Dim the lights and turn on the music. Barry White is good, but YMMV.
Wait nine months.
Once bun is out of oven, get an English Birth Certificate from the hospital.
Go to the Canadian Trade Office in Taipei. Their address is 365 Fuxing North Road, 13F, Taipei, and their telephone number is (02) 2544-3000. They’re open from 9:00 to 11:30 M-F. They’re right across from the Zhongshan Middle School MRT Station. At the Canadian Trade Office pick up a Child Passport Application (for Canadians under 16 years of age) and an application for Canadian Citizenship Certificate. The passport will be issued before the citizenship is ready, so it’s just a 1 year, non-renewable passport. The passport takes 15 working days to process, and the citizenship takes up to 13 months, although they say recently many applications have been processed in as little as 6 to 7 months.
6.For the child’s passport application you will need to fill out the pertinent details on the application form, and you will also have to have a guarantor - someone “who can confirm the child’s identity and has knowledge of the child.” The guarantor must perform Free of Charge the following two tasks:
a)Certify the information on the application form
b)Write on the back of ONE of the child’s photos, "I certify this to be a true likeness of (child’s name), and sign.
The guarantor must:
be available to Passport Canada for verification;
have known you (the applicant) personally for at least TWO years,
have known you and the child well enough to be confident that the statements you have made in the application form are true;
live within the district of the passport issuing office;
sign the "Declaration of Guarantor section on the application form;
sign the statement on the back of ONE of the photos; and
be included in ONE of the following groups:
dentist, medical doctor
-judge, magistrate, police officer
-mayor
-notary public
-practising lawyer, notary
-signing officer of a bank
If you have not known an eligible guarantor for at least two years, you must complete a “Declaration in Lieu of Guarantor” form PPT 132, available from any passport issuing office.This form must be completed at your expense before a person authorized by law to administer an oath or solemn affirmation. This may delay the issuing time of the passport, and I got the impression that they really don’t like having to go this route, so try to find a guarantor.
The child’s passport application also requires two photos, 50 mm wide and 70 mm long. The length from chin to crown of head must be 31 to 36 mm. The child’s Canadian Citizenship Certificate application also requires 2 photos, but they have to be 35 mm wide and 53 mm long. The length from chin to crown of head must be 25 to 35 mm, with a plain white signature strip (no more than 10mm and no less than 6mm deep) at the bottom of the photo. I recommend going to the Shiwei photo studio around the corner from the Canadian Trade Office, as they’re very familiar with the exact specifications required for each application. Their address is 113 Minquan East Road, Section 3, Taipei. Their telephone number is (02) 2713-0730.
For the child’s Canadian Citizenship Certificate application you should also provide:
-both parents’ passports
-proof of the Canadian parent(s)’ citizenship ie: a Canadian birth certificate or a Canadian Citizenship Certificate. They have to see ORIGINAL documents, photocopies will not be accepted.
-the original marriage certificate of the child’s parents, if available.
-the child’s original, official, birth certificate, which shows the child’s personal birth details and indicates the full names of the natural parents. If this document is not in English or French, you have to arrange to have the certifcate translated by a licensed or notarized translator before it will be accepted by the Registrar of Canadian Citizenship for processing.
The current cost of a one year passport for a child is $600NT, and the Canadian Citizenship Certificate is $2200 NT.
10.It’s also required to bring the baby there in person so that they can verify that she is the child in the photographs.
How bizarre that the baby has to “apply” for citizenship. Surely it is a Canadian citizen the minute it pops out of mummy? Oh I see. The citizenship certificate costs NT$2,200. Ka-ching!
I asked about that, and they said the baby doesn’t apply for citizenship, but for the certificate. ~shrug~ I could (and will) bring her into Canada without the certificate and on a temporary Canadian passport, but there would be hassles later on down the road if we didn’t formalize this.
And even more bizarre that the child has to show up in person. I wasn’t sure if I should post this here or in the “really chaps my ass thread”. This becomes especially troublesome when you live in southern Taiwan and have to take the child on a four or five hour trek to get to the documents office.
EDIT:(Dear God, Please let me remember everything I need)
Thanks for the post Maoman. My search gave me exactly what I needed and more. I need to get up there on Monday or Tuesday to finally get all this stuff in order. Have a rough plan to head back to the Great White North in April.
All done. A few bumps in the road but nothhing that couldn’t be worked out easily. Had a problem getting the right photos for the citizenship certificate in Kaohsiung so I went to a shop mentioned in the OP and it was clear sailing. There are a few different photo shops along that strip and CTOT tells me they are all familliar with these photos.
