My Citizenship Dni Is Ready And Will Be Delivered Next Week!

[Ceviche]

Was Bajo able to get citizenship for you?

not for me. but for many ppl I know of.

 

[arlean]

Thanks Ceviche. Napoleon said Gabriel told him he was not eligible so he went to Bajo. What I meant--I was asking Napoleon if Bajo WAS able to get his citizenship and how long it took him to do it.

Thanks for your response anyway, it's appreciated. But Napoleon, are you still out there?

 

[Ceviche]

Thanks Ceviche. Napoleon said Gabriel told him he was not eligible so he went to Bajo.

Unfortunately, after i had finished 24 months in, 2010, in Argentina both Cerano and ARCA (Lorena) told me I must complete 5 yrs of residency in Argentina to be eligible for citizenship.

Look at the present day website of ARCA. Its a joke!

http://www.argentina...p-passports.htm

Luckily, I encountered this forum in 2011 and the posts of "SteveinBA" and I was inspired to take the reigns of my case in my own hands and pursue my case devoid of any legal help.

Though frequent posts here on this forum, by Bajo cero on citizenship matters was used by me ( at no costs) for the benfit of my case.

 

[arlean]

So did it work? Are you a citizen? Or are you still working on it?

Yes I know about ARCA. They told me that too, probably in about 2006. They and the people I went with both told me what you were told. I didn't hear from a single source that it could be done otherwise. The bad information caused me to not be present when my mother died because she took a bad turn while I was renewing my residency--which was completely unnecessary from the start. This is why people need all the help we can give them. People are damaged by this stuff.

 

[Ceviche]

So did it work? Are you a citizen? Or are you still working on it? Yes I know about ARCA.

yes, i have made a full report of my case on the forum in other citizenship threads. All went well. I am a citizen for more than a year now.

 

[jantango]

When the doorbell rang at 12:30 today, I knew it was the mailman with my DNI. It took 19 days from processing to delivery, and 14-1/2 years in Argentina to have it.

 

[Napoleon]

Napoleon, was Bajo able to get your citizenship? And how long did it take. Do you remember?

Currently in the States visiting family and friends, but unfortunately I'm house sitting at a house with either messed up WiFi or a changed password. And my cell package (pre-paid like Argentina, but without the AR$1/day 3G option) doesn't help me out in the WiFi category either. The internet was "invented in the US" (I'll pass on getting technical) and yet it's much more difficult for me to use it than in Argentina. Oh the irony...

My case:

Cerano said I didn't qualify for a visa because:
-I didn't have a company than wanted to sponsor me.
-I didn't have a person (wife or girlfriend) who was wealthy enough to show that they could spare an extra US$2,000/month to support me.
-I didn't have US$2,000/mo to wire into a bank account here.

So there was nothing he could do.

I started with Bajo basically in February of 2011 and at first I wanted to be kept in the loop on everything that was happening, as it was happening, but eventually I saw that filling out a Power of Attorney on this case would speed things up. In fact, there were several things that could have sped up the process.
-Filing a Power of Attorney form from the outset
-Getting the FBI Finger Prints sent in ASAP (didn't do this and it wasted ~6+ months)
-Getting the Apostille Stamp on my FBI approval immediately (didn't do this and it wasted another ~year)
-Not taking an extended vacation/visit to the States (last year I was out of the country for most of August->December)
--because a family/friend annual vacation turned into a short term freelance job during the tourist low season of Argentina...
--and then my father had health concerns and I wanted to be here for Thanksgiving & his birthday.

Things out of my control were that:
-Bajo was just a few months into starting the fight that would change the process when I signed on with him.
-I was randomly assigned the worst possible judge from the start.
--Bajo realized this and let me know what the deal was. That being said, as of the last meeting I had with him, he hadn't lost a case, he just had some drastically slowed by judges.

I had already been in Buenos Aires nearly 4 years when I started this whole process. I came to take Spanish, then took a teaching English course to stay and make some money in 2007. Left for 3 months to get rid of things and to move out of my apartment in the US (California) and then returned in late February of 2008 and have been here ever since. I've mainly transitioned from English teacher to working in Turismo and so having a work visa hasn't been a major holdup to my life, but...

I did some voice over work in 2008 that could have led to other work if perhaps I had had a visa. Not having a visa/DNI/"legal status" to work... whatever. There are some other sectors that I've been interested in exploring, but I haven't considered them too much because as a perma-tourist, they were basically off limits.

In late 2009 I started dating an Argentine girl who was ready to get married immediately. While I didn't think that it was such a great idea to rush into things, I wasn't opposed to the idea. But the longer we dated (and I hadn't totally committed to a long-term relationship/marriage by proposing or saying "Let's have a baby."), the more skeptical she became about how committed I was to staying in Argentina. She wanted me to get legal status. And it was after we broke up for about the 8th to 10th time (or the 2nd or 3rd big break... which was our final breakup) in early July that I started my visa adventure. I spoke to that Cerano guy in late July or August of 2010 and he kind of sized me up as a poor prospect (both as far as options and probably financially as well) and said he couldn't do anything.

THAT is when I turned to Bajo. But I still was a little skeptical because he was trying something that hadn't been done before. I met him and I felt like his background as a criminal attorney had trained him to find laws and precedents that would help his clients "win" in the face of conventional wisdom or when going against the status quo. But I held off a bit until I found out that an English friend had started the process. That's when I decided to start the process.

Unfortunately between a busy November & December (on my part keeping me from stopping by Bajo's office) and the courts being closed in January, my case didn't really start until February of 2011.

FINAL QUESTION: Have I gotten citizenship yet?

ANSWER: If I were working on a doctorate, it would be basically an "a.b.d." (All But Dissertation) From early July through mid August I had to move out of my old apartment, into a short term rental, plus some orthodontist stuff, and finally to another place WHILE I was putting together something for an Italian TV station in addition to other turismo things... and I don't speak Italian, so I had to find a tri-lingual person as well. Bajo tried to set up a swearing in time, but it wasn't going to happen before my trip back home. It will happen A.S.A.P. upon my return... in addition to getting my braces off. (YEAH!)

I'll report on the final thing when I'm back in BsAs.

LAST NOTE: To get citizenship, you need to get two people who will vouch for you. One of my two is a friend who has worked in the court system for about 6 years, though she just got her law degree about 2 years ago from UBA. She's ~31 or 32, so not a kid and has worked with judges and around the courts for over half a decade. After she went to Bajo's office to sign a form, she reported to me that she was very impressed with my lawyer. She let me know that he knows his stuff and that she thought that I had done a good job finding him.

So that's where it stands. (It's late and I might have made some grammatical mistakes, but I'm posting this for now and maybe I'll correct grammar and punctuation tomorrow... maybe.)

 

[Napoleon]

Was there anything I left out?