An alternate method of obtaining a Khmer wedding license
An alternate method of obtaining a Khmer wedding license
Hello all,
My wife and I had a ceremony years ago, and got married in Texas years ago. But, we had never gotten married in Cambodia. As I was approaching 50, I decided a few months back to start the process of obtaining a Khmer wedding license. My first stop was the U.S. Embassy to get an affidavit stamped by them. The first problem was that my choices on the form were: single never married, or single after divorce. Neither applied to me because we are legally married. Compounding this problem was the fact that the Foreign Affairs office did not like my copy of my police record as it was not embossed, and they were asking for my U.S. work permit..........and such a thing does not exist.
The route to a single man getting a marriage license in Cambodia is very difficult. There are stacks of paperwork....any of which can be denied, and you have to make multiple trips to get things translated....which usually results in some words not being correct and thus...multiple trips back to the translation company, and so on. In addition to the hassle, it is also not cheap.
I was about to throw my hands up when a friend of my wife's who works in the Foreign Afffairs Ministry told her that we could bring in our U.S. wedding license and they could give us a Cambodian license. It sounded too good to be true. But, we took our license to Foreign Affairs. They stamped it, and told us to take it to our local Sangkat. They warned us that the local Sangkat might not be familiar with how to process this. We took our stamped paperwork to the local Sangkat, they signed off....and I think the local police may have signed off too....and yesterday we picked up our Khmer wedding license. Total cost was 30.00 that we gave to the local Sangkat as a tip for their help.
Not only were we able to get the license for only 30.00.....but there was no medical exam, tax records, police report, etc....required. And, the license was granted after my 50th birthday. My friend in his 60's is now going through the same process.....but it seems that there is no age restriction if you do it this way.
IMO, it is an easier route to get married in your home country.....and then get the marriage license here....and, I was surprised to find that there is an alternate option for those over 50 to be legally married to a Khmer bride.
My wife and I had a ceremony years ago, and got married in Texas years ago. But, we had never gotten married in Cambodia. As I was approaching 50, I decided a few months back to start the process of obtaining a Khmer wedding license. My first stop was the U.S. Embassy to get an affidavit stamped by them. The first problem was that my choices on the form were: single never married, or single after divorce. Neither applied to me because we are legally married. Compounding this problem was the fact that the Foreign Affairs office did not like my copy of my police record as it was not embossed, and they were asking for my U.S. work permit..........and such a thing does not exist.
The route to a single man getting a marriage license in Cambodia is very difficult. There are stacks of paperwork....any of which can be denied, and you have to make multiple trips to get things translated....which usually results in some words not being correct and thus...multiple trips back to the translation company, and so on. In addition to the hassle, it is also not cheap.
I was about to throw my hands up when a friend of my wife's who works in the Foreign Afffairs Ministry told her that we could bring in our U.S. wedding license and they could give us a Cambodian license. It sounded too good to be true. But, we took our license to Foreign Affairs. They stamped it, and told us to take it to our local Sangkat. They warned us that the local Sangkat might not be familiar with how to process this. We took our stamped paperwork to the local Sangkat, they signed off....and I think the local police may have signed off too....and yesterday we picked up our Khmer wedding license. Total cost was 30.00 that we gave to the local Sangkat as a tip for their help.
Not only were we able to get the license for only 30.00.....but there was no medical exam, tax records, police report, etc....required. And, the license was granted after my 50th birthday. My friend in his 60's is now going through the same process.....but it seems that there is no age restriction if you do it this way.
IMO, it is an easier route to get married in your home country.....and then get the marriage license here....and, I was surprised to find that there is an alternate option for those over 50 to be legally married to a Khmer bride.
- raendi
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Lucky you, since Cambodian government haven't been recognize marriage outside Kingdom for years. Maybe "law" have changed again or then it was just about your great connection to MoFA.LoneStar wrote:a friend of my wife's who works in the Foreign Afffairs Ministry told her that we could bring in our U.S. wedding license and they could give us a Cambodian license. It sounded too good to be true. But, we took our license to Foreign Affairs. They stamped it, and told us to take it to our local Sangkat.
Pardon my engrish, thanks you.
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I did this just last month but my situation might be different from most others as I hold dual citizenship. We were never legally married or had a wedding ceremony. The procedure is similar to what your described. I am fortunate to have a military friend who knows people, he filled in the forms for us, photocopied our required documents then brought to the district chief, got and signed and stamp; the same process repeated with the Sangkat (we were allowed to put the wedding date to whenever) -- he also made us birth certificates at the same time all less than $15. But the entire process was time consuming.
