Before coming here, I was encouraged to obtain an international driver’s license because of the DWC (driving while Chinese) syndrome. Apparently because of the influx of lots of Chinese from Asia, many of whom drive without licenses, it is common for the traffic police to “shake down” by stopping vehicles driven be Chinese, who generally all carry a lot of cash and basically collecting from un-licensed drivers. Getting an International driver’s license from the AAA was a breeze, requiring only a modest fee and two pictures.
The first thing one has to remember while driving here is that cars drive on the left hand side of the road and that the steering wheel, gear lever and brakes are on the other side of the car. The most difficult part initially is turning right into a street without ending up on the wrong side of the road. One of the things I have still to get used to after almost a month here is seeing no driver on the left side of the car in front of me. Initially I thought that most of the drivers were very short because I could not see their heads! Another disconcerting thing and also a pet peeve is how closely they follow each other at high speeds. While I was driving on the freeway yesterday, I kept seeing cars behind me following so closely that I could not see their head-lights in my rear-view mirror. Putting on the hazard-flashing lights do not deter them at all, they just ignore me. I would periodically tap on the brakes and they would give me a little space, but would be right there again when I let off the brakes. And what is worst is that they will not pass me when there is space, they just enjoy sitting on my tail.
I will relate some of the tips that some of my local relatives and friends have drummed into me (in no particular order):-
· Always lock the car door and close windows as soon as you get into the car.
· Put our bag and phone out of reach of the windows. Smashing windows and reaching into the car and grabbing things within reach is pretty common.
· Do not stop at places like lights at off ramp at night if there are places that can conceal a person. A few friends have had bricks thrown at their windows from people hiding at off-ramps.
· If you see an obstruction on the freeway, try and get away form it even it means going the wrong way. A relative had a tree put in his way on a major freeway and when he reversed to get out of there, someone threw a brick at his car.
· At night, travel on well lit freeways even if it means traveling a lot further. (Johannesburg has ring roads and multiple freeways that lead to the same destination, some a lot safer than others.)
· Do not drive through the center of town at night.
· Do not drive through Hillbrow even during the day. (This used to be my favorite place to visit with Margot before I emigrated.)
· When waiting at someone’s house, always make sure that the car can move wither forward or backwards at short notice, i.e. do not park into a driveway with a wall or gate in front of you.
· When approaching your destination, make sure you have not been followed and that there not people you do not know milling around where you are about to stop. If necessary, go around the block several times until the coast is clear and call the people at the destination to make sure it is safe to stop if the coast is not clear.
· When coming in from the airport, make sure you are not followed. Two friends of my friend, Richard, were robbed by people following them from the airport. One of them had this happen to him twice on two consecutive trips! I could not figure out initially why my friend, John, insisted that he come fetch me from the airport, it was only afterwards that I found out what he was worried about.
· Always carry a working cell phone when driving.
· Always carry R2 coins when going anywhere, these being used to pay people that guard cars that are parked at parking lots and also along the city streets. They supposedly guard the cars in their allotted places and mostly have some sort of badge indicating that they are parking guards. However, do not expect them to risk their lives for your car if a robber comes for the car.
· Be on the lookout for vans that look like VW minibus. They are generally the taxis that will stop anywhere at no notice and also turn at no notice. The minibuses are generally not well maintained and are always packed. (See below at an email sent to me titled “Soweto goes Formula 1” for a giggle.) These minibuses generally have seatbelts for 10 people including the driver, most of them will pack 15 to 18 people into it. Commuters taking them have developed a complex hand signaling mechanism that allows the drivers to determine whether to pick them up or not. They have no scheduled stops nor to the best of my understanding established routes. They are like roving cabs that cater to lots of people simultaneously.
· Do not turn into the driveway of the American Consulate. A friend of Bridget’s did this to execute a three-point turn and had her car impaled by spikes coming out of the ground. Caused damage amounting to tens of thousands of Rands.
· Start the car in the garage before opening the door and close the door as soon as possible. This minimizes the time the door is open. Not very healthy for people inside the garage and the house though.
· Always make sure to look at the map to know where you are going, and what off ramp you are going to take on freeways. There are signs on the freeways, but generally there is only one indication of the pending ramp, which is generally blocked from view by one of the trucks that crawl the freeways. The signs are generally at the ramp itself giving not a lot of time for changing lanes.
· Road rage is pretty common; do not react unless you want an altercation.
· Do not assume that most cars are road-worthy or well maintained.
