Our marriage registration saga continues. We went again on Friday and were told to wait. After waiting for hours, we were again told to wait. Sam got angry and the marriage registration officer threatened us, saying to me, “Tell your husband if he raises his voice, I will throw you out, not register your marriage and make you suffer.” When told this was our third visit, he said we would have to come ten times if he wanted us to. And then, of course, he made sure we would. We were called back on Monday.

The three of us (including my father for good measure) got there before 11 a.m. this morning and left after 4.30 p.m. I’d like to tell you that these six hours were a productive use of our time, but no, all we did was wait. For him to accept our paperwork and put it into processing. That’s right. This is my fifth day off work so that some incompetent guy from the government can look at my paperwork and say, okay, these are the documents we need. Anyway, thankfully, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel. We have a date approximately one month from now, in August, when we’ll get our marriage certificate. In the meantime, we have to go to the local police station and get them to verify that we do actually live where we say we live.

In most countries, when you get married it’s official immediately. In India, there’s no such thing. That’s why you hear about so many gay weddings– they’re getting married in the eyes of God or family or whatever, but in the eyes of the government, they’re not because they haven’t submitted the paperwork. Because the priests or officiators have no legal authority, you’re not legally married (ETA: officially registered) and given a certificate until you’ve gone through this entire time suck (which most people don’t). That’s pretty much our situation right now– we’re married, but in the eyes of the government our marriage doesn’t yet exist on paper. Inefficient? Well, of course. This is India.

Sam and I spent the six hours contemplating why we hadn’t just gone to Vegas instead, and imagining gory ways to make this guy feel pain, and because we’ve recently been watching the last season of 24, we got very creative.

I came back to a box of books though and that cheered me up immediately (I love you, flipkart.com) and now I’m off to salvage what’s left of my day.

How’s your Monday going?