Adventures of Legalizing My Thai Marriage Certificate in Belarus — Part 1
A story about the difficulties of legalizing a Thai marriage certificate in Belarus, bureaucratic delays and unexpected surprises
After I came to my senses after a slightly tiring flight, I decided to go about inviting my wife, and I was sure that it would go smoothly because I was well prepared. At least, I thought so.
Before flying to Belarus, my wife and I were actively trying to find out what we should do in Thailand to make everything go smoothly in Belarus, but the obstacles started already in the kingdom. Well, now let me tell you everything in order.
Are you ready?
Let’s fly then!
Thailand
The first thing I did was to ask my wife to call the Belarusian consulate in Thailand. My wife spoke in Thai to the consular officer and explained our situation. She said that she had married a Belarusian citizen in Thailand, and now she was planning to move to Belarus.
She added that we have been officially married for more than five years, but we do not know what we should do with the Thai marriage certificate, and in general, we do not know the procedure for how to legalise Thai documents so that they would be valid in Belarus.
In response, the co-worker only advised calling the Embassy of Belarus in Vietnam. At this stage, I learned that a consulate and an embassy are not the same thing.
In short, an embassy is a small representation of a country in another country. While a consulate is a kind of coordinating body, they are not authorised to issue passports, visas, or legalise documents.
The Consulate official also made it clear to my wife that there were no such cases in history, and they admitted that they did not know how to act in such a situation, so they advised me to contact the Embassy of Belarus in Vietnam.
Well, I wrote a long email with a detailed description of the situation, but there was no response. It should be explained that I trust letters more than phone calls because I can later prove that they didn’t answer me or gave me the wrong recommendations.
Anyway, there was no reply. We were running out of time, so I put on my detective hat and started my investigation.
I began studying the official websites of the Republic of Belarus. In particular, I read the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the pages of the Immigration Department. However, since there is no Belarusian Embassy in Thailand, the procedure for legalizing our marriage certificate remained vague.
I was thinking, “Let’s say there is no embassy in Thailand, but there should be a procedure for such situations? There are over 200 countries in the world and it is good if Belarus is represented in 40 of them; what about the rest?”
With these thoughts in mind, I started studying the websites of the state bodies of Belarus on the second round, and to them I connected the study of forums.
I reckoned that there must be similar cases with countries that also don’t have an embassy to legalize marriage certificates. So, I bought a bag of coffee and drowned in the digital world of documents.
Hours turned into days. I was like the main character from the film The Lawnmower Man, only instead of virtual buttons, I travelled through open windows with PDF files and whispered, “Close. Open. This is wrong — to the bin. Here — access denied.”
Once I finished my investigation, I called my wife into my abode. She came into the room and I told her everything I had managed to find out.
“Well … I called the Russian Embassy just in case, as it is authorized to cooperate with certain legal procedures for citizens of Belarus within the Union State. If you remember, I obtained an affidavit there to marry you?”
“Yeah, I remember,” she replied with hope in her eyes.
“Anyway, they can legalize our marriage certificate, but it will only be valid in Russia. They emphasised that we would not have this document accepted in Belarus. It’s probably about the seals, but I found out other things too.”
“What is it?”
“I found out that in the absence of an embassy, we need to get an Apostille from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for our marriage certificate, and it will be accepted in Belarus, but...”
“But?”
“But Thailand doesn’t do the Apostille as it is not a party to the Hague Agreement.”
After these words, my wife sighed heavily, “So what do we do now?”
“I don’t know for sure,” I sighed too, “but in other countries, in similar cases, they translate documents into English and then legalize them at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I think we should go the same way, and then, I’ll deal with it locally in Belarus.”
“Okay!” my wife immediately cheered up. “I can translate our document now, and then we can go to the ministry in Bangkok.”
“Oh, hold your horses,” her answer made me smile. “That should be handled by an authorized translator. I’ve already found probably the best company in Thailand — Sawadee Translations. Call them, please.”