· When the traffic light (robot) turns green, do not assume that people with the red light will not just go. Some lights now display red in all directions for a little while to allow for traffic to settle down. However, some drivers being wise to this will start moving as soon as the other side turns red while others will carry on moving even when it is red because they know that the green is not yet due for a few more seconds!Makes for interesting traffic patterns. :=(>
· Pedestrians do not have the right of way. If fact the right of way is mostly determined by the size of the vehicle and the driver’s ability to accept risk. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the greatest risk takers, the minibus drivers mostly rate a 9.9!
Needless to say, driving here has been somewhat nerve wrecking for me. I find even the NYC and LA drivers to be easier to handle than the ones here! I do not particularly enjoy driving at the best to times, this just makes it more of a chore. :=(>
I was sent this email as a joke by Richard which I thought was appropriate for this blog (Soweto is a part of Johannesburg) : -
Soweto goes Formula 1.
Ferrari Formula 1 racing team recently fired their whole pit crew to employ a few young guys from Soweto. This sudden reaction was due to a TV documentary showing how Sowetans could take a car's wheels off within 6 seconds, without any fancy equipment.
Ferrari soon regretted their decision, however, as the young men not only changed the wheels within 6 seconds, but 12 seconds later the car had been re-sprayed and sold to the McLaren Team.
Ferrari was still eager to compete in the race and, since they no longer had a Formula 1 car to race with, decided to race a Sowetan Minibus taxi complete with an experienced (Yet unlicensed) driver and Fare collector in the Grand Prix.
Of course they easily won the championship, since the minibus weaved its way through the start grid, set off before the lights changed and didn't bother to change the tyres when they wore out. It also took all corners at a maximum speed, as the brakes were non-existent. On the way to victory, the new Ama-Ferrari-Ferrari team also managed to hijack several competitors' cars, and picked up 35 passengers at some notoriously dangerous spots, including blind rises as well as in the chicane. We can be proud of another SA sporting achievement, which will put us at the forefront of sporting history. Well-done boys!!!!!!!
Saturday, November 27, 2004
Friday, November 26, 2004
The Saga of Zak’s South African Trip in October, 2004
Hi everyone, this is going to be a long and probably boring tale. I feel justified to share this you because some of you asked to be tortured by my (mis-)adventures, some of you were involved and some of you just unlucky enough that I have your email address. I am writing this in part to act as a journal of my trip and mostly because I am suffering from jet-lag, a cold/flu (courtesy of a fellow passenger) and allergies (from animals that pervade every house-hold in RSA) and can not do anything else of any use except sit in front of the computer. Given this I would not feel at all offended if any, or all, of you should stop reading at any point and simply close this blog. Now that I have completed my disclaimer, I will follow it with my saga.
My brother immigrated to Canada, so bringing my parent to the Unites States became a priority. After consultations with several immigration lawyers, it became obvious that the only way to get them over in a reasonable period of time was for me to make a trip to South Africa. Doing the paper work from the American consulate in South Africa would reduce the time from a few years to a few months. Hunting for air ticket took me to several sources until I finally settle on Cheap-tickets, a consolidator. The best they could do was for me to travel 9 days from booking the ticket. With the ticket settled, I had to choose a lawyer and engage him to help with the paper work. Two days before leaving, the lawyer produced a list of documents that I would have to have to accompany the applications. This resulted in here days of frantic searching for things like birth certificates, social security cards, bank statements, etc. Poor Violet had to go to her safety deposit box at least three times looking for non-existent documents. Finally two days before leaving, I had managed to gather all the papers that hopefully are required. Next panic was to copy them and send to the attorney while taking the originals with me to RSA. All the copiers within reach would eat the originals and then spit them out after copying. This was not viable as some of the papers like my birth certificate was older than I am and would not survive the copy machine’s digestive system. So off to “mailbox are us” and did the copying. Unfortunately, as some of the papers were very old and had writing on both side, the modern copiers would show both side of the paper when only one side was desired. One Friday afternoon at 3 pm, the lawyer called to tell me that I was holding up his long deserved weekend and that if I did not produce the copies for him within an hour, he would really have a good weekend. Desperation, being the mother of all creativity, kicked in and out came my trusty digital camera and in a thrice, I had the copies in digital form for the lawyer, beating his deadline by 30 minutes and thus spoiling his well deserved rest! J Strange, even though some of my friends are lawyers, I have not managed to develop much empathy with them!
