Ink on our fingers.

One of the requirements for our visa is a background check by the FBI to show that we don't have a criminal history. This background check requires that we send a set of fingerprints to the FBI who will then check our fingerprints against a nationwide data base and provide us with written documentation that we don't have a criminal record.

Getting yourself fingerprinted is not as easy as I would expect. Some of the information I found was that local police will do fingerprinting, so I called the village police here in Corrales and they have one officer who does fingerprints. After several attempts at phone tag we talked to this officer and he said we would need to bring in the card to have the fingerprints put on, we said we didn't have one, he recommended we call the local FBI. We called the local FBI office and they don't give out those cards but referred us to a local business that does fingerprinting for a fee. We contacted this service, on the other side of town, and they will not give out the FBI fingerprint cards or sell them claiming that is a federal offense (even though you can print one off the FBI website) but we could pay them to do the fingerprinting.

We checked some more on the FBI website and decided we could use the fingerprint card provided by the local police. We contacted the officer and set an appointment this morning to have our fingerprints done. When we got there, the fingerprint card they use is identical to the one shown on the FBI website except it says "Corrales PD" instead of "FBI", so these are the cards we will use.

My fingerprint process went off without a hitch, all ten fingers and I was set to go. Valerie's fingers were a different story. Seems women have softer fingerprint texture which makes them harder to get onto paper, part of those soft hands we men so appreciate. It took a second try with Valerie's fingers and we had our fingerprint cards in hand and now we are ready to send them off to the FBI.

It is a good thing the delinquent activities of my youth never resulted in any arrests.