Ten minutes later, my joyful wife comes up to me and says, “Everything is great! They’ll translate the documents and drive down to the MFA themselves, then mail the documents to us. We don’t have to go to Bangkok!”
“Cool! How long will all this take? And how much does it cost?” I asked in anticipation.
“The whole procedure will take about a week, but they said I need to get some more documents from the city government. The translation and legalization not only the marriage cetificate but also the application documents for that will cost 5,000 baht.”
“Hmm, with Thai MFA fees and postage included?”
“Yes!” she nodded with a smile.
“Okay. Let’s do it, and then you’ll send the documents to me in Belarus by EMS mail, and I’ll find out on the spot what to do next.”
“Okay,” my wife said, hugging me.
At this stage, we were overjoyed and were sure that only some trifling formalities would be left in Belarus and that I would be able to issue her an invitation as my legal spouse.
Little did we know about what we had to face later…
Belarus
After my exciting flight, I got the news that our legalized documents were in my wife’s hands and she was ready to send them to me. I should say that we were happy about Sawadee Translations, which took care of the documents.
It was a stack of documents, including one marriage certificate and three sheets with full details of witnesses to our marriage and other details, just in case. The company did everything quickly and properly.
This news pleased me, but in order not to waste time, I decided to deal with other documents in Belarus. First, I had a medical examination, as a result of which I was surprised to find out that I was healthy.
Despite having slightly deteriorated eyesight and lower blood pressure than usual, my heart and basic tests came back clear during my medical examination. I needed to undergo this examination in order to renew my Belarusian driver’s license and obtain Category A for motorcycles.
The first surprise came when I learned that I could easily legalize my Thai motorcycle driving license. This was possible because I had already completed training at a Belarusian driving school many years ago, so I didn’t need to take the theory test again.
I went to the police to make sure I was right. The second surprise was waiting for me there.
I was astonished that the police officers were very kind and helpful. I was even a little confused. They gave me a clear procedure and the sequence of my further actions. They also advised me not to re-issue a driver’s license for driving a passenger car without preparing all the documents for the motorcycle category in the first place.
Why? The thing is that in such a case, I would pay for the re-issue of documents once. Yet, if I renew the driving license of category B, then re-issue it with the addition of category A, I would pay twice.
“Am I definitely in Belarus? Or is it a dream?” I thought. I didn’t expect such care and attentiveness from the police officers.
As a result, I only needed to translate my Thai license from English into Russian, then notarize it, and then go to the police with these documents. I did it all in two days.
As you understand, very soon I received my license in categories A and B.
After that, I came home and began to write a letter to the migration department on a special site for appeals to government agencies. Of course, I could call, but I decided to write a letter to be answered for sure.
The letter was very long, as I described the situation and asked a lot of questions so that I would not have to write additional letters. Here I had the third pleasant surprise: two days after my appeal, the police called me.
I heard a very bright and ringing voice that radiated life. “Alexander, hello. I’m from the Immigration Department, and we have received your letter. Did you write it?”
"Yes, I did, that’s right. Hello,” I replied.
“Great. Look, we can write you back, but you may have further questions, and if it’s convenient for you, could you come over in person?”
“Yes, of course, that would be even better.”
“Great! When would it be convenient for you?”
“Let’s do it tomorrow; is it possible?”
“Yes. Tomorrow is my second shift, so come by after 12:30 and bring the marriage certificate with you.”
“Great, it’s a deal.”
“One more thing, will it be okay with you if we write an official response that we gave you full clarification in person, because, frankly, there’s no time to write full responses to everybody, hm?”
“Sure, that’s okay. I’m more than happy with that.”
“Great, then come back tomorrow; I’ll be waiting for you.”
That was the fourth surprise. To be honest, I didn’t expect the police officer to speak in the voice of a professional radio presenter. You know, that voice that radiates happiness when a person seems to adore their job.
I told my parents and my wife that it would probably not be long before I could issue an invitation. Everyone was excited.
…to be continued