Went to Violet’s to pick up stuff to take to RSA. Thought it would only be a few books, turned out to be a little more and would not fit into my luggage. So Violet offered me her “carry on” roller bag to accommodate the stuff. Went back to reshuffle my baggage and ended up with two roller bags plus a carry on roller bag. Not bad for a 2-month trip with at least 30% of space taken up with presents!
One week and one day before my departure, my niece, Bridget, emailed asking me to purchase and bring over a set of professional drums. This resulted in a flurry of phone calls to various musical stores none of which had the required instruments. Eventually found on the Net an organization in Florida, which had it in stock. The free delivery would cost extra if I wanted to get the set on time before my departure. So much so for free. The scheduled delivery was on the Friday and my departure was set on Sunday. Very little room for screw-ups! Along with the email promising delivery was a description of the boxes that contained the drums. “3 boxes measuring over 30 inches and weighing over 100 pounds.” Needless to say, I survived the heart attack this information produced. On Friday morning, the drummer boy (Justin) called to see if his toy had arrived and he offered to talk me through reducing the three boxes to two. Told him he had to contain himself for another 6 or so hours. At about 4:40pm, while I was in the copying process, UPS rolled up with these three mountainous boxes. Reality sank in; I really had no concept how big 32 inches until I saw the boxes. A few hours later, Justin called from RSA extolling me to open the two lighter boxes and consolidate the flat box (hardware) into the smaller big box (stool) and try as I may, I could not convince him that the things form the flat box could not and would not fit into the box containing the stool, either inside or outside the stool. We ended the conversation with Justin having the impression that I was really an incompetent buffoon. We agreed that I would simply carry the three boxes and he would show me how it is done once I get to RSA.
The next morning was taken up with last minute shopping for packaging tape and green (so that it would be distinctive, not with-standing the sizes of the boxes!) ropes. Back in the garage, re-taping the boxes and then using my extensive (but non-existent) boy-scout skills tying the boxes up with green ropes to provide handles for the boxes (and I guess to keep them from falling apart.) Finally I have all my luggage ready. It consisted of three big boxes and one really big roller bag and a smaller (normal size) roller bag and a carry on roller bag. Five items to be checked and one carry on. I had arranged to have my friend, Wendy, take me to LAX; Kathy and Lilian working that day and Violet not being able to drive to LAX and also attending church. Looking at the boxes, it was obvious that they would not fit into Wendy’s car. So now, transport to LAX was a problem. Fortunately my friend, Mary had a Humvee available and was free to take me to LAX.
Arrived at LAX three hours before the flight!!! Had a porter help with the luggage and his comment was, “you are allowed two bags of 30 kilos each, you will pay lots”. As we walked in, I slipped him $5 and his disposition changed and he then said to me to wait and not enter the queue. He went over to two guys in uniform (TSA baggage handlers) talked to them for a while, left them my luggage and came back to me to me and said they will look after me. One of the two came over and said that I was facing an excess luggage charge of over $1000. Did I want some help to reduce that? Obviously a rhetorical question! J On my affirmative answer, he started weighing each piece, did his arithmetic and came back with a solution. He would make the flat box and the smaller big box one item and my two roller bags one item and I would end up with 3 items instead of 5 and only get charged for 1 excess bag. I readily agreed, he, however, just stood there. I took me a whole 5 seconds to realize what would fire him up. I slipped $20 to him and that proved to be sufficient lubrication. He sent the older guy off to get binding straps while he examined the boxes. The other one returned with a bunch of tapes and they started tying the two boxes. As it turned out, the straps that airline provided were not long enough to go around the combined boxes and they had to create makeshift straps much like fat people have to have extension seatbelts. What bothered me was that they managed to break several straps buy pulling too tightly. After about 30 minutes, they were examining their handy work and pronounced it good. Next problem was to take care of my two roller bags. I was told tat I should go and buy a big box so that they could put the two bags into it. On my protestation of my ignorance, the younger one volunteered to buy the box for me. Another $20 proved sufficient to light the fire under him. Off he went and about 20 minutes later, he emerged with two old boxes and strong packaging tape. I decided not to question him, but I guess my facial expression could not hide my question. He then handed me $10 and said he got free boxes but had to go a long way to buy the tape. They put my big roller bag into the box and found that they could not figure out how to make the other roller bag fit. They then suggested that I remove the contents of the small roller bag and pack it around the bigger bag and then they inverted the other box and capped it off with lots of tape and then put straps around it. They weighed the result and it was 30.5 kilos. They proclaimed their job well done. I must admit that I was dubious that the airline would accept this jerry-rigged lot as 3 bags and only charge me for one excess bag. They took the bags to the counter for me and when it was my turn, they talked to the counter person who agreed to make me pay for only one excess bag at the rate of $250. The older of the two guy stood looking at me with a strange look on his face and I suddenly realized that he needed to be paid. So out 1 $20 bill and all was happy. My mind was racing; I managed to save $500 with an outlay of $50, not a bad ROI! J I thought that my luggage problem were over as I was given the claim checks, but no!
