and gathering documents and securing translations and packing and flying, only to leave without knowing for sure (it was positively received, with words along the lines of 'when' we receive our visas) left us all a little frazzled. We adjourned to our hotel for lunch, and a nap for Miss M.

The rest of the day passed very quietly for us - a walk, an in-room movie (a never-before experienced treat for our frequent travelers), and pizza. We were up early, and caught our flight back home to Saskatchewan. The drive back to our community was uneventful, and we were all so very happy to be home!!

Now, the waiting...