Just so that I don’t disappoint anyone this is just a reference for people, especially for people out of the European Union, which apply for a Mexican student visa. The visa is free - no application fees or any other costs besides the price you pay for making 4 pictures. It’s much easier than applying for an American visa - that’s for sure!

My nationality is German and it took about 2 weeks to apply and get it handed out to me. For other countries that might be different, I believe to have heard that for Russians or Chinese it takes longer up to 4 month.

You can acquire the visa at every embassy and consulate. But bear in mind, that you need to do it in the closest one to your home. If you live in ‘Hessen Germany’ Frankfurt am Main will be the place you want to go.

Now to my story and how I got my visa.

I had a bit of telephone contact with the embassy in Frankfurt, which was difficult because their working hours aren’t the friendliest ones (Monday till Friday from 9am - 1pm). While talking with them on the phone they’ve told me that I only can get a visa when I have a written letter from my university that says that I’m a fully accepted student. A letter that says that I’m a guest hearer wouldn’t be enough.

This was an important fact for me. Before the phone call I was still looking for a guest seat, that all changed after the call obviously. ‘How I found my university’ can you read in an earlier post of me.

To the other problems I had already came on top that the official website of the Mexican embassy in Germany was down, so that I wasn’t able to get the proper forms. Luckily I was able to get them faxed to me by a helpful employee for the embassy. The forms weren’t too complicated to fill out it basically just asked for normal and reasonable information:

“Will you visit the northern border of Mexico? Will you visit the southern border of Mexico? Where will land or enter the country? What are you intentions (student, worker, employee)? Have you ever had a visa before? Was your last visa accepted? ” The questions ‘where will you enter the country’ supposes that you bought a ticket before your apply for a visa. Or am I mistaken? I found that a bit weird, but OK.

What wondered me the most is that they didn’t want an address were I’ll be staying. On the paper it said further that I need to have a bank recipe that ensures that I’m having at least 500$ at a monthly basis - I guess they just want to make sure I don’t starve in Mexico or become a bum. All the paper work was filled out pretty quickly just took about 10 minutes. I think the hardest part of it all was just getting the proper papers from the embassy.

There I was, all happy and smiling, in the train to the embassy with all my papers:

• Appliance letter
• Passport
• Bank recipe
• 2 Photos

It took just 30 minutes for me to arrive in Frankfurt and luckily there was a train station next to the embassy. But it’s not like I found it immediately, oh no I searched for approximately 20 minutes till I saw that little sign saying: “Mexican Embassy”.

At least there weren’t too many people in the embassy, just an hectic Russian that was anxious to cut me in line. When it was my time to get to the counter the woman was very friendly and she accepted my papers - except my bank recipe. She told me that she would prefer a letter signed letter from my dad with something similar like that on it:

” With this letter I’m assuring that my son Thomas will be getting 500$ each month from me. Dad”

I just thought: “great I made the entire journey for nothing”. But at least they kept my papers and passport and promised that I just need to send them this letter and they proceed from there. The same day my dad faxed them the letter. So we called them again the next day but then they told me that this wasn’t enough they also wanted a copy from my dad’s passport. Another day was lost. Finally at the third day they seemed to be happy and said they process it now. This was the start of just waiting and hoping that everything will turn out good. There are all those myth that Mexicans are lazy and it usually takes them longer till they get something done, but not this time. After the 10^th working day has passed I’ve called them and asked whether they got my visa done and they said ‘yes, you can come and pick it up.’

Score! About 2 hours later I was at their office and standing in line for picking it up. I got all nervous because the person who wanted to hand me the visa out didn’t find it at first - I guess he mixed up my last name, well that happens to a lot of people. Once he found it he wanted me to put one finger print and a signature in a booklet - or my student visa. Yes, the Mexican visa is an extra booklet with lots and lots of pages where you can put lots and lots of information… Next to the booklet he also handed me my Passport back, they also put a new sticker in it, saying that I’m a having a visa. The employee also told me that I need to carry with those two items (visa and booklet) the entire time while traveling around Mexico.

That was it basically. Hopefully this will help someone someday.

Thomas

Ps.: The student visa allows you to leave the county and entering it again. Oh, and if anyone wants or needs the forms i’ll be happy to send them to you!