Home health pro from the U.S.A.

Hey Matt, it’s been a long time since this carpet bagger has chatted it up with a razor back!   I think you are the first American expat from Arkansas I’ve heard of.  Like you say in your profile, “I wouldn't go back if I was paid to” either!  

If I read your post and profile correctly, your father in law is Indonesian and you’re looking to sponsor a friend or someone you know back in the US to come over to Surabaya to assist with in house physical therapy and rehabilitation of your father in law.

Neither you or your Indonesian spouse can sponsor this person for a KITAS visa, but, there really wouldn’t be any need for a KITAS anyway.  Your “friend” could come over on a 60 day visit visa and that visa would be renewable at the immigration office for up to four additional periods of 30 days making a total allowable stay of 180 days.   If additional time was needed, that person could take a quick visa run over to Singapore and obtain another 60 day visit visa (again being renewable in Surabaya) to cover an additional stay of 180 days.

If you want to discuss details via private messages rather than publicly, by all means, be my guest.

I know exactly what you’re going through and your desire to do the best for your family…my having been in that exact same boat a few times over the years living in my wife’s ancestral village here in Bali.

Good luck!

:-D Hi Ubudian, thanks for the reply. I know about the Singapore loop. I used it myself for a year and a half.  I'm very glad to have my KITAS. Not that I don't like Singapore but having to go there every six months gets tiresome. I wonder if it's different for family. See the professional is my mother.  I want to have her here so she can teach me how to care for my father-in-law and supervise his care when I am out of the house.

It's funny you should say that I am the only one you have heard of from Arkansas. I haven't met anyone else from there here either. How far north are you and yours back home?

Matt, for you, having a KITAS makes all the sense in the world…married to an Indonesian and living here six years already.  Your next move should be a KITAP which will make you a permanent resident and you can kiss all those visa runs forever goodbye.  Obviously your wife would be your sponsor for that.  She can do this herself for around 2.5 million IDR.

If your wife isn’t already a member of KPC Melati, she should join: 

http://www.kpcmelaticenter.com/en/histo … round.html

Just recently I took at look at all my old passports and did an accounting of visa runs I used to have to take.  They added up to Bangkok, 14 runs and Sinsomemore (as Singapore it used to be called in the “good old days”), 4 runs.  While I love BKK, I couldn’t be more pleased having that periodic ritual done for good.

Unless you are planning on having your mom living with you guys for a very long term, she’ll still have to initially come into Indonesia on a visit visa anyway, as the KITAS is initiated through the immigration office…not the embassy or consulate offices.  Your wife will not be able to sponsor her KITAS…if in fact your plan is to have her here for a long time, but rather you’d need to engage the services of a licensed visa agent who could act as her KITAS sponsor.  That’s the way immigration would handle this here in Bali, and I suspect it would be the same in Surabaya. 

My own mom came to Bali twice to see her grandchild (our first born son, Bima) and we were also planning on her permanently moving over here to Bali.  This was 14 years ago.  Unfortunately the Gods had different plans for her, so she now occupies the first of the ancestral temples in our compound.  My Balinese wife had to slightly modify the daily offerings for her to include a cup of coffee and a martini! 

How far north for me?...the big apple...check the hat in my avatar.   

Once again, the best of luck to you. 

Cheers!

As soon as I had wrote it I knew I was wrong, east not north :-D I had changed it twice and told myself to settle it. :-D yes,  if we can get her here for the long term that is my goal. She has worked so hard and needs to give it up. I know a good travel agent here maybe it's time to ask her about it. Have you become an orang Indonesia or do you still have US citizenship?

Either your mom or a travel agent in the US can apply for the 60 day visit visa via mail directly through the Indonesian Embassy in Washington, DC.

Full information and instructions can be found here:

http://www.embassyofindonesia.org/consu … itvisa.htm

And the visa application forms can be found here:

http://www.embassyofindonesia.org/consu … 20form.pdf

If she or the travel agent you have in mind for her think this is all to complicated (which it really isn't) then another option for her is to just come in on a 30 day VOA (issued at the airport on arrival) and extend that for another 30 days at immigration in Surabaya.

Cheers!

The first time I came to Indonesia the voa was only 30 days without exception. I'm glad that has been changed. I have a contact in Singapore who gets visas renewed. So if she comes on a voa and goes out via Singapore she can be back in within two days. :-D

Just to be clear Matt, the 30 day VOA hasn’t really changed aside from that when it originally came out, and for a few years after, it was not renewable here in Indonesia for another 30 days.  Now it can be renewed here in Indonesia for another 30 days…total stay 60 days and then one must leave the country.

Once she’s here you can start the KITAS process for her using a licensed visa agent in Surabaya.

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