This seems to be a fax number. The web site gives this number:
Thanks for the excellent info, but I do have a question:
What is meant by the guarantor must “live within the district of the passport issuing office”? Does this mean Taipei, or all of Taiwan? I live in Taichung and don’t know anyone in Taipei.
I love that ‘Guarantor clause’.
Whatever civil servant thought up that jumpable hoop and prime cash generator, is most certainly a fiend amongst fiends.
My advice on dealing with the Canadian trade office with regards to getting one’s Taiwanese-born kids Canadian citizenship ID and passports:
Be Prepared. It’s a Canadian Gov’t office, staffed by civil servants. They WILL attempt to throw spanners in one’s works. Bring all available ID/documentation about your life, marriage and your kid’s life. Bring it all.
Go mid-week. Tuesday or Wed. always work best. Avoid Monday & Friday.
Get the photos done in Taipei. In order to avoid any faulty deviation from the rules. There’s a shop just north-east of the office that does efficient service in this regard.
Smile a lot. Don’t go when you’re in a rush. Be fully aware that bureaucrats are a creed above ordinary mortals, and must be treated with due regard.
Bring your kid right in the cubicle when your number is called. This is important as it will soften the bluest of blue meanies, and thus expedite one’s file.
Got my kid’s pasport delivered to Kaohsiung County today, just 12 working days after I submitted it.
I have to say that the Chinese staff at the trade office were very pleasant and reasonable. You do have to make sure all your papers are in order and photos meet the specifications but these aren’t things determined by the staff at this office. Better they set you straight here than they send your citizenship certificate papers back from Nova Scotia in six or seven months.
Make sure when you get your child’s English birth certificate that all the names are in the same order. Our son and I had the family name last while my wife had her family name first on our son’s birth certificate. We were told that this would just confuse the people in Canada and that we needed to get another one with all the names in the same order.
It wasn’t a big problem and they let us mail them the new birth certificate instead of having to go back to the trade office. We’ve already received his passport and now just need to wait for the citizenship paper.
Told by whom? Our daughter’s birth certificate had all names listed according to their customary order, i.e. English names ending with a surname, and Chinese names beginning with a surname. We had no trouble at all.
The lady at the trade office told us when we applied for the citizenship certificate. She insisted that we get the birth certificate redone with the names in the same order so that people back in Canada wouldn’t get confused.
I didn’t put up much of a fuss about it (actually, none at all). We just got it redone and mailed it back to the trade office.
Can you do Citizenship for Idiots, Step 1, getting your spouse to become a Canadian?
I’m an idiot, and I want to know.[/quote]
I’m working on it. The thing is, it’s a more complex problem - especially if you’re not planning on living in Canada. Now, I know that it’s possible for the holder of a permanent resident card to live outside of Canada and still have his/her time out of Canada count as “time served” towards the three years required for citizenship - as long as the reason for being abroad is to accompany the spouse. But as far as I know, one still has to actually go to Canada to complete the acquisition of a PR card, and since we’re never there more than a few days at a time, we just haven’t gotten around to it. I’d love it if someone else did it first and wrote about it here!
In the future you’ll have to be born in Canada to get Canadian citizenship only if your parents were also born outside of Canada and later acquired citizenship. For Canadians born in Canada, their children automatically can get a Canadian passport if born outside of Canada. That’s my interpretation anyway.
In the future you’ll have to be born in Canada to get Canadian citizenship only if your parents were also born outside of Canada and later acquired citizenship. For Canadians born in Canada, their children automatically can get a Canadian passport if born outside of Canada. That’s my interpretation anyway. [/quote]
Yes, and it’s a ridiculous Conservative circle-the-wagons and rally-the-troops move. Look for it to be overturned.
Oops, sorry, as I read, if one of the parents is “first generation” Canadian, the kid will still have Canadian citizenship. I guess the new law is aiming to stop naturalized citizens passing on their citizenship forever.
Have you forgotten the years leading up to Hong Kong “rejoining” China in 1997? Wealthier HK citizens were taking advantage of laws allowing children born in a country to obtain that country’s citizenship and get out before the doors closed.
Forcing people to automatically take the citizenship of their parents may sound sensible, those who hate illegals might love the thought, and for foreigners living overseas who want their kid to have their own citizenship it might be the ideal (especially if it’s a mixed foreigner/local marriage and one wants to leave the country after a divorce).
But for refugees, foreign citizenship through a child can be a lifesaver. This is just one of many examples of why:
