afadfiofieadiblargh!!!
Apr. 25th, 2005 11:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akujunkanAs I'm sure all of you know, I'm going to China. This requires a visa. Having no desire to take time off of work, I looked into applying for said visa by mail, which is possible through the Nagasaki embassy. I got the information; my traveling companion Andy had a Japanese friend look into the particulars. We applied for our visas together at the beginning of this month.
Andy received his visa two weeks ago, although he didn't actually have it delivered until sometime last week. I did not receive my visa. Once Andy put two and two together about the mysterious missed delivery slips he'd been receiving for a week, I put two and two together about the mystery phone calls I'd been receiving throughout the same period. (I usually don't answer unfamiliar calls because of the possibility of billing scams.)
Sure enough, it was about my visa. It costs $50 for British citizens to apply, but $70 for American citizens. I longed to be angry at Andy for not thinking of this, but the fault is all mine, because I was perfectly happy to let him do the application legwork at the time. It was eight days to departure and no visa for me. I asked the woman on the phone if I could send the remaining $20 to her by bank transfer. I could not.
I emailed Andy to get the information our Japanese friend had sent him about the application process. He didn't respond for two days. Only he had, but he'd been sending short texts, which my DoCoMoFo cell phone cannot receive. I applied anyway, crossing my fingers that I was sending the money to the right division. It cost $15 to overnight the $20.
I had to work Saturday, so I received Monday off as a replacement holiday. I'd meant to get up and cracking, but 11:00 found me still lolling around in bed when the doorbell rang. Hoping against hope, I sprang up, threw a robe over my pjs and answered. Hallelujah! It was my passport (with visa), and thanks to the kindness of fate I was at home to receive it.
The COD charge was $9.50. I'd spent over $25 in total on mail order fees to apply, but dammit, I had it.
I opened my passport to gaze upon the glory that was my Chinese visa, the source of all these troubles, to discover a nice, handwritten note to the effect that visas for American citizens are actually only $60, and could I please tell them my bank information so that they could send the remaining $10 to me by bank transfer?
They must be taking cues from my electric company.
Oi.
That will be all.
Andy received his visa two weeks ago, although he didn't actually have it delivered until sometime last week. I did not receive my visa. Once Andy put two and two together about the mysterious missed delivery slips he'd been receiving for a week, I put two and two together about the mystery phone calls I'd been receiving throughout the same period. (I usually don't answer unfamiliar calls because of the possibility of billing scams.)
Sure enough, it was about my visa. It costs $50 for British citizens to apply, but $70 for American citizens. I longed to be angry at Andy for not thinking of this, but the fault is all mine, because I was perfectly happy to let him do the application legwork at the time. It was eight days to departure and no visa for me. I asked the woman on the phone if I could send the remaining $20 to her by bank transfer. I could not.
I emailed Andy to get the information our Japanese friend had sent him about the application process. He didn't respond for two days. Only he had, but he'd been sending short texts, which my DoCoMoFo cell phone cannot receive. I applied anyway, crossing my fingers that I was sending the money to the right division. It cost $15 to overnight the $20.
I had to work Saturday, so I received Monday off as a replacement holiday. I'd meant to get up and cracking, but 11:00 found me still lolling around in bed when the doorbell rang. Hoping against hope, I sprang up, threw a robe over my pjs and answered. Hallelujah! It was my passport (with visa), and thanks to the kindness of fate I was at home to receive it.
The COD charge was $9.50. I'd spent over $25 in total on mail order fees to apply, but dammit, I had it.
I opened my passport to gaze upon the glory that was my Chinese visa, the source of all these troubles, to discover a nice, handwritten note to the effect that visas for American citizens are actually only $60, and could I please tell them my bank information so that they could send the remaining $10 to me by bank transfer?
They must be taking cues from my electric company.
Oi.
That will be all.
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no subject
on 2005-04-26 02:09 am (UTC)Have you considered doing summaries of chapters in advance of proper translations? Summarizing is a lot faster than translating, I'll bet.