Gina's Mexican Citizenship Journey

This article is a reaction to a recent discussion on a certain Mérida Facebook page. Some of the response to a very simple question of mine was kind of hostile.

A few people actually questioned the very fact that I was a Mexican citizen, that I became a Mexican citizen simply by marrying a Mexican born person. 

They had all kinds of theories and I think it's because they don't realize that 40 years ago things were different than they are now. 

Some also seemed very shocked that I would be working in Mexico illegally. Even comparing me to a Russian spy for working for a foreign government, Canada!

Back in the 80s there were few foreigners in Mexico and it was very easy to get certain jobs without a work permit. Teaching English was one of those jobs. All the schools were very eager to get what they called "native speakers". And it was a good job and it paid really well. But you had to have a car and go all over the city, sometimes twice in one day. 

As an example, on the day of the big earthquake in September 1985, I was on the fifth floor of the General Motors building in Mexico City. I taught there every weekday morning from 7 to 8 AM, to a group of employees. One afternoon a week I did French conversation with an executive at Nestlé. We just conversed in French. 

And as for the embassy job well I was working for the Canadian government so they never asked me if I was legal, they didn't care - they just wanted me to be a Canadian citizen. And you had to be trilingual which was not that common. 

All this discussion about the legality of my Mexican citizenship ended up piquing my own curiosity.  I wanted to make sure I was getting everything right. Since I keep everything (documents) it wasn't hard to find the proper chronology. The following is for the purpose of putting some order in all that discussion, both for the curious and the incredulous. 

Gina’s Mexican Citizenship Journey - A Summary

• January 1980. Arrive Cuernavaca to study Spanish.
• April 1980, move to Mexico City, meet future husband. He is Mexican, born in Tabasco. Decide to stay in Mexico. Get a job teaching English. 
• July 1980, tourist visa expires. (Doesn’t matter, language schools don’t care if you’re not legal.)
• Spring 1981, fiancé and I decide to move to Canada. Fiancé applies for immigration to Canada; Canadian immigration insist we get married in Mexico before they will process his application.
• April 29, 1981, marry Mexican citizen. The same one!
• Summer 1981, move to Canada with new husband.
• 1984, husband and I decide to move back to Mexico.
• Summer 1985, back to Mexico, I enter with tourist card.
• Summer 1985, study Spanish at UNAM.
• Fall 1985,  start working at Canadian Embassy in Mexico city. I find out from a colleague who was showing off her new Mexican passport that if you’re married to a Mexican you can obtain Mexican citizenship. I am delighted! (Funny how certain events stick in your mind. I remember that day very clearly!)
• November 1985, in order apply for citizenship, first I have to apply for residency. On 26 November I receive permission to change from non-immigrant (tourist) to immigrant, as my husband's dependent. In other words I'm not supposed to be working. But as I mentioned elsewhere the Canadian government was not concerned about that. 
• 1985-86. I don't have the date of the application for citizenship but the document (Declaratoria) granting said citizenship is dated April 14, 1986. The first paragraph contains these words: "... es mexicana por naturalización en los términos del artículo 30, sección B, fracción II, de la Constitución Política de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos, por haber contraído matrimonio el día 29 de abril de 1981 en México, Distrito Federal con el señor (name of my husband), de nacionalidad mexicana..." 
• I quoted the above for the benefit of those who don't believe you could obtain citizenship just through marriage in those days. No five-year residency was necessary, as some have claimed. As I keep saying, this was 40 years ago! 
• November 12, 1986, receive first Mexican passport. I still have it. I still have all the passports issued since then every 5 or 10 years. I love entering Mexico with my Mexican passport because there's no queue! 

                                            *****

Wait! There's more... Back then when you took on the Mexican citizenship you had to renounce your Canadian citizenship and hand in your Canadian passport. Then the Mexican authorities delivered your passport to your embassy - supposedly to be destroyed but of course the Canadian government just gave it back to you because they allowed dual citizenship. The funny thing is that one of my responsibilities when I was working at the embassy was receiving and giving back those Canadian passports. So, I received my own passport and gave it back to myself!