traveldiary.stracke.us

India, like many countries, requires a visa to visit its shores. So, about a week ago, I went on the internet to research the hows of obtaining one. We had 2 choices, we could either get it in person at an Indian Consulate or we could get it through the mail. One should probably opt to get it by mail since it would be more convenient, except for a small point that the consulate made on their website, which states that it was not responsible for any passports lost in the mail. I could only imagine the hassle of acquiring a new passport in a short period of time. NYC, the closest consulate site, is a nice place to visit, thus we opted for the in-person route. Yesterday we embarked on the 2 and 1/2 hour train journey to the big city. The weather was dreary and as we came upon the various bridges along the Huson River, only the pylons of the massive structures were visible. They were jutting out of the icy waters, but the actual bridge spans were shrouded in fog, giving the whole scene a twilight zone appearance. Upon arrival in the Big Apple, we took a quick cab to the Indian Consulate, where we were horded into a basement room, which can only be described as a fire marshall’s nightmare – a fire trap. The approx 14′x16′ room had one small exit for the 150+ people, all waiting to get a visa, the entry ticket to India. On the way in, the security guard pointed us to a ticket machine, where we pulled a number which gave us an indication of when we could expect to be waited upon. According to the numerals, we had close to 70 people in front of us:mad: There were 4 customer windows but only 2 people working. This could not be good!

We resolved ourselves to the fact that it was going to be a long wait. Apparently the doors to the consulate would be closed at 12:15 sharp but we were assured that the people who had been lucky enough to obtain a number, would be waited on. We became acquainted with fellow visa-seekers, mostly Americans, of Indian decent. From them, we learned that although this consulate was on US soil, the inner workings were of an Indian mindset. What does that mean?……….According to them, slow, irratic service, that would be interrupted by travel agency messengers butting the lines, various people claiming “emergencies”, and the occassional bribe given to the security guard to get a person in quicker. All that they predicted became reality… Now why did I not just slip him a $20? After a couple of hours, our number illuminated in bright red, signalled our turn. We ventured to the next open window only to be informed by the nice lady clerk that she couldn’t handle our passports, we would have to wait for window # 1. We dutifully did, and clerk # 1 told us that clerk # 2 could only work on some passports, something about her being new. We had to assume, she meant non American or European passports. To make a long story short, we paid our $100 visa fees, $60 for Americans and only $40 for Europeans. The Europeans must have negotiated a better deal! One must consider these visa fees as entrance fees to a country, like one would pay a fee to visit a sight or a park because why else would they have visas? The only more outrageous international fees are the so called departure taxes. In many 3rd world countries or islands, they charge these for leaving. Do people not spend enough money in these countries? What would happen, if one didn’t pay, would they keep you? Might be a way to stay in a place that you really don’t want to leave.:idea:
After the application was handed in and the fees were paid , we were informed to pick up our passports between 4:30-5:15. Our new acquaintances warned us not to be late. They personally knew of people who came 1-2 minutes after the deadline and were refused their visas and thus missed flights. OOh scarey! We were told of one doctor who came 2 minutes late because she was with a patient and who in turn had to miss her scheduled evening flight, since they would not make any exceptions. Her family in India had held up the funeral of the doctor’s father, so she could be there. Now the poor man would have to wait another day before he could find his final resting place. On a lighter side note, they asked us if we had been to India before and if we liked Indian food. We responded we hadn’t and weren’t really familiar with Indian food. They just smiled, or maybewas it a smirk? Now what did that mean? I guess we will find out. We decided we’re going to stash some food in our baggage…..just in case.
Next it was off to lunch, a quick trip to the 1/2 price Ticketscounter, the hotel check-in and then back to the Consulate to hopefully retrieve our passports.
We were able to get great orchestra area tickets for a new Broadway play Democracy . The drama is about Willi Brandt’s political life( German Chancellor, end of ’60’s to early 70’s).
The afternoon retrieval of our passports, with the pretty 1 page visas, was uneventful. It was actually well organized. At whichever window you had dropped off your passport, you now had to wait there in a Disney-like line to retrieve it. Within 10 minutes we were in possession of our 6 month visas.
It was back to the hotel for a quick snooze, so that I would not fall asleep in the Broadway show….yes I have done that before, but usually only in musicals, which can sometimes lull one to sleep.
The play, with an all male cast, had incredible acting. Politics at that time did not include the fairer sex. Thank goodness, that the playwright gave a synopsis of the politics of that time in the Playbill. I am sure it helped many understand the play, especially those who were not up on their Cold War politics:oops:or those under the age of 35, who really didn’t live through that spy era.
Therafter we had a small midnight dinner at a quaint Italian restaurant in the Theater district. Once again we were the only customers, which is a condition we had gotten used to in Greece or Africa, but in NYC? OK it was late, but this is NYC, the city that never sleeps!?

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 13th, 2005 at 7:51 pm and is filed under General, India. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.