Identity and Civil status documents- Japan

[marikoi]

Hi there,

I am applying for a spousal sponsorship and when going through the specific checklist of japanese nationals, the identity and civil status documents had me confused. When it says "A marriage certificate, birth certificate, Family Register or certified official copy and a translation of
your unaltered "Koseki Tohon" and "Kaiseigen Koseki Tohon" does it mean that i have to provide all the three documents listed above or just one of them is good enough? the use of "or" and "and" in that statement was kind of confusing me.

Your opinion would be highly appreciated!!!!

Thank you!

 

[Kayaker]

Hi, I believe I sent in:

- my marriage certificate (it doesn't exist in Japan - the Japanese equivalent is the marriage application acceptance certificate)
- my koseki tohon (if you just got married, you must wait a week or so until they update it)
- my father's koseki tohon (it shows me as having been removed from it)
- my father's kaiseigen koseki tohon

no birth certificate - we don't really use those in Japan, the koseki tohon takes its place.

They ask for your kaiseigen koseki tohon, but most likely it won't exist - because I didn't have a koseki back in the days of the kaiseigen (older version) koseki. I was an entry in my father's koseki and kaiseigen koseki until I got my own koseki by getting married.

To explain - what they're interested in is your family life, especially regarding previous marriages and children. By marrying, you've created a brand new koseki, and that may or may not include previous marital info. Your father's koseki has information prior to your marriage. And your father probably is old enough to have had the kaiseigen koseki, and they want to see that too, to make sure no information was left out when they changed the old version koseki to the new version.

I know it sounds a bit convoluted, but that's the reasoning behind it I believe. When I was collecting my documents I got confused and eventually happened upon a blog; the blogger had gone through the same thing. She had initially just submitted her koseki because she didn't have a kaiseigen koseki. But CIC still asked her to submit her kaiseigen koseki and she figured out that they wanted to know about her entire life, prior to marriage. Makes sense. They want to know that you are married (obviously) but they also want to verify if you've been married before, or if you have any children.

Good luck!