Passport Dramas

This coming week is Diwali, the Festival of Lights, and one of our favourite Indian Festival. School is out for both boys so we had planned a trip to Dubai for 5 days.  It was actually a trip we postponed from the start of the year, when we had to cancel due to our upcoming relocation to Hyderabad.  We were all very excited and looking forward to some quality family time with Jack home from boarding school. However, we seem to be having trouble actually making it to Dubai and have had to cancel again.

Mike had been traveling last week to Bangalore and had taken his passport as identification - a mandatory requirement here in India when traveling domestically.  He returned on Saturday evening and forgot to take his passport out of his shorts pocket.  Sadly, I did not check the pockets, and when I did the washing the next day, his passport managed to get very 'cleansed' !!

Damaging your passport is a drama at the best of times but when you are living in India and need to get a passport and visa redone, the headache is twice as bad.  So, we made the tough decision of not 'attempting' to travel on his damaged passport and cancelled our holiday to Dubai.  Mike then had to make an emergency trip to Delhi to visit the Australian High Commission to apply for a replacement passport.  We are hoping he will get it back in time for his next trip on the 22nd November, to Phuket with Jack for his football tournament.

We managed to recoup 'some' of the money from the Dubai trip, so we have booked a mini getaway to Goa for two nights to celebrate Diwali and have some R & R.  It will be a simple beach holiday that will give us all some well needed down time together.

Not so fun times in the Nairn house this week  !!