It's all our fault (and Brazil's bureaucracy's), but I'm still upset at the prospect of being stuck here longer

Ridiculous title, I know, you don't have to tell me.

Ridiculous situation to be in -- now I tell you. All because in the past some evil parent kidnapped his/her children and took them out of the country without the other parent's authorization. So now all parents need authorization to travel with their children without the other parent. Not only to leave the country, but also to move within the country using public transportation -- this I already knew, it was already like that when I lived here 13 years ago.

So, THE DUMB THING: we totally forgot to print out authorizations for me to travel with the boys and take them to a notary public where K needed to sign and have them notarized. We only remembered this past Sunday when we were taking K to the airport bus. We stopped and purchased some blank printing paper and he signed about 15 of them. Today I painstakingly assembled the authorizations (one for each boy, two copies of each, with printed color photos and all) and printed them on the signed papers. Then I took them to the notary public (one in which K already has his signature registered and "recognized" [firma reconhecida]) for notarization.

They couldn't notarize it, though. Because K needed to be there to sign in person. TOO BAD because he's in Philadelphia right now. HOW GREAT!

Now we're going to spend upwards of 100 dollars for K to drive to NY, pay the notarization fee at the Brazilian consulate and then mail the authorizations back express to us.

How fun. And the poor guy has his first phone interview tomorrow afternoon, so he won't even be able to pick up the authorizations and will have to go back to the consulate on Thursday and mail them only on Thursday! Unless we beg some kind soul to get the paper from K and retrive them in the afternoon. Or unless they are kind enough at the consulate to stamp and notarize the document WHEN HE'S THERE.

Bureaucracy RULES in any Brazilian government office or organization, though, so I don't know if they'd do this for him.

My apologies for the pathetic rant, it is all our fault after all... we should have remembered to go to the notary the day K got here. SIGH.

We're supposed to travel back home next Tuesday, the 19th. Wish us luck.

P.S. I was really really (pleasantly) surprised that I was able to travel with six-day-old Linton by plane from Connecticut to Texas and back. Here in Brazil this would NEVER EVER be possible. First, because one cannot travel using public transportation with a child in Brazil without the birth certificate. Not even the parents. Second, because as only one mother, I'd need the permission of the father.