Being an American, I am fully aware of the lack of confidence held by the general public regarding the accuracy and efficiency of the US Postal System. I conveniently ignored this well-known fact when I decided to mail my passport to the Ghana Embassy for a visa. I was in school finishing up the spring semester, far from the Washington D.C. embassy. I mailed my recently renewed (as of March 30th) passport via priority mail, with a tracking number, and included another stamped, pre-addressed priority mail envelope (with yet another tracking number) inside for the Embassy to mail it back to my local address in Laurel, MD since I would be back from school by then. In an alternate universe, I called the Ghana Embassy and asked them to hold my passport and visa until I could come pick it up in person.
However, in this universe, I was royally screwed.
A change-of-address notice which had been placed for the Laurel address to forward my mail to my school address in Worcester, MA was still in place, which directly countered the more recent change-of-address notice I had just obtained to send my Worcester mail back to Laurel... hence, the dilemma. My passport and newly granted visa, along with my certificate of vaccination against yellow fever, disappeared into the black hole of lost mail. Fun Fact: Did you know that once a package begins a forwarded journey, no one in the post office world tracks it anymore? Yep. Good to know…
The time frame I was working with was as follows. I find out the post office had no idea where my passport was—even what state it might be in—on Monday. I am scheduled to leave for Ghana on Saturday. Tuesday I frantically make phone calls, visited the Ghana Embassy to explain my situation, and picked up a replacement vaccination certificate ($5). Wednesday morning was the earliest possible appointment I could get for the Passport Agency. I waited in line starting at 9am, pled my case, and luckily was given permission to pick up my replacement passport ($160) at 2pm. At 1:30pm I arrived to wait for my passport, after which I ran it to the Ghana Embassy before they closed at 3pm. I paid another $100 for an expedited visa, for which they said I could pick up at 2:30pm on Thursday. Another fun fact: They close at 3pm, and are not open on Fridays, and I had to leave on Saturday… no pressure…
Finally Thursday afternoon, with my passport and visa in hand, and roughly $300 poorer, I breathed a sigh of relief and began to think about the other essentials I hadn’t had time to think about due to the passport fiasco—packing, bringing what I need for my research, resubmitting my IRB application to the university, paying bills, attempting to fix the forwarded mail situation, etc. Friday night was my last night in town and I spent the night with friends and my boyfriend, Sean, and my brother came out too. It was a good night, and really good to finally see everyone I’d missed. After I borrowed money from a friend since the passport thing set me back financially a bit, my brother walked me to my car and we said goodbye. I remembered my rent check was still in my purse and my brother offered to slip it in the mailbox when he got home. At 2am, I got a text message from my brother explaining he’d put my rent check in the mailbox, and found a forwarded priority mail envelope: my long lost passport. Of course. At least I have closure.
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