As many in the Greek Diaspora know all too well, getting your Greek Citizenship can be a long and difficult process. This is because people are often stuck communicating with the Greek government through consulates and embassies in America, which are often understaffed and poor at communication.
We at KTE have heard countless stories from Greeks living all over the world about how hard it is to track down all the necessary documents to make their Greek citizenry official, even after multiple years into the process. Well, we figured, enough is enough. As Greek Americans who have been through the process and whose father is a lawyer, here are five ways to get your Greek Citizenship done faster.
5. Keep it simple
Many people don’t know you only need to trace your lineage to Greece through one parent, not both. It’s always best to go with whichever parent has the strongest existing family legal records, or “merida,” because it will simplify the process a lot. The reason why tracing your lineage through both parents is a bad idea is because you effectively double the amount of work required to get your citizenship and double the chance of something going wrong in the sourcing of historical records. You likely already have a lot of work to do in providing your local embassy or consulate with your birth certificate, your parents’ marriage certificate, and in especially tricky cases, name change records, so do yourself a favor and keep it simple.
4. Enlist the help of your relatives in Greece
Imagine you’re a small government office in Greece – in the χωριό – and you get a long email in English, sent by someone you don’t recognize. Yeah, odds are they won’t respond to you right away, if at all. That’s why it’s best to enlist the support of your remaining family members in Greece, who are probably known by name in the city or village you’ll need to pull old family records from.
When you come into the process cold, the first thing the consulate in America will have you do is email your ancestor’s municipality office, to pull the family records of whichever family member you are trying to link your heritage back to. When we were getting our citizenship, we had our cousins in Larissa pull the documents for us, since they were known community members to the local officials there. They literally just walked in, spoke to Kyria Maria – whom they had known for their entire lives – and saved us weeks or months of time and effort. If you have the luxury of relying on your relatives for the local treatment, do it in a heartbeat.
3. Be aware of possible name changes
This tip won’t be applicable to everyone reading this, and if that’s the case for you, consider yourself lucky. Name changes anywhere down the line in your family’s migration from Greece to America are really, really tricky because the Greek government is very strict on it. For example, my Pappou had his name changed from “Soumbeniotis” to “Benis” by the U.S. government, and that change almost derailed our entire citizenship effort.
The reason it’s such a big deal is because unless you have an official government document verifying your ancestor’s name was changed, the Greek government will have no way of verifying that your ancestor’s family records in Greece indicate they are the same person with a different name in America. So, at all costs, find that name change document. If you can’t locate it, well, that brings us to our next tip.
2. Know your situation
If you know that you’re missing some key pieces in your bid for Greek citizenship or feel completely overwhelmed, it may be time to hire a Greek lawyer to do the dirty work for you. Sometimes, hiring a quality lawyer can mean the difference between getting your citizenship in 12 months and waiting in governmental purgatory for years and years.
Another example of a lawyer-level problem is if you were born out of wedlock, or if any of your ancestors divorced and it hasn’t been officially documented yet in Greece. Each of these situations can lead you down a legal rabbit hole if you’re not careful. Sometimes people need to hire a Greek lawyer just to officially divorce their parents in the eyes of the Greek government, and nothing else can happen in your citizenship process before pieces like this are processed and finalized.
Luckily, KTE has a network of trusted lawyers they can refer Greek Diasporans to, so if you feel this may be a necessity, do not hesitate to email us via the contact info on our website or message us on social media.
1. Get your children their citizenship early
We’ll keep this one brief. Our advice here is to essentially kill multiple birds with one stone, especially if you’re a parent and already went through the trouble of updating your Greek family tree – or “merida” – to finally include you, your partner and the birth of your children. If you apply your children for citizenship before they turn 18, you can effectively tack them onto your process more smoothly than if you let them fend for themselves once they are adults.
That’s our list, built off the experience of securing our Greek Citizenships before turning 18. If you want a more detailed step-by-step guide on how to get your citizenship from start to finish, read our previous article on the matter here.
Καλή τύχη!