Saturday, July 21, 2007

French Revolution in India


state of mind, 11 th July 2007 : cool, composed, relaxed
I was roaming in the wonderful British paved streets of Mumbai. I had just submitted my documents in the outsourced VFS French Consulate building. The last words which the outsourced personnel told me was "your VISA fees will be reimbursed if you are not given the VISA". I believed it was just the norm followed by these people....

Chill, meet the Nairs, do some socializing with new sis-in-law - on a whole IT WAS WONDERFUL TIMEPASS!

state of mind, 12th July 2007 morning : a little nervous, but no tension. Go to VISA consulate after a thorough searching of Backbay - managing to reach the consulate a few minutes before the clock struck 11! Quick process, finish a clean interview and wait for my VISA and passport to come. I was quite excited - it was the 4th stamp on my passport in the last one year ... All I was thinking then was "I am gonna beat Ravi clean, with this stamp!"

The VISA issuing officer calls me, and asks - do you have any other intimation letter from the French organisers. I show him the invitation letter - and the comment he makes is "This cannot be the real invitation. And this is not how the FRENCH give invitations" .... I was bemused. Few seconds later - much before I realised what was happening, the VISA officer was nodding his head in disgust and stamping REJECTION!


State of Mind: 12th July 2007, Noon : pissed, irritated, annoyed, helpless, desperate!
Soon the security comes and asks me to leave the Consulate immediately. I tell them "This is not fair, the grounds on which you are rejecting my vISA" ... they threaten me saying ... "Now, we will call the lady security and throw you out Madam" ... so I say in anger " At least give my money back"... "Sorry madam... just mail to this email address, we cannot do anything" .....

Sadly, with a rejected passport I leave to meet Saranya for lunch. This person called A2D, calls all the people he knows, encourages me to go back to the Consulate like its the most obvious thing to do.

Meanwhile, I just mail the consulate the links to the course and my page on the course webpage.

State of Mind: 12th July 2007, 3pm : relaxed & non-chalant !
This time I speak to the security guys in a more proficient way and explain to them how the VISA officer will be keen to meet me, after he reads my mail. I explain it to them in my spitter-spatter Hindi! It was just a shot in the dark - luckily they believe me and go talk to the officer(JMR) abt it. JMR agrees to meet me! What luck! Still I was sure of not getting the Visa.


I manage to get into the Consulate and wait there ...

State of Mind: 12th July 2007, 4pm : relaxed & tensed ... and bored !
Finally, JMR comes out and tells me he wants to see an intimation from them saying they expect me in France. "What crap!!". I again tell him to look at the invitation letter.

JMR goes back in, and makes me wait longer

State of Mind: 12th July 2007, 4.30pm : relaxed & bored ... and very bored !
This time JMR comes out with my documents and and tells me the same things and asks me for more documents... the consulate closes at 5.00pm... i only have 30 minutes to prove whatever i have to - to him....

State of Mind: 12th July 2007, 4.40pm : excited, tensed and determined
I quickly chekc my mailbox... find some mails and manage to pay 20 bucks and get the printout and hurry back with 5 mins. GIve the printout to the security to give it to JMR and WAIT....

State of Mind: 12th July 2007, 4.50pm : fingers crossed!
He comes out quickly this time and tells me .... this is not enough(expected!) ... but(luckily there was a but) I will wait for an intimation directly from the course organisers and then decide whether to give you the visa. He is angry with me for wasting 2 hours of his(all i was thinking was - "what abt my 2 days!!"). But I was sure, that I had managed to convince him abt my integrity!!

Then it was almost peaceful after that...

I directly called the course organiser who was really nice to mail the VISA ppl (in french ;-)) 3 minutes after i spoke to him.

Then, I mailed the all-feared JMR.... who replied typically "The Visa 'can' be issued" ... whatever that meant....

Again, I respectfully wait for 2 days for the passport to reach home.... which didnt come. Again I mail him ....this time another typical laconic response "Somebody should come and collect it"

Then I bug Saranya to go and collect the Visa and all she told me was "I don't know what you did to the security guards, they were desperate to talk to you" ....

and guess what the security guard told me "we have never seen this happen before, you better give us sweets" ...

2 comments:

Arun Ram J said...

Quiet a story mann... BTW whats the final score on the Visa stamping.

Nice story on perseverence

RaviB said...

I predicted the revolution and u made it...Hats off to you dhanz...if it had been arun (or even me), we would have come back home immediately [:)]