After the airlines tag the bags, the passenger is obliged to take them over to security for screening. The two guys, bless their hearts, stuck with me and moved the boxes (3) to the screening area while I waited in line again. A few moments later, the older one waved me to get out of line and follow him. Why, I inquired! Too big, he answered. Bewildered, I followed him to the other end to the cavernous departure hall to a place where they screen over-sized bags. This time, the two guys left me to my own devices as soon as they deposited the three boxes into line. When it was my turn, I pushed the big box to the front of the line and the woman handling the machine struggled to get it up to the conveyor belt and screamed “stop”. The box was falling off sideways. What is funny now was then not very amusing. I was barred from going to help prop up the precious drum form dropping to the hard floor. She tugged and pushed and got the box to the edge of the screening machine and yelled “stop” again. The box was too big by 1 inch to fit into the machine! By this time, she was pissed and simply gave it a shove and the drum rolled over and dropped on to the floor. She then came for the combined boxes and tried and guess what, that too was too big. Now there were two big boxes that had been dropped from the screening machine on to the floor. She came back for my third box with a look of this better fit look on her face. Miracle or miracles, it went through without a hitch. She then came over to me and told me that they will have to open the boxes up. The look of horror must have been pasted on my face because she started beaming. They cut apart the combined boxes and sent the flat box through the machine. Then opened the smaller big box and riffled through it. Then the big box was taken apart. They, in about 1 minute, undid the tying and wrapping and roping that took hours to do! Tapped it up and waved me off. I was protesting that there was now 4 pieces of luggage, but I had only three claim checks and there were only three routing slips on the 4 boxes. My protestations were to no avail. Despondent and resigned to having to explain to Bridget how a piece of her drum set went missing, I went to the departure gate.
With one exception, the trip to London was uneventful. I was sitting next to a young boy probably about 10 years old. He seems very nice and was very quite. At about meal time severe turbulence (as is usual during meal delivery) set in and the plane was shaking very badly. Just as I finished my dinner, I noticed that the guy sitting next to the boy was opening a burf-bag, then I noticed that the boy was crying and grasping for breath. The older guy, who I surmised is his father, kept smiling and repeating, “be a man and beat it”. It was obvious to me that the boy was having great difficulty breathing. Not being able to hold myself back, I said to the guy that the boy was not breathing (this was of course obvious) and he replied that the boy had asthma and this was aggravated his fear of flying and the turbulence. I asked if he had the spry device that would ease his breathing and he replied that he did not bring it and that the boy needs to learn to get along without. I felt really bad for the kid and wondered what kind of man would let his son suffer like that without showing some sort of compassion. I guess it take all kinds to make a world. About an hour later, the boy did indeed survive and revive.
The transit in London was a 8 hour layover. I had originally planned to go into London during my layover, but was informed that going through customs and immigration would take up to two hours and that the trip itself was about an hour to and from the airport, leaving me 4 hours and that I need to, because it was an international flight, be at the airport 3 hours before the flight. That left me with an hour in London. Hardly seemed worthwhile. So I decided to be bored and just walk around the transit lounge. On my wonderings, I came across a Luffhaser booth that had a bunch of laptop for people to use to “get information from Luffhanser”. I looked around at the machines and everybody except the Luffhanser employee was surfing the net instead of being connected to the intended company. So I stood in line for an available machine and logged for my emails, expecting the get kicked off when the employee came around. She did, indeed, come around to my machine, but instead of kicking me off, simply said ‘good morning’. After my email session, I walked around some more and found a whole bunch of terminals that one could use for a fee. Boredom and lack of sleep was catching up on me and I found a chair that could recline and immediately claimed it as my own and fell asleep for about an hour. Walked around some more and it was time to catch my flight to RSA.
