Things Getting in the Way

I'm not making excuses. And I am upset with only myself. But. I have gotten ridiculously off course. I think it's a good thing I'm staying in Cluj now for about a month. I was doing SO well there, peaking with this meeting with the Secretariat and I was just blossoming with ideas.

But....... a few days in Bucharest with all night Embassy parties, Latin dance clubs, ridiculously good food (made by fellow Fulbrighters, not courtesy of Bucharest restaurant scene) and 8 hour treks each way have really thrown a wrench in the works. 

Also, I've been planning a trip to Paris that has now taken me SO MUCH planning time, I should've just started walking now and gotten there sooner. Budget airlines remind me of Romania in general. You think, wow, this is is inexpensive, great! Then it turns into the most inconvenient process EVER as I book FOUR flights from here to Paris, total travel time = 24 hours; total flight time = 3 hours. Total number of credit cards REJECTED by various cheapo airlines' websites: 3. Not an exaggeration. Also, the booking process is convoluted and inconvenient. And they nickel and dime you SO MUCH. I got charged to pay with a credit card (and by me, I mean my good friend Rachel who had to use her non-Visa, non-rejected cards to buy these tickets) on a website. This leads me to the question- how else was I supposed to pay for this flight if not a credit card? So watch out for those buggers, they'll get you at the last billing page when your miraculous 5 Euro flight turns into a 64 Euro purchase, complete with NO baggage checked in and the worst placed terminals ever. 

Anyways, what I'm saying, Philip, is this had better be the best trip of my life. 

And I won't let myself rant too much about it, but Rachel and I had another fun visit to a Romanian bureaucratic office. I will just allow myself to share/rant about one teensy irksome thing: You need a form to get the visa (you need about 7 various forms, but one of them is provided by the Office for Foreigners). This form needs to be filled out by the time you get to the front of the line/get invited into the office. The form is only distributed in the office (and I do mean IN the tiny office, not the whole building). Therefore, one must approach the crowd/line, open the door a crack, get chewed out by an unfriendly ward/employee of the state, wait until current satisfied customer is served/rejected due to a technicality, and then get a form from inside the office, push your way back to the back of the line, fill in the form, and then get back to the front of the line in order to re-confront the officer. 

Is there some genetic/social urge in Romanian government employees that makes them miss the most obvious, least offensive to EVERYONE involved, practical procedures?! 

WHY don't you put the forms directly OUTSIDE of the door?!!??!?!?! 

WHY do you waste your time, day in and day out, over and over and over (10 times in the hour I was standing there) first chastising inquiring people and then letting them try again to get the form??

WHY can you not make things easier for everyone, and most especially YOURSELF, dear officer, and place a tiny plastic table outside the door to leave the forms on?!

Do you enjoy repeating "Wait outside, wait until you're invited in, don't come in, close the door" 15 times an hour (that is a stupid question, of course he liked doing it, that's why he works for the government of a post-communist regime).

Do you think you're serving your country well by badly serving both the people needing forms and people who are FINALLY invited into the office by wasting both parties' time? 

Do you enjoy the power trip of having some bureaucratic forms piled on your hideous desk that you distribute at will? Is this the only element of your life or career you have control over? 

Do you know how much I just enjoyed ripping you to shreds? Do you know how much I resent you for making it impossible for me to turn in my 7000 forms today so that I have to stand in that line again tomorrow? 

CRETIN.