It's Official!

I got a call yesterday from the Dept. of Foreign Affairs to say that my certificate of residency was ready. I confirmed that I could come in and collect it today (that's a lot of alliteration - probably a leftover from the story...).

So off I go this morning, take a number and join a queue. When it's my turn, the woman says I'm in the wrong building, I need to go to another place, right at the other end of town (where I just came from) and up a hill.

I go have a beer, walk up the hill past the park where the guys are playing cards. By now lunchtime has started, so the office is closed until 2pm. I hang out and watch the guys play cards, then go back. And take a number, and wait. The woman there tells me the certificate hasn't arrived yet; I say I got a call; she says it's in the other building. I explain that I went there, they told me to come here; she says it's all very difficult. Anyway, she phones them to confirm that the document is there.

So off I go, past the card game, walk back across town to the first building. Take a number, queue. And when it's my turn, a different helpful woman explains that I should go to the other building.

"Really. You confident about that?"

So I explain the phone call, my little tour of the city, but she's sure I'm in the wrong building. She asks someone else, who pulls out a box with the document in it. At that point the woman realises that she was in fact the one who phoned me yesterday.

On the bus home we passed the park; card game still going strong.

But it's official: I'm official!