🍕 Pizza Time In Phnom Penh 🌇 & And How We Got Scammed By The Ministry Of Foreign Affairs 🛃

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In times like these it's best to focus on the positive moments to distract myself from the disaster that has happened during our Phnom Penh trip.

A View Of Queen Mansion 👸

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     We've arrived in Phnom Penh and checked into our usual hotel, and things were initially off to a promising start. We have come because the Ministry of Foreign Affairs assured to assist me with solving my longterm visa issues by getting married and then later returning for a K-Visa. Before dealing with any bureaucracy, we always take showers, get some rest, and eat to recharge ourselves. I enjoy looking through the bars at the distant Queen Mansion building, and with a fancy name like that you can be assured you're not staying there for less than many hundreds of dollars per month, perhaps even more than a thousand.

Freebies At The Mall 💘

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     One of the required things we were told by the MFA is that we need to be married first, which we already are, but in typical corrupt Cambodian fashion, they only accept marriage certificates produced within the country. I was told to get my stack of documents and a certificate of single status from the US Embassy, and that set me back $150. We also paid the MFA $80 of "tea money" to assist us through the process of obtaining the K-Visa. We arrived at the US Embassy early, and I noticed we had enough points on our Smart cell phone app to claim a hooded sweatshirt from the mall around the corner.

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     After we used our points to collect the hoodie from the shop in left in the background, we passed by Auntie Anne's and the owner offered us free pretzels for a social media selfie post. I hate going in malls because none of the shops ever have anything that interest me and it's all too expensive, but it was pretty cool to leave with some pretzels and hoodie totally free of charge.

Pizza Time 🍕

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     For dinner we walked to a nearby Italian restaurant for some pasta and pizza marinara. It is possible to enjoy vegan Italian food, and pizza marinara is a traditional pizza, but I've rarely seen it on menus beyond real Italian restaurants. In Ecuador I couldn't even convince a pizza chef to try making a pizza marinara for us, they thought we were crazy to want a cheese-less pizza and refused to make it.

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Visa Setbacks 🛃

     Well, long story short, two major setbacks have happened. The guy forgot to mention the cost of getting married in Cambodia is $1,200, a total surprise that came out of nowhere, and something he forgot to mention in all the weeks we communicated and prepared everything before coming. We can't produce that kind of money so quickly, so I stayed up all night stricken with panic attacks, then withdrew all my non-Hive crypto which totaled $1,206, ironically.

     Early in the morning we were about to go and pay the Ministry of Foreign Affairs the corrupt outrageous fee the totally normal price for getting married when we got a call from the guy to let us know the K-Visa is only for people with Khmer DNA, something we already knew and told him early on in our talks. We have the whole chat on Telegram, he assured us we aren't familiar with the latest changes to immigration law. Well, turns out I was right and he admitted to not even checking if the K-Visa was available for people with Irish potato farmer DNA.

     In the end he apologized and told us he already spent the money, so he couldn't return us our $80. We asked what good a Cambodian marriage certificate would do when it won't help to obtain residency here, and he said it would help us to immigrate to other countries. We informed him we already have a marriage certificate from Suriname, and already used it to start the US Immigration process, so a Cambodian marriage certificate is a useless $1,200 piece of paper that doesn't give me any additional rights or access to residency.

     In the nicest words possible, we told him we were quite upset that we've already spent $500+ on hotels, food, diesel, documents, and bribes to make it to this point. We didn't even need to come to Phnom Penh, the guy is a total fool, and now I've got less than three months before we face a forced family separation. Thank you Cambodia and the USA for once again placing obstacles to my family's unity.

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Man! What a farce! I really feel for you guys. Sending love and postive energy

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I guess everything plays out as it should. This instability makes me question whether or not we should invest in the land we have or just finish the fence and call it done. It's so hard to invest money here beyond the hundreds because the future is always uncertain. Well, either way, it's the rollercoaster of life, and I've learned not to get too excited or depressed with the ups and downs.

There is no doubt we have a future beyond this country, whether it be 6 months or 10 years, we have a destiny beyond this country's borders.

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Yeah man, not much you can do about it, aside from focusing on the now and putting one foot in front of the other. All things will work out, one way or another, eventhough it might not always look like that.

Never stop smiling and making fart jokes. Keep the inner child alive ;<)

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LOL you killed me here "the guy forgot to mention the cost of getting married in Cambodia " jajajaja at least looks like you enjoy the trip on the pics, all this were just life obstacles, keep on keeping on ✌️

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There are always additional xenophobic taxes here, and the prices get higher and higher because mainland bigtime Chinese investors gladly pay these outrageous fees because it keeps out working class foreigners from starting small business here. When one has millions of dollars, a few thousand bucks to get married is like a cup of tea, but for us it's life altering setback.

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I feel you also my friend. Being scammed or broken of promises can make us discourage. But be strong, and have a positive way of life always.

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It always seems to happen that when I about to do something successful here, the government sets up roadblocks and dreams quickly get dashed. Also, the law and reality are always two different things here. 🙏🙏🙏

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Oh my God sr! Sorry for what had happen...Its really a challenge to you but I know your family can recover it soon.Ya your right sr lets just focus on the positive side...

