Marriage to a Bulgarian

Hello,

I am an American woman living in the US currently. I have been with my boyfriend, a Bulgarian for almost 3 years now. We met while I was in the Peace Corps and have been together (in a long distance relationship half of the time) ever since. I tried to move to BG last year to live, but I was unable to find a job. Now my fiance and I are planning to get married in BG and then move back to the US where I have a good job. Does anyone know how I can do this. I will only have about a week of vacation to accomplish this, so any advice would be great!

Thank you!

Dear Kirsten,you could get married in BG within a week but after that you cant go back to the states with your new husband.Its a long and tiresome procedure to obtain an american visa or citizenship even through marriage.After you get married in BG you have to have your marriage certificate translated and legalise and fill in and submit all the paperwork in the American Embassy in Sofia.Before that you both,you and your fiance should go to the American Embassy and obtain a certification that you are elligible to marry a bulgarian which could be done on the same day of applying for it. After you get married, have your certificate translated,both passports,pictures,proof of relationship which means e-mails phone bills pictures then pictures of the wedding party and anything that could come to your mind,then you as a working american citizen have to fill in a form for support state all your income throughout last 10 years,property owning and so on and submit If you had previous marriages submit court paperwork of termination,then your fiance should obtain a paper from bulgarian court that he is not under prosecution if he lived more than one year in onether country he should contact that other country embassy in BG and obtain the same paper for not being prosecuted there.THis all is just the beginning.Then they should set a date for interview which is usually done after 6 months at least.Then your husband should obtain more paperwork and phisical examination which to my own opinion are highly intrusive.Why i am saying this all?Cause an year ago i got married to an american but we both live in BG now.All i could say is wish you luck with the visa paperwork. If you want you could always contact me gannongannon_ltd@yahoo.uk.co If you decide to get married in BG dont hesitate contact me , could help with arrangements

And Kirsten, before you both arrange a date for your wedding make sure you contact the American Embassy in Sofia previously and set a date for obtaining that marriage eligible paper.You might need to e-mail them several times before they set a date. Once again i would be more than glad to help you with this just because i already went through it to get married to my husband under whose profile i am writing this reply

I am in a similar situation to the woman Kirsten who posted in January - I am American, my fiance is Bulgarian, and I am taking a week to go get married in Bulgaria and then return to do the paperwork. And wait and wait.

I have some really specific questions ... So thanks in advance for any trouble.

The first thing I can't figure out is this whole business with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs - do I need to make an appointment for the "authentication" of the document from the American embassy that says I am legal to marry and for the "apostille seal" that needs to appear on the marriage certificate? Can I just walk in and find the right person to go to? And I can't find their hours on their Web site, so I would be worried they won't be open on the day I need to go there...

And the second half of the questions is where does one get married in Bulgaria? I know it happens in a civic wedding hall, but does each town have one, or do I need to go to Sofia or other large town? And I would suppose I need to make an appointment? Actually, I realize that these questions are probably too specific to my case in general, but I guess the critical one is: do you get a marriage certificate immediately following the ceremony? I am only going to have a one-day turn-around time following the ceremony to go get the seal...

Anyway, THANKS SO MUCH for anyone who has any insight...

Emma D.

Dear EmmaD,I just wonder if you would be able to deal with all the arrangement and paperwork just for one week.Once you get that paper from the American Embassy you should go to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the authentification. Their office is located at Evlogi Georgiev str. in Sofia and of course they do keep certain working hours but you make sure you go there before noon, the whole procedure will take no more than 3 minutes. Then depends on where you wont to get married, if you chose Sofia, you and your husband-to-be should go at at the cental civil marriage office to choose the place and the date, make sure you both have your passports and ID with you along with the paper from the Embassy. Once you choose the place you haveto go there, addresses of location ara available atthe central office, supply again your ID, personal data of both your best man and best woman, medical reports for civil marriage, the receipt for the taxes paid, you get this at the central office.
On your next question, certificate for the civil marriage you get at the ceremony but you need this translated and legalized. So, first after you get the document, you should wait at least 3 days to appear in the computer system of the municiple, you shouldgo there with the original one and ID card of your husband, you should apply for stamped and signed copy which you need for translation and legalisation.Find a company dealing with such stuff, they will translate it and legalise it for a couple of days.
In case you run out of time, your husband should be able to do this and just mail it to you in the states.
The document you'll obtain from the Embassy is good for 6 months.If you have further questions , don't hesitate, you can contact me via gannonandgannon_ltd@yahoo.com
And EmmaD, think before you make any further steps, your husband-to-be should be part of this whole process and should arrange all the dates for you.

