Beetlejuice

[mbarrick]

I'm sitting in the passport office, waiting to see an "examiner". It is remeniscent of the closing scene in Beetlejuice. I wouldn't be surprised if the guy beside me knows how to shrink heads.

I skipped out of work to do this. The passport is so I can proceed with my Australian immigration, although in another year and half it will be require to go to the U.S. as well. Either way, it's about time I got one.

Why must government waiting rooms always be so dismal? It doesn't seem to matter which governmant it happens to be, either. It's like there is an international standard that applies to all levels of government.

All the require players are present as well: the increacingly imaptient running/screaming infant and apologetic mother; the shrill women nattering in a foreign language; the surly clerks manning only 10% of the available wickets...

Comments

[tnkgrl.livejournal.com]

You should see the gov waiting rooms down here in the US.

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

That's just it. At least from my own exerience there isn't any remarkable difference. Some are slighlty more abysmal than others, but the range is distinctly limited.

[dream-king.livejournal.com]

Don't forget Friday, 8/8:30 for dinner.

[sovietnimrod.livejournal.com]

The best government experience was when I went to the Irish Republic with my cousin in 1996.

We get off our flight from London and walk towards immigration. There's a sign (in English and Gaelic) saying "EU Citizens Left; Non-EU Citizens Right" and two pathways (seperated by portable barriers) splitting off each way.

My cousin (who's English) takes the left path while I head right. We walk along for all of 20 feet when the two pathways turn around a bend and empty out into the main public reception area... both myself and my cosuin step into the area at the same time, perplexed... never any sign of any immigration officers, offices, or nothing except those carpet-covered portable barriers...

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

Case in point. At the passport office there were two lines: one for people applying for passports and one for people picking up passports. The same clerk was serving both lines.

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

I haven't forgot, but I'll have to let you know tomorrow. Elaine got some kind of bite, possibly a spider, on her forehead last night and doesn't want to be around a bunch of new people if it is still as lumpy as it is today. I don't blame her - right now it looks a little like she's been clocked with a baseball bat.

[mediavictim.livejournal.com]

I remeber me passport expereince - I also rember the hoops the government made me jump through BEFORE I even went into the passport office.

had to go and stand in line to pick UP the application, Had to get my photo taken somewhere else , had to get references from another place , had to get a notary public to sign a peice of paper, had to order another birth certificate , missed a lot of work (and pay) jumping through hoops even before I set foot in the passport office to drop OFF my application.

When all was said and done - my $80 passport cost me about $300 in time , lost wages, and extra required services

The government has got red tape down to such an exact science that they don't even NEED an office to inconvenience you.

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

Yeah, at least that wasn't so bad for me. You can pick up the forms at any postal outlet now. The birth certificate I have (and actually why I haven't bothered with a passport to date - driver's license and birth certificate are all you need to go to the States at the moment, but that is changing in 2007). Dunne & Rundle in Bentall Centre does passport photos, so that was easy. I got one of the CGA accountants at work to be my guarantor and sign the pictures and form.

[sovietnimrod.livejournal.com]

Yes, but at least you had a clerk...

In my case, there was no proof I ever entered (or left) the country.

[seymour-glass.livejournal.com]

hey the waiting room in our licensing area is nice...i have to get a passport eventually too...but i doubt i'll be going to the states anytime soon...last time was in '97 for a day...

[princeoigan.livejournal.com]

So are u still likely to head down here? Or are you just covering yourself in case you do? You have see an examiner to get a passport? Whoa.. we just have to fill in a form and provide some ID at the post office! hehe

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

I had no idea what the "examiner" was when I wrote that. The first clerk looked at my papers to make sure they were filled out completely and I wasn't a waste of time. She then gave me a number and I sat for an hour and a half in an unconfortable chair between a pickled late-middle aged woman with skin like leather and dressed entirely in denim who asked me why my "calculator" had so many buttons and could not grasp that I was reading and posting to a website, and an old Japanese man with halitosis who felt compelled to tell me how Japanese electronics were superior to my Blackberry.

When my number finally appeared and I went to see the "examiner" I discovered just what a passport office "examiner" does. He "examined" my I.D., made sure the number on my birth certificate matched the number on the form. put my photos in a little sleeve that I had to sign, and took my money for the fee. That was it. It took about a minute. Based on his job title I thought I was going to be interrogated or something. The "examiner" was, in fact, nothing more than a cashier.

I felt kind of short-changed after the experience. After waiting so long I was expecting more.

[dream-king.livejournal.com]

Let me know when you can.

Pez got bitten by a flying ant last night and her leg swelled something aweful and it had red spoltches from her ankle to her upper thigh.