CK Link - Theatre of Dreams for Calvin

Finally, my US Driver's License

My IL License

This is rather a long story...it reflects some of my frustration to the American civil services but also some good ones indeed, eventually. It all started with me applying for my first US driver's license down in Tampa, Florida in early December last year. So I ended up going to one of the DMV (Dept of Motor Vehicles) in town and went through all those vision, written tests (road signs and written driver's education type of questions, including financial responsibility, Driving Under Influence, etc...); and I even got through the driving test (a.k.a road test). Amazingly, I finished all the above in an afternoon at the office. I had a great time in that office, even though I waited for quiet some time but they have an online reservation system so I got there with my assigned slot on the Saturday and I appreciated the help from a madam who works there and she was so nice to put me in an express queue. Thus, I got my license! But, they would only mail it to me via postal service. At the time, I was going back home for Christmas in about a few days but I thought my roommates would be in the Tampa address anyway so who that should be fine. It turned out to be a worse decision! As I am actually relocating to Chicago after my X'mas; thus I no longer return to the Tampa address while my roommates never got the mails and they left home/to New York for their holidays so I never got on hold of that Floridian license!!!

Then US has this great system calls mail forwarding which you filled in an online form with USPS (the postal service) and they would forward all your mails at the preceeding address to your new place. Sounds nice huh? Well, when we moved to Chicago we found out in about 2 week or so after that the postal service never really got that forwarded mails working (partly because we indeed had to inform the postman at our new place for our names in order to receive the mails!) Well, supposingly, first they had our mail forwarding application; and second, the apartment complex we stay at should also inform the mail-lady for new addressees but both did not happen...so we had no mails for weeks in January and of course my forwarded Floridian license never show up in my Chicago mailbox.

In the end, I called up the Florida DMV in Tallahassee to check, they told me my license was never returned and it is still valid but I do not have a physical copy of it. What is even worse, in order to get a duplicate/replacement, as a nonresident, I have to go back to Florida to get it in person!!! Meaning that I have to pay for over $180 bucks to get down to FL to get it settled....craaaaazy! All in all, finally some good news happened on Jan 31st when I tried to talk to the officer at Tallahassee again. They sent me this clearing letter and suggested me to try get a new one in Illinois since I reside in Chicago now so it does not matter if I get a Floridian one or an Illinois one.

I brought my clearing letter, with my documentation anxiously went to the Chicago Driver's facility tonight and after taking the vision and written test again (and of course passing them first time and on spot again!), I finally got my Illinois License and my first physical US license!!! What a nice day to have this license issued, too...as you can see on the license, the issue date if Valentine's Day!

posted by CalvinCK @ 12:11 AM