Lessons From My Italian Citizenship Appointment

Do you find that what allows you to be an absolute boss of a project manager at work filters over to your personal life?

I do.

I write and talk a lot about peppering your personal story into you company’s brand and leveraging social media groups to connect over your brand.

I’ve been doing both of those things in my quest to be an Italian citizen, which I referenced in my last personal story blog post.

The content of this post has been modified from what I originally wrote in a Tap Talk community. I had recently returned from my appointment at the Miami Consulate to turn in my jure sanguinis application packet, and I wrote about my experience.

What My Miami Appointment Was Like

While preparing my application packet for my consular appointment, I had daydreams of walking into a private office where I met a counselor officer sitting behind beautiful cherry mahogany desk. Speaking in Italian, I presented my application packet to her, and she was both impressed with my organization and my Italian.

Well, things didn’t go exactly as I had dreamed.

I did speak in Italian during my entire time appointment. But… when communicating with the consular officer, I stood on one side of a glass panel and he was on the other side. He’d tell me what document he wanted to see, then I’d find it in my binder and hand it to him through a small opening in the window.

As I gave him all of my documents, he inspected them, gave me his comments, then I paid. He went into the back for about 10 minutes and I sat down in a waiting area until he came back.

The whole process was rather underwhelming. Reality often times does not measure up to daydreams. But I did learn a lot from the meeting, and I write a few key takeaways below.

Lessons From My Consulate Experience

Lesson #1: Book your citizenship appointment when it’s midnight in Rome.

The consular booking system is updated every day at midnight in Rome. That’s 6 p.m. in Miami. So I set a reminder on my calendar and an alarm on my phone to check for a citizenship appointment every weekday. Instead of having to wait a year or more, I got an appointment in a few days.

Note that this tip is only available to those who are available to travel to Miami on a few days notice.

Lesson #2: If you have to travel to Miami, stay with locals in the area.

I say this tip, because I saw that people in various online communities were posting about the luxury hotels they were staying in, and the rides they were getting to the consulate.

The Miami consulate is actually in Coral Gables, a very walkable area with a lot of comfy and friendly Airbnb hosts. There are also plenty of cafes and restaurants around.

If you need to wait for the consulate to open, check out Cafe Demetrio . It’s a charming spot only a few minutes walk from the consulate.

Lesson #3: Show up early to your appointment.

Every available slot that I saw for citizenship appointments at this consulate were at 9 a.m. That is when the consulate opens, but the building is open before then. And the lobby of the building has very comfy couches for you to wait on.

I got there at 8:45 and there was already a group of people there. If you get there earlier than I did, you’ll have more of a chance to be the first in line. This may be something you’ll want to do, because there were a lot more people who came to the consulate right at 9 a.m., and they had to form a line about 20–30 people long.

Lesson #4: Bring your state of bliss.

Whatever mental bliss is for you, come prepared to access it while you are talking with the consular officer.

From previous experience, I know the grumpy reputation that bureaucrats have (Note that I don’t limit this to Italian bureaucrats. I have some stories from Miami too.) So, your own state of bliss may be the only thing that makes your appointment successful.

I say this because as opposed to getting the nice woman officer that people talk about working at the Miami consulate, I got Don Francesco. (I add the Italian use of Don here to show respect and also because his first name will be important later.)

Don Francesco either needed to drink more coffee that morning, or woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Whatever it was, he kept sighing more heavily each time I asked a question.

But I kept asking questions, because the consulates refuse to give any answers unless you are standing in front of them.

I persisted and got my answers despite Don Francesco’s heavy sighs and less than jubilant comments.

Lesson #5: Be prepared to amend documents.

I say this tip because I know a lot of Italian immigration stories started in Pennsylvania (like mine). But it takes a court order and a lawyer to change a document after the relative has passed away.

In my case, nearly all of my documents are from New Jersey (grazie a Dio), so I was able to amend spelling changes easily and cheaply.

But one PA document alone was going to double to cost of this entire project.

I decided to find a lawyer who could amend my PA document, but not actually hire her unless the consulate said I needed to.

My heart sunk a bit when Don Francesco told me I’d have to amend that document. But as soon as I left my appointment, I called the lawyer who already had all my information, and I got the ball rolling for that court order.

Lesson #6: ALL the names and dates matter.

I am applying through my grandfather’s father, because my Italian grandmother’s side has a history of changing names and confused birthdates. My Italian grandfather’s side kept their names relatively unchanged.

I understood that I needed to make sure all the spellings of names and dates were correct and consistent for the side of my family that traced back to a single Italian-born relative. My grandmother married into the family, and I did notice that on two documents her last name was “Di Francesco” and on one document it was spelled “De Francisco”.

I didn’t think that this small change of an “i” to an “e” would be an issue.