I am American and I currently live in Scotland. I have just graduated with my masters from there. Because of their visa system, I now have a two year working visa. My boyfriend is still currently a student and he is a Bulgarian citizen, although his parents teach at a university in England and he has permanent residence in the UK, even before they joined the EU. We want to get married and would like to continue living in either the UK or somewhere in the EU for the time being. I do not want to give up my American citizenship at this moment, as he grew up in Chicago and wants to maybe move back there someday. He has also been thinking about joing the US military at some point in order to secure his citizenship, however, I would prefer him not doing that (he wants to join not just for his citzenship, but also because he is interested in serving the country he grew up in). My question is: if niether of us wants to change citizenship anytime soon, is it hard for me to just have permanent residency alongside him, so we don't have to seperate? The idea is, I have a two year visa, so if we get the paperwork started now, we would never have to live apart. I would like to live in Bulgaria for awhile, maybe teaching English, as that is what my degree is in and that is what I do now.

Also, does anyone know if we would be better off speaking to a Bulgarian consulate (we are going to Sofia for Christmas to see his family) or the American consulate for accurate information. I just sort of want to make an appointment and hear it from a government mouth what we have to do.

Thanks!

Hi - an update to my post in October, for anyone who encounters a similar situation (I'm American and I was engaged to a Bulgarian, who is still in Bulgaria.)

The marriage can be done in a week! But not easily. And you must return home alone to file the immigration paperwork - as of January 2007, you can't file directly at the consulate unless you have lived in Bulgaria for more than 6 months.

First, let me say that we tried to bring my fiance back to the U.S. on a tourist visa so that he could meet my family and we could have a somewhat normal engagement process, rather than having to rush into getting married. According to all of the government immigration sites, it would be totally legal for him to come back here, we just have to submit proof that he is not coming to the U.S. on a tourist visa to marry me and then change status on that visa (which = VISA FRAUD). We had four letters of support directly addressing this issue, proof of his employment project for next summer, and information about his children (they are the whole reason we didn't just get married this past summer when he was in the U.S.; we didn't want him prevented from going back to see them). No go, they didn't look at anything, just a flat rejection.

We found this out on a Monday, and I was in Bulgaria for four more days. We launched into Plan B - I had made my appointment at the American Embassy for that same Monday to notarize that I am legal to marry (all they did was look at my passport and driver's license and his national identity card) for $30. This document is valid for 6 months.

Next step: Ministry of Foreign Affairs - not the main building, it is the division of consular affairs, in some small house. A number of very strange things transpired there, including a bribe to make the "authentication" (which consists of people scribbling on the back of the embassy document) take 1 hour instead of 2 days... we ended up paying 35 lv for this.

Next step: at the municipal building of the small town where my fiance lives. More paperwork, more fees, 50 lv I think. We were told it would take 2 months, maybe we could schedule a wedding at the end of December (this was November 20). Long conversation, next thing I know the lady asked: is November 22 OK?

Yes it was. Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. I have to say, after the hurdles, it turned out great! We just threw together a wedding and reception with one day of planning, and it was a blast!

Now I am in the process of submitting the I-130 package, then we will be waiting anywhere from four months to infinity to live in the same place. I can't even quit my job to come to Bulgaria as I have to show I can support him!!!

