Ancora in attesa (still waiting)...

Trevi fountain

Bureaucracy is bad, we all know that.  But Italian bureaucracy is really, really bad.  Michael was planning to go to Chicago on Thursday to pick up our passports.  But he decided to first call and make sure that they had not put the passports in the mail rendering the trip useless.  He was told - "oh no you cannot come get your passports or the whole process will stop - you must send an email explaining that you both need your passports and want to continue the process".   I sent that email and was told "we are working on it and we cannot return your passports until the process is completed". 

Spanish Steps

 So... Michael wanted to wait and see if they would mail the passports in time for the flight.  Needless to say they did not.  Not only did they not mail them they also ignored requests for some sort of time frame (vague as it might be) in order for us to re-book the flight.  For the second time we changed the date on the flight (at a cost of 800.00!!!!).  It was a total guess as to how much more time to allow since we received no guidance whatsoever. 

View from the top of the Spanish Steps

  

This is it, the last flight change.  We cannot continue with this as it is not affordable and there is no end in sight.  Our new flight will depart on April 2nd and this time we will most definitely be on board.  I do not have any faith that the process will be completed by then.  In the end, we will likely have thrown a lot of money away.  So sad...

Street in Rome

While we are saddened and dismayed we are still trying to keep our issues in perspective.  After all we are not carrying our belongings in a backpack and fleeing from war.  We are still able to return to Italy - just maybe not in the way we chose.  Whatever happens we will manage - there is always a Plan B 😏.