The BA ground staff was very organized in LAX and boarded everyone by rows and there basically order. This time round, there was a free for all and mass confusion. When I got on, the plane was full to capacity and I was sitting next to an elderly woman (probably one or two years older than I am!) and soon it was apparent that she was suffering from a bad case of some sort of flu. I was hoping that my constitution was strong enough to not catch what she had, but alas, that turned out not to be the case as I would find out a day later. Sitting behind me were two women and a man that were speaking a language that I did not recognize. It was probably Russian. They were very rowdy and the man decided that he was not going to allow me to put my seat back. The kept kicking the back of my seat even before the plane took off. After the plane leveled off, I put my seat back and he tapped me on my head and indicated that he wanted to push my seat forward. I gave him a dirty look and ignored him. Later he tried to push my seat, but fortunately dancing developed my leg muscles and he was not able to successful in pushing my seat forward. At meal time, as the stewards were coming around with the drinks, they helped themselves to bottles of wine while the stewards were serving other people and got caught and were forced to return the bottles. He then made a big fuss about the seat and the steward asked me to move it forward until the meal was over, which I did. As soon as the meal was over, I moved it back and he made another big fuss, this time, the steward told me to cool it. He tried pushing the seat a few more times and got tired of it and the rest of the trip was relatively peaceful.
On arrival at Jan Smuts, we were bussed to the terminal from the plane. Then proceeded to the immigration stations and went through without any fuss. At baggage claim, I waited and waited and waited for my luggage. Finally there were only three of us left who had no gotten their luggage. I had walked between the carousel, where the normal bags came out, and the over-sized conveyor many times, hoping that my luggage would show up somewhere. Eventually the box containing my roller-bag showed up at the over-sized area. I went to rescue it and one of the porters offered to help and I gratefully accepted. The intercom kept announcing that the going price for baggage handling was R5 per piece. I did not have any South African money. My second box, the big one containing the drums came and was out on the cart, which was now full. I went to get another cart by which time the second big box arrived and that was put onto the new cart. Waiting a few minutes, the flat box arrived. Miracles of miracles, all 4 boxes arrived despite the fact that I had only claim check for three boxes. Not sure how they did it, because one of the boxes did not have a routing tag! I now had two trolleys filled to capacity and one roller bag (my carry-on) and I thought ‘no problem’ as the porter would help me. I gave him US$5 because I had no RSA money. He accepted this with a big smile. As we walked towards customs, the porter said to me that he was not allowed beyond the red line and abandoned me with two trolleys and a roller-bag. I must have looked a sorry sight as I tried valiantly to navigate the three wheeled objects around the corner to the customs station. One of the customs officers came to my rescue and we managed to get all the luggage to the customs station.
The customs officer asked me what I had in the boxes. I told him my cloths in the smallest one, and a drum set in the other three and of course my carry-on. He wanted to know what I was doing with the drum set and I told him that I had just started drumming and that I was planning to practice on it while I was visiting my parents for 2 months. He then said that I was obviously going to take it with me when I leave and I replied that was the plan. He called over another customs officer who is supposed to be a musician to question me about the drums. He asked me if I knew what a 'riff' was and I gave a a blank look. He said to the first officer that I was abviously a real beginner. I readily agreed with him and he was satisfied. He asked how much it cost me and I answered that it was US$1,000. He spent the next 20 minutes trying to make me say that I was going to sell it while I was in South Africa and I would not admit to it. Eventually, he said that if I was going to take it back with me, then he would charge me a deposit that is refundable, but if I had a possibility of selling it, then he would charge me tax and that the tax would be considerably less than the deposit. When I asked how much, he did some calculations and told me based on US$1000, with some exemptions that he could apply, it came to R600. The deposit would be over R900 as the exemptions would not apply. I then told him that I would pay the tax. He then went to his computer and told me that he had to confirm the price of the drum set. My heart skipped a beat as I was sure that the internet price would show something like US$3000 instead of US$1000. (The actual price paid was US$1799 with a MSRP of $3000). He kept complaining about the slowness of his computer and then smiled broadly. I interpreted his smile as a “I got you, you bastard” smile. He pointed his finger at me and said with a broad smile “you have been had, my boy” and I gave him a quizzical look. He pointed at his computer and said the “yamaha drums are only $800 and you paid $1000.” I said with a sad face “even the best of us get caught” and he laughed again. I then asked him if I could pay in US$ and he said no but that I could change money outside and come back in through security and pay at the cashier. In the meantime he would hold on to my stuff. I thanked him and went off in search of Bridget who was going to come and get me, hoping that she had cash to pay customs. As I walked out, I was confronted by a wall of faces, none of which looked remotely like Bridget. So I proceeded to the money exchange area and stood in line. The line was relatively short, but was not moving after 5 minutes. Then I spotted an ATM machine and I said to the guy behind me that I would try the ATM machine and if it did not work, I would come back and claim my spot. The ATM machine accepted everything I told it and then eventually put a message on the screen that said something about coming into the bank to get an ID card. I thought that I had lost my credit card and that I would have to spend hours getting it back and getting some money to rescue my luggage. Just as depression sank in, I heard the clicking of the machine obviously counting out money. I grabbed the money, my card and the receipt and rushed off the customs area. The entrench was not obvious, and had to ask three different people before being directed to the correct security area. Went in and paid the tax and came out struggling with the two trolleys. As I got out of the doors, another porter came to my rescue and as we pushed through the crowd, I found Francis, my nephew with Helen, who was going to take ownership of the drums. I absent-minded reached into my pocket and pulled out a bill for the porter and gave it to him, only realizing that it was a R100 bill when he had his finger around it. I quickly grabbed it back and asked Francis to give him R10. We then walked the drum set to Helen’s car. And then went with my luggage to Francis’s car. The journey had come to an end and I was safely in South Africa.