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I have faith that things will work out one way or another, and if it doesn't then it wasn't meant to be I guess. We've always had our eyes open for a country more willing to host us than either of our own, but so far nothing has come up.

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OMG, what a horrible turn of events 😢

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It's a never-ending rollercoaster, but at least I roughly know how to move forward with the information I now have.

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Oh, such a bad experience though. But don't you worry God won't give you what you can't bear. Everything has its solutions and it will pass by. God will make a way also for your goal to be reached. Take care and God bless.

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Thank you, I do have faith things will work out exactly as they are meant, but I still have to do my part and keep fighting to open doors. I hope when we are in retirement age we aren't still living year to year though, it'd be nice to feel at home somewhere.

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With God everything is possible. Stay safe and God bless.

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Wow! You need to write a book and a script for a movie 🎥 from your combined experiences @justinparke

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It is so frustrating at times, but I did willingly decide to live longterm in a country with no path towards immigration or residency. It's just hard to do anything profitable or invest in anything significantly when you can only plan one year ahead due to visa policies, and of course immigration laws change almost monthly here.

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oh this is terrible news man. I was really hoping we would be past this by now.

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It seems in recent years Cambodia is no longer the easy longterm visa country for SE Asia because from what I hear Vietnam and Thailand are pretty straightforward nowadays, luring the digital nomads away that once called Cambodia home.

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There are a few people I know here that spent time in Cambodia that talk about how it was just a question of bribe money in Cambodia in the past and whether or not your were eligible for the visa didn't really matter. They blame the Chinese for why this has changed but who knows if that is true.

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I won't say there's not some truth in that, sort of a way to squeeze out microbusiness, and therefore the projects that most non-Chinese foreigners are doing here. It's a lot like back in the USA how they have made every single hustle have a complicated licensing/bureaucratic structure to go through, even things like cutting hair/doing nails. Too many barriers make it impossible for a poor entrepreneur to get their foot in the door, but at least here in Cambodia the barrier is not softened by a stack of paperwork and complicated laws, it's just an in-your-face outrageous upfront cost for everything, and it makes even running a legal busy 30-chair restaurant potentially unprofitable after all annual licenses and taxes are paid. Such a hot mess.

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Cannot believe this is happening to your lovely family once again!

Countries now money grabbing, individuals doing similar.

!LUV
!PIZZA

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It's so hard for Cambodians to get visas to what most people consider to be desirable countries, and because of this every single document that aids a Cambodian citizen in leaving their country has a huge price on it. I guess the rationale is that once you've decided to go abroad, nothing is going to stop you, and because of this you'll pay anything. The police check alone here is $150 for a Cambodian citizen, and in the USA it's only $5 to $20 in most cases.

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From South Africa much the same, police clearance, health clearance, visa applications it all adds up to becoming a massive expense with no promise. Everything takes forever here as well with electricity being a massive problem!

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Sorry it will have to come down this way. It is what it is. The thing I'm not exactly sure if I understand correctly, you mean even when we have enough money to bribe all the way to make it through with a Cambodia wedding certificate, you still can't get a K-visa?

My only concern now is, whether is it possible? I remember you mentioned many Chinese fat asses has a Khmer waifu there without worrying if they get kicked out.

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The K-Visa is not possible, the Ministry isn't educated on their own laws, and just as I suspected it is only available for those with some Khmer DNA. I did discover there is a 3-year visa, but it's only available to Korean, Japanese, and Chinese nationals, bummer. It looks like I will only ever have a one-year solution for the foreseeable future, but at least it looks like I can renew my visa in person at the Immigration office for far cheaper than visa agent costs, and I won't need a work permit to do this.

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Hi @justinparke nice to meet you.

I love the picture of you, your wife and kids!

That is just so terrible what happened with the marriage license! What a rip off to begin with and they won't give you your money back???? OMG!!!!

I'm praying a wonderful solution will come about for you and your family.

Barb :)

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It is regretful that we wasted the time and money to go to the capital, but we had to have faith that the government knows the situation more clearly than us. We originally thought that was true, but it turns out the government is mostly less informed than me who spent about 4 hours studying immigration law. The situation sure highlights some of the problems holding Cambodia back.

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Well that sucks and can't understand why these policies and borders keep families apart.
Hope you guys will find a solution a.s.a.p. like u mostly have found till now.

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I think we can make things work here with some added difficulties, but still we long to find a forever residency home somewhere one day. I think I'll visit the USA in May and also see if I can't solve some of our immigration/visa issues while there. 🙏🙏🙏

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I think I'll visit the USA in May and also see if I can't solve some of our immigration/visa issues while there. 🙏🙏🙏

Hopefully it's easier if you're over there in person, instead of doing most paperwork overseas and probably also not as pricey.

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At the moment we're stuck on getting uploaded documents to be viewed and accepted. If we can progress one more stage we'll be able to talk with a real human, but for now whoever it is that is denying our documents is doing it through a software program and we can't directly communicate with them. If I could just get to the interview stage I'm sure we could clear up any concerns, but they seem to not want to let us get that far.

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That sucks, especially knowing that due to some stale (coded) system you're application gets into limbo somewhere, if I read it correctly.

I guess the AI hasn't reached the system yet (trying to lighten the mood 🙈).

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