She flicked through my passport, a slight frown wrinkling the corners of her eyes, a just-audible tut-tutting sound escaping pursed lips. Suddenly it was slapped down on the desk, and she was shaking her head.

I rolled my eyes and turned away as Gabriel moved forward to argue with her. This was our third time in this notary’s office today, and, I calculated, it must have been around about sixteenth in the procession of notaries we’d visited in the last two weeks. At least they made a welcome change from banks, lawyers’ offices, the public registry office and immigration.

We were trying to buy a VolksWagon combi. It was to be in my name, as Gerente General of the company. At 9 am when we’d first dragged the increasingly impatient seller along to the notary’s office, the notary had not actually been there to sign off on anything. At 11.30 am she was on her way.

Tempers had begun to fray a little at this point; but money had already changed hands, fingerprints had been inked on to documents, so we were stuck.

As instructed, we returned at 1 pm. The notary was still nowhere to be seen, but now there was suddenly a problem with my identification.

“There’s no civil status on this passport.”

“Well… no…,” I wasn’t sure where this was going.

“All passports state the civil status.”

I stared at her.

“My passport doesn’t.”

“All passports have it.”

Was she suggesting I was attempting to buy a 10-year old car with a fake Australian passport? I could think of at least fifteen other things I’d be doing at that exact moment if I had the capacity to create that kind of professional forgery.

“Australian passports don’t.”

“All passports do.”

I turned away again, suspecting the look of sharp irritation on my face wasn’t going to do us any favours either.

I haven’t really enjoyed my first taste of Peruvian bureaucracy. Never having attempted to start a business back home, I’m not qualified to compare, but I can’t help but suspect that there, notaries actually pass the greater part of their business day in their office, and that if confirmation of my marital status was a relevant pre-requisite to my signing a contract, it would always be a requisite, and not just all of a sudden after I’d already opened a bank account, rented a house and signed the Constitution of our new company.

I’ve been told I can’t apply for residency until the company is constituted; and that we can’t constitute the company without my residency being approved. Finding a bank that would open an account for a foreigner felt more a matter of smiling nicely and hoping to get the right person at the right time than having to do with any concrete rules. I’ve been fingerprinted so many times my right index finger is, I swear, developing a permanent blueish tinge.

But you know what? Now that I’m through the worst of it, it wasn’t that painful. The rules may have seemed a little abstract at times, but that also meant that with a few smiles and the right contacts they could be flexed that little bit further, far enough for us to slip on through. The company is formed and we’re in the midst of renovations and redecorations. We’re no longer spending days, weeks waiting for progress to happen, we’re making it.

The only things left is my residency. Should be a piece of cake, we just need a translated business plan. And every time I look at that 14 page document in oh-so-articulate English, I get a headache. Best get a move on it, though. The visa runs out in four days. This is not a convenient time for a visa run.

This is my contribution to the fourth Lonely Planet Blogsherpa Carnival, Rubber Stamp – a collection of stories about the trials and tribulations of visas, border crossings and bureaucracy on the road from some of the best travel bloggers on the web.  For more travel inspiration, have a look at the LP Blogsherpa Squidoo Lens on World Travel.

And yeah, WordPress still broken.  Considering the next blog post planned is a photo essay on Lima, lets all pray it comes good soon.