Here is what practical advice I learned for any American marrying a Bulgarian. I didn't find anything useful out there, except DennyG's advice on this site, so I hope this can help someone else...

Before leaving:
1. Make the notarization appointment at the American Embassy. You must call between 2 and 4 pm Monday-Thursday, excluding all Bulgarian AND American holidays (this conveniently ended up being between midnight and 2 am for me, since I live in California). The web site is: http://sofia.usembassy.gov/married4.html. Make the appointment for as early in the morning as possible unless you are staying in Sofia. That way you can get over to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs before they close in the early afternoon and don't have to stay an extra day just to do this.
2. Get tested for syphilis. Yes, this was a surprise to me, too. They don't care about HIV, but they care about syphilis, so bring evidence of that you don't have it.
3. Have documentation of all your vaccinations (I don't know specifically what was required, as I have everything).
4. Have documentation of your blood type.
5. Have divorce documentation if either of you has been married previously. If the American of the couple has been married, they might require a translation into Bulgarian, so you should check on this.
6. I would highly recommend printing out the G325a Biographic information forms - on the white, green, pink and blue paper if you are using the actual colors - for your spouse BEFORE you go to Bulgaria. These are interactive pdf forms and probably could be done in Bulgaria, too if you have a fast computer and fast internet connection for downloading the files (bring the colored paper for printing). That way you can have him or her sign the forms while you are there, rather than a bunch of mailing overseas when it's time to submit the paperwork. The only thing you won't know for sure is the date of your wedding, so you'll have to print out different versions of all the possibilities or just fill that in by hand later. ALSO - have him or her fill out the name in Cyrillic on this form, unless you have someone in America who can write this well for you.
7. Also there is a section for the Cyrillic name and address on the I-130 form, so either have this all filled out too (supposedly on yellow paper, printed double sided head-to-foot) or practice your Cyrillic.

After the appointment at the American Embassy for the declaration of eligibility to marry:
1. Go to the Ministry of Foreign affairs to "authenticate" that document. Look up the address on the map so you don't have to drive up and down the street like we did. It's a surprisingly small house, not a big government building. The web site is: http://www.mfa.bg/en/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5136&Itemid=356; it has the phone numbers on this page to get the address (someone at the American Embassy gave me the address but I don't have it with me).
2. Have your Bulgarian fiance/e ask about how to speed up the process if they give you the information that it takes a day or two to authenticate that document. It seriously should take 5 minutes, they really don't do anything. The official fee is 15 lv but we paid an extra 20 lv to expedite the processing.
3. Once you have this document, THEN you can go make the appointment for a wedding. Beg them to do it in a couple of days, as they will probably tell you it take a month or two to schedule. For what? Anybody's guess. We were probably the only wedding all month in our village, so I couldn't figure out why the place was not available for more than a month. But it is probably much harder to book a time in Sofia and other big cities. They told us we could not make the reservation until we had the authenticated document from the American Embassy, though.
4. TAKE LOTS OF PHOTOS OF THE WEDDING. You will need these later in immigration interviews. Try to photograph yourselves with as may other people as possible so it is clear that many people know you are actually married. There are so many fake marriages out there, that is why this whole process is so difficult for the people with real marriages. So if yours is real, flaunt it!

After the wedding:
1. For unknown reasons, it takes a couple of days for the marriage certificate to show up in the system. Once it does, and you have it in hand (or your spouse does - as was our case, since I caught a plane home the day after our wedding) it's back to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs house in Sofia for more authentication and a mysterious "Apostille seal."
2. Then you have to get it translated. We used a certified translator just to be safe (but even then, there are mistakes, like my middle name is listed as my father's name!)
3. Then copy, or scan and e-mail the certificate to the American for filing the paperwork.
4. Also repeat steps 2 and 3 for a divorce document if the Bulgarian spouse was married previously.
5. Get your spouse's signature on the G325a forms.
6. Take a few, at least 4-6, passport-style photos of your spouse for all the documentation filing. Again, this will save mailing time later.

