How I Love Bureaucracy

September 4th.

I had slept over at my new apartment so that I could head straight to the police station to begin the process for my visa extension.  Thinking that getting there nearly 2 hours early would be fine, I was proven seriously wrong as I received my number "70" and was told to go stand in the "extranjeros" (foreigner) line.  There were two long lines, one for Spanish/EU citizens and one for everyone else.  When the police station opened at 9:00am, the line didn't move at all as they would only take two people from each of the two lines and wait until they had finished what they had to do inside.  There were a few other kids from my program who were also trying to get a head start on the visa process.  After an hour of not moving, I decided that I would return the next day even earlier.  I should mention that the police station is only opened from 9-2, the same exact hours of our classes.  Luckily for me, I have an "open first" study period until 10:00am so If I was one of the first in line I would hopefully be able to get in and out without missing any class.

Today our 11:00 teacher was unable to come, so I had an extra hour.  Rather than wait in the line that wasn't moving, I went over to the University of California/University of Granada Study Center to talk with the International Student Advisor (a really nice lady named Inma who has a similar position to my mom's job at ELS).  I had been confused about how I was supposed to register for classes.  Inma told me not to worry as she would be giving a presentation to us tomorrow and had assembled some helpful handouts to assist us with the process.  I also told her that I had rented a piso, and she told me that I should feel lucky to have found such a good one.  Both Inma and the study center director (and UCSD professor) Ramon are very helpful and attentive to what we need.

I walked briskly back up to the residencia in time for my 12:00 class.  As it turned out, two of the kids from my program had been able to get their form processed.  I decided to go back tomorrow and try again.