EVERYONE BOW DOWN TO HIS MAJESTIES phat kunthea™
Raendi,
I don't think this was due to our connection....I think it would work for anyone.
I don't think this was due to our connection....I think it would work for anyone.
- vladimir
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LS, you didn't once mention a request for proof of income here.
Were you not asked for it?
Happy to see someone getting a fair deal.
Were you not asked for it?
Happy to see someone getting a fair deal.
ירי ילדים והפצצת אזרחים דורש אומץ, כמו גם הטרדה מינית של עובדי ההוראה.
Nope,
I was not asked for anything whatsoever, except for a thumbprint on the new license paperwork.
I was not asked for anything whatsoever, except for a thumbprint on the new license paperwork.
Can anyone confirm this?
pew, pew, pew, pew!
Interesting! Considering any foreigner wishing to be legally married in Cambodia to a Cambodian citizen must first be approved by the MoI.
Congrats anyway!
Congrats anyway!
I'm not a negative person, I encourage people all the time...it's usually to f**k off! But, whatever.
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I'm in the same boat (even have the Texas marriage license).
Curious if you needed an extra official license to give the Sangkat to keep or did they hand your original back to you? Also curious what benefits you know of in having the Cambodia license in addition to your US one? I may go this route. Thanks for the info.
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Curious if you needed an extra official license to give the Sangkat to keep or did they hand your original back to you? Also curious what benefits you know of in having the Cambodia license in addition to your US one? I may go this route. Thanks for the info.
Sent from my Furious 7 Pro using Tapatalk
- raendi
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Didn't work for me couple years ago, but good that they have changed policy about foreign marriagesLoneStar wrote:Raendi,
I don't think this was due to our connection....I think it would work for anyone.
Pardon my engrish, thanks you.
- rogerrabbit
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One that comes to mind is, if you want to get Cambodian passport. Of course before getting it you would need to live here for 3 years.lostjeremy wrote:I'm in the same boat (even have the Texas marriage license).
Curious if you needed an extra official license to give the Sangkat to keep or did they hand your original back to you? Also curious what benefits you know of in having the Cambodia license in addition to your US one? I may go this route. Thanks for the info.
Sent from my Furious 7 Pro using Tapatalk
I'll have to give it a try. My Khmer wife and I were married in Singapore 5 years ago and have lived there since. We'll be moving to PP at least for the short term soon. But since there's no spousal visa yet, I guess it won't make much difference either way.
Do they need groom to process or just only bride or both have to present their selves for stamp on marriage license? I prefer to be done all before he come after me as he has really short holiday.LoneStar wrote:Hello all,
My wife and I had a ceremony years ago, and got married in Texas years ago. But, we had never gotten married in Cambodia. As I was approaching 50, I decided a few months back to start the process of obtaining a Khmer wedding license. My first stop was the U.S. Embassy to get an affidavit stamped by them. The first problem was that my choices on the form were: single never married, or single after divorce. Neither applied to me because we are legally married. Compounding this problem was the fact that the Foreign Affairs office did not like my copy of my police record as it was not embossed, and they were asking for my U.S. work permit..........and such a thing does not exist.
The route to a single man getting a marriage license in Cambodia is very difficult. There are stacks of paperwork....any of which can be denied, and you have to make multiple trips to get things translated....which usually results in some words not being correct and thus...multiple trips back to the translation company, and so on. In addition to the hassle, it is also not cheap.
I was about to throw my hands up when a friend of my wife's who works in the Foreign Afffairs Ministry told her that we could bring in our U.S. wedding license and they could give us a Cambodian license. It sounded too good to be true. But, we took our license to Foreign Affairs. They stamped it, and told us to take it to our local Sangkat. They warned us that the local Sangkat might not be familiar with how to process this. We took our stamped paperwork to the local Sangkat, they signed off....and I think the local police may have signed off too....and yesterday we picked up our Khmer wedding license. Total cost was 30.00 that we gave to the local Sangkat as a tip for their help.
Not only were we able to get the license for only 30.00.....but there was no medical exam, tax records, police report, etc....required. And, the license was granted after my 50th birthday. My friend in his 60's is now going through the same process.....but it seems that there is no age restriction if you do it this way.
IMO, it is an easier route to get married in your home country.....and then get the marriage license here....and, I was surprised to find that there is an alternate option for those over 50 to be legally married to a Khmer bride.
Which direction or the office should i go directly to MoFA? because last time the security guards there gave me the person, not let's me go inside (or because i went there while they had big conference) and they charged me alot 15$ per page with 4 original copied.
I hope Cambodia will still recognize official swiss marriage license next year.
Thank you in advance for the answer.
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