Legality!

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As of two days ago, only 7 months after my arrival in Marseille and the beginning of my contract with a governmental agency, I am no longer an undocumented alien worker but a legal foreign scientist! How very liberating.

Though I needed a work visa before I could even leave the US and I received a temporary Carte de Sejour a couple months later when the visa ran out, this temporary card expired way back in January and my attempts at renewal were met with complete non-responses from my unhelpful CNRS Representative. (Ironically, when I first arrived, I was assured that as a CNRS employee, rather than a student, the agency would take care of all of my immigration needs so I wouldn’t have to deal with this ugly bureaucracy myself.)

I was told I had to wait for an official summoning from the Prefecture before I could receive my permanent card, so I waited. Waited through the expiration of my temporary card, waited through the application for a second temporary card, and waited as it became clear that this second application was never going to be processed and I was thus probably not technically working legally anymore.

Then, glory be, at the end of January (note: 5 months post-arrival), I got my postcard in the mail telling me I could go to the Prefecture to pick up my real Carte de Sejour!

J’ai l’honneur de vous informer que le titre de séjour que vous avez sollicité est a votre disposition…

When I went to the Prefecture, Window B, where I was supposed to present my documents, was closed, and there was a monstrous line queued up for the other windows. I wandered around until I found an unoccupied employee, showed her the postcard, and explained the Window B dilemma.

Luckily for me, she quizzed me on the items I had brought. Yes, along with the postcard for my appointment, I had my passport, my temporary card, and this special stamp of 300 Euros. How about my official medical certificate? No. She claimed I should have received an appointment with a government doctor and that I couldn’t get my card until I had been checked for various diseases. I argued that this wasn’t necessary for me because on the list of things I needed to present to pick up my card, the line with “certificat medical” had been crossed out, much like the 70 Euro fee line had been crossed out (and 300 Euros written in its place).

This woman was not convinced and told me to go away until I had been convoked and had my medical certificate in-hand. Could I go to any old doctor to get checked out? No, only the official doctors could perform the requisite tests. So could I call up these doctors to schedule an appointment? Again, no – I had to wait until they contacted me and gave me whatever appointment they felt like. Hopefully I’d be in town.

So the waiting recommenced. I waited while I flew home on a spur-of-the-moment grad school interview process and then back to France (entering on a tourist visa this time).

After a while I started harassing the secretary of the lab to harass the CNRS HR person to figure out what was going on with my medical appointment. Unfortunately, it seemed to be nothing, until last week – when I got a letter informing me I was being convoked on Tuesday at 8:30am chez les medecins.

I arrived at the office to find an enormous crowd of people murmuring angrily in front of a pair of doors. It wasn’t clear to me how one gained access to this inner sanctum, which was presumably where the official doctors did their sacred check-up work. I had an appointment, but I assumed all these other angry people did too, so I milled around a bit trying to figure out what was going on. Extremely fortunately for me, a woman who entered just after me pushed her way up to the doors and marched right in. Since no one threw her out, I figured this was a good plan of action and so did the same.

I wandered up a couple of flights of stairs, handed my appointment slip to the receptionists, who had a discussion between themselves about whether I was worthy to pass to the examination. As one of them glanced through my file, she said, “Ah, elle a été convoké par Isabelle!” and promptly ushered me in. Apparently Isabelle is someone good to have as your convoker.

After more waiting around, some routine exams and an x-ray of my lungs (which I got to keep!) they gave me my approved medical certificates and I marched right off to the Prefecture with them to get my card. More waiting around (but nothing particularly unexpected), and 3 hours after I began, I became the proud owner of a French Carte de Sejour! I am now legal and official and can pretend I’m a tiny bit European.

And since the card lists the type of visa I have, I am now officially a card-carrying scientist.