everything is possible. but it's rarely easy.

We moved to this province four years ago.  And we never changed our home address on our drivers licenses.  Mostly because we avoid government bureaucracy like the plague.  Also because we knew several other foreigners who tried to move their licenses to this province and failed... each of them heard the ever-so-helpful "I'm sorry, we can't help.  You'll have to go back to where your license was issued to fix this problem."

Seeing as how returning to the issuing city (in our case, a one hour flight south) to visit yet another government office didn't sound appealing, we dug in our heels, prepped our paperwork, and headed out to get our spot in line.

The clock was ticking.  Our licenses expire in May, and we knew that we couldn't renew them as long as they were still based in our old city.

And we did it!  I got really nervous standing in line (bummer too, since it was a long line, so the butterflies in my stomach just kept churning and churning and churning).  I don't have a history of good experiences in offices like these, and I knew that there was a slight bump in the road I was hoping to travel - long story but not all of my paperwork lined up like it should have since I renewed my US passport recently and my drivers license is linked to my old passport number.  

So when the lady behind the desk said "I'm so sorry, you can't renew yet, you can only renew within a 90 day window of the expiration date... but, I can at least change the data over so that you have a license issued in this province", well, I was elated.  I didn't tell her that Matt and I were the first foreigners we knew of to successfully maneuver this crossroads.  I didn't want to prompt her to go looking for some sort of code we were violating!

We walked out of that government compound with a spring in our step!  One trip to the local police station, one trip to a eye exam clinic at a local hospital, two trips to a photocopy place, one trip to get our photos made, another trip to pick up the printed photos, and two hours at the drivers license office this morning all added up to success!

Of course, we still have to go back in April to do the actual renewal.  And we'll have to retrace our steps - again visiting the police station and the eye exam clinic - but the actual renewal should be a lot less complicated!

We celebrated with a quick lunch.  And a sigh of relief.

[Thank goodness Grandma and Grandpa were here to man the fort at home!]