"When I had a Fulbright in Warszawa. . ." II

Dear Ms. _______________,

I am writing you today with the hope that you might be able to help me. My name is [Chrzanka] and I am a student Fulbrighter currently living in Warsaw. According to my contract, I am scheduled to return to the States in June 2002. However, a not so minor problem may prevent me from doing so.

I am a dual citizen of both the United States and Poland. I was born in Poland; however, I have spent the majority of my life in the States. As a dual citizen, I have two passports and I entered Poland on my Polish passport. The problem is that my Polish passport expired on [date].

My attempt to renew my passport two weeks ago at the Mazowiecki Urzad Wojewodzki w Warszawie was unsuccessful. Therefore, I went to the main Passport Office at Plac Bankowy on Wednesday, [date] in order to try again.

As it turns out, renewing my Polish passport in Poland is more complicated than it should be and it will require even more time to process my paper work than it would if I were not a dual citizen. My problem stems from the fact that my Polish passport was issued in Chicago in 1992 by the Polish Consulate. Because of this, I have to write a letter explaining my circumstances and I need to wait two months, instead of the usual 6 weeks, before I can get my new Polish passport. I still have not submitted my paperwork to the Passport Office because I am missing a bit of information that every Polish citizen has, that is the "PESEL" or "numer ewidencyny" [like a social security number].

In theory, because I was born in Poland I should have this number on record somewhere. However, I found out today that I do not have this number because I was too young to receive one when my family emigrated to the States. Therefore, I need to apply for one now.

This matter worries me because I really was counting on returning to the States in mid-June. Moreover, I need to change the date of my return airplane ticket very soon. I purchased it when there were no return dates fro June available. Therefore, I am working with a very short timeline. My question to you is whether there is a way in which I can bypass this process and enter the States on my American passport instead of having to go through the hassle of renewing my Polish passport in Poland.

I would appreciate any advice that you can offer me regarding this situation.

Sincerely,
[Chrzanka]

P.S. You may be wondering why I did not renew my passport in the States. Well, I naively accepted the advice of the Polish Consul in Los Angeles and decided to take care of the matter in Poland. At that time, I had no idea that taking care of something that is relatively simple in the States would be so difficult in Poland. Moreover, I was living in the Bay Area at the time and my circumstances did not allow me to travel all the way to Los Angeles to renew my passport.

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Wednesday, March 27, 2002

Dear Madam,

I am sorry to hear about your problem. You will, however, understand that we are not responsiable for attitude of every person working in Poland. If you are not satisfied with the service please report it to the
superiors of the lady you talked about. I can also advice you to ask during the conversation with superiors
about this birth certificate which according to my knowledge in not needed in your
case ( due to para 2 point 1 of Ordinance of 10 March 1999 with regard to documents needed in order to get passport). The lady was also wrong saying that you should apply for passport here [the United States].
You have every right to apply in Warsaw and she knows that. In conclusion let me state that you had the bad luck to meet the person who was not fully prepared to deal with more complicated case such as
yours.

Regards,
__________, consul

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Yeah, thanks a lot!