Well, it was.

I am convinced that because Don Francesco has a lifetime of knowing how his own name is spelled, that he quickly picked up on the variation of spelling.

This was not only not part of my daydream, it was also not a detail addressed by any of the consultants I talked to. But it’s a rather easy fix, since the document is from New Jersey.

If I were to do this again, I’d save myself the $25 amendment fee and $25 additional apostille and get every single name and date matching — even for those who marry into the family.

Lesson #7: Be clear on your next steps.

The consulate is not necessarily in the business of making sure you understand what you need to do. So, be sure to summarize what you understand from the officer.

I made sure to ask Don Francesco, “So, according to you, once I update my Grandfather’s birth certificate, I will have an application that will be successful?”

He said “yes”.

I’m so glad I asked for clarification.

He then told me where to send the documents and what I could expect to happen after that. And at that, it was my turn for a sigh… but a sigh of relief.

I later learned that he didn’t have to allow me to mail in the amended documents. But also that applicants who spoke good Italian had an easier time at the appointment. Maybe this was a nicety I was granted because I cared enough to learn Italian. I’ll never know for sure, so I’ll run with that idea.

Resources That I Used

Why should you care about what I did?

Well, because even though I’m not a citizen yet, I’m confident that I will be.

That is because I found several people to help me along the way. Below are the sites that I found the most helpful.

(1) My Italian Citizenship. This website is really what got me started on this whole process. It educated me, then diligently got my documents from Italy. They also offer a genealogical research service. I was very please with this, because the emailed me results before they charged me. These results were very exciting for my entire extended Italian family.

(2) Visure In Rete. My Italian Citizenship may take months to find your documents in Italy, and they do not answer questions by email. If that makes you uncomfortable, then go with a private company like this one. I paid a few euros extra and got my questions answered quickly and got regular updates on their progress for finding old documents from a small town in Abruzzo.

(3) Family Echo. I used this online family tree to map out the connections of my huge Italian family, keep track of important dates, and make notes of important life occurrences for each person. This not only helped me stay organized, but it also helped me build up the life stories of all of my family that passed away before I could know them.

(4) Get Italian Citizenship. Audra De Falco was quick to get back to my questions, and helped me understand my options for applying in Italy versus applying at a consulate. *Note that she did this free of charge.

(5) Italy Mondo. I wanted to make sure all my documents were ready to go before I got to the consulate. I contacted Italy Mondo and they gave me a free consultation with Peter Farina, who has been working as a jure sanguinis consultant seemingly for as long as the niche has been around.

I shared a spreadsheet with Peter and his team with links to scanned copies of all my documents (I share a copy of this document below). Peter looked over all of them, then called me and told me what I’d need to amend and what to expect when either applying at a consulate or in Italy. * Note that he did this free of charge.

(6) Fast Italian Translation. I did a comparison of a few different translators, and found that Alberto Cioni has quite a bit of experience with jure sanguinis translations, and he has a lot of positive reviews. His prices were fair. But what I didn’t know is how fast he would be! Just as his company name implies, he’s super fast with his turn around! He’s also very responsive, and we had a nice email conversation about our common business goals.

(7) Tibbot and Richardson. To get a court order in Pennsylvania to amend my grandfather’s birth certificate, I called 5 family lawyers, the law library for the county, and the records department for the state. None of them could tell me exactly what to do to get the document amended.

Then I called this law firm and spoke to both Attorneys Dana Richardson, Beth Tibbott, and Kristie. They were all super friendly and they get s*** done. That’s exactly how I like it to be.

They were my first call after my consular appointment.

(8) Rick Zullo’s Blog and Podcast. Rick is a fellow Italian American from South Florida, and he lived in Rome for a number of years and shared his experiences.

I found his podcast The Fatal Charm of Italy to be both entertaining and informative. He interviewed dozens of Americans living in Italy and asked them about their take on the experience.

If you listen to enough interviews, you start to see themes. Maybe you can imagine your slice of reality amongst the people he interviews.

This resource is to give you motivation to keep on going!

(9) Dual U.S.-Italian Citizenship Facebook Group. I found out about this group after I had my consular appointment and all of my paperwork was accepted. So this group was not pivotal to my experience, but it has calmed my nerves a bit. The moderators of the group have been consulting people for years on what steps to take.

There are also people in the group (like me) who have learned quite a bit about the journey they’ve been on to become Italian, and they are happy to help others where they can.

What does this all mean?

I hope this post is helpful either because you are pursuing Italian dual citizenship through your family heritage, or because you run your own microbusiness and want to use post as a model to provide really helpful content and connect with others.

Wherever you are in this process and whatever project you are working on, in bocca al lupo! I’m wishing you the very best of luck and good fortune.

Originally published at https://backstoryfirst.com on November 7, 2019.