Whew! That's all I know for now.

I will probably post again if I learn any critical information about the K-3 visa application process. I have already encountered so much conflicting information that I am paying a lawyer for assistance.
Feel free to e-mail me at: strullo711 at yahoo dot com if you think I can answer any questions about Americans marrying Bulgarians. Good luck to you all and try not to let the two countries' bureaucracies make you crazy!

--EmmaD

i have seen first hand experience of my american friend marrying other national and the real cumbersome paperwork is actually on the american part of the law / visa. so my practical advice is :
1. get a marriage eligibility certificate from the civil office (applicable to yr fiance) in bulgaria, and get it appostilled
2. travel to US on a B1/B2 visa
3. get married at USA at yr convenience (before the visa expires)
4. apply for permanent residence and then citizenship

best of luck
sammy

Dear Kirsten,

I can help you as I have quite good contacts in the Bulgarian authorities.
About the paper work - yes, you have to have your marriege certificate translated and legalized, also appostiled. Of ocurse it will take time until your husband gets the American visa, but it is not impossible.
If you would like to discuss this wiht me in more details, just drop a line at

v.kopoeva@expatservice.org

I will be glad to help

Have a very smily day

First, the new hot water system in our kitchen failed for the second time in a week. Gladys is once again carrying buckets of water from the upstairs bathroom so that it is possible to wash up in warm water. I called up the contractor who fitted our new electric heater under the kitchen sink and he had the gall to say, ‘You know those small electric units are actually rubbish, they never last long, I did tell your husband at the time. Once they start going wrong they’re finished.’
----------------------
williamgeorge
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I received a note about my previous list of all the things that had to be done for an American to marry a Bulgarian, and a couple of things are out of date.

1. I apparently thought that a copy of the marriage certificate was enough to submit but it's not. You send the original, with all the stamps and seals on it. My husband sent it to me from Bulgaria using Speedy and it took 2 days to arrive.

2. The colored papers are a relic from the past, phased out around the time that I applied. Just use white paper.

3. This isn't really the place for a discussion of the hundreds, maybe thousands, of nuances of the process to get your Bulgarian spouse into the U.S. I found out about a forum called visajourney.com and I can't recommend them enough.

So - in conclusion - it took us 7 months to be approved for the US visa. Now we are dividing our time between the US and Bulgaria so that we don't lose his residency and have to start over again. After we have been married for 2 years, I will be working on obtaining Bulgarian residency. Oh joy, the fun begins anew...

Good luck to all you American-Bulgarian couples out there!

I personally have married a bulgarian lady and we got married in Spain. Let me tell you i have more papers than the pope.If you get married in a seperate country other than your own or Bulgaria you will need 3 lots of papers even more complicated! quit your job and take six months off. It will take you this long "minimum" and about 8000 euros.
good luck and if you really love this man he's worth it. I know my wife is!!
money is not everything in life happiness comes before anything!!

I am an Australian citizen, residing in Bulgaria and at the end of last year, I married my Bulgarian sweetheart here just outside of Plovdiv. I have to say that the process was quite straight forward, apart from the paperwork, which took us about four hours to complete and submit.The longest part of the whole thing was waiting for the courier company to get the signed and stamped documents back from Sofia. Twenty four stamps and signatures and three days waiting in all.....total cost.....400 leva!!!
I hope it all works out for you guys.

Bazz

How are you? What happened to the beer!. Marriage would be a fine thing. After my first marriage to the devil her self Im a bit slower at commiting again. I keep hiding from Iliyana. All our friends and family keep asking when? HELP!!! I keep saying look at all the paperwork and changing names on passports etc.If you went to your bank manager and asked to borrow money and commit all you own, everything! and then you said that you had a 50 50 chance of failing he would tell you to walk away in a jurking fashion!!!!!!!!!. Why ruin a good relationship!!
Bazz I need a beer Give me time ,date and location. Peter Whats your wifes name? Sheila???

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