I was later to find out that one of the three boxes comprising the drum set contained the in-correct stuff (reason why Justin was surprised that the flat box stuff would not fit into the box containing the chair), but that is the subject of another blog.
My brother immigrated to Canada, so bringing my parent to the Unites States became a priority. After consultations with several immigration lawyers, it became obvious that the only way to get them over in a reasonable period of time was for me to make a trip to South Africa. Doing the paper work from the American consulate in South Africa would reduce the time from a few years to a few months. Hunting for air ticket took me to several sources until I finally settle on Cheap-tickets, a consolidator. The best they could do was for me to travel 9 days from booking the ticket. With the ticket settled, I had to choose a lawyer and engage him to help with the paper work. Two days before leaving, the lawyer produced a list of documents that I would have to have to accompany the applications. This resulted in here days of frantic searching for things like birth certificates, social security cards, bank statements, etc. Poor Violet had to go to her safety deposit box at least three times looking for non-existent documents. Finally two days before leaving, I had managed to gather all the papers that hopefully are required. Next panic was to copy them and send to the attorney while taking the originals with me to RSA. All the copiers within reach would eat the originals and then spit them out after copying. This was not viable as some of the papers like my birth certificate was older than I am and would not survive the copy machine’s digestive system. So off to “mailbox are us” and did the copying. Unfortunately, as some of the papers were very old and had writing on both side, the modern copiers would show both side of the paper when only one side was desired. One Friday afternoon at 3 pm, the lawyer called to tell me that I was holding up his long deserved weekend and that if I did not produce the copies for him within an hour, he would really have a good weekend. Desperation, being the mother of all creativity, kicked in and out came my trusty digital camera and in a thrice, I had the copies in digital form for the lawyer, beating his deadline by 30 minutes and thus spoiling his well deserved rest! J Strange, even though some of my friends are lawyers, I have not managed to develop much empathy with them!
Went to Violet’s to pick up stuff to take to RSA. Thought it would only be a few books, turned out to be a little more and would not fit into my luggage. So Violet offered me her “carry on” roller bag to accommodate the stuff. Went back to reshuffle my baggage and ended up with two roller bags plus a carry on roller bag. Not bad for a 2-month trip with at least 30% of space taken up with presents!
One week and one day before my departure, my niece, Bridget, emailed asking me to purchase and bring over a set of professional drums. This resulted in a flurry of phone calls to various musical stores none of which had the required instruments. Eventually found on the Net an organization in Florida, which had it in stock. The free delivery would cost extra if I wanted to get the set on time before my departure. So much so for free. The scheduled delivery was on the Friday and my departure was set on Sunday. Very little room for screw-ups! Along with the email promising delivery was a description of the boxes that contained the drums. “3 boxes measuring over 30 inches and weighing over 100 pounds.” Needless to say, I survived the heart attack this information produced. On Friday morning, the drummer boy (Justin) called to see if his toy had arrived and he offered to talk me through reducing the three boxes to two. Told him he had to contain himself for another 6 or so hours. At about 4:40pm, while I was in the copying process, UPS rolled up with these three mountainous boxes. Reality sank in; I really had no concept how big 32 inches until I saw the boxes. A few hours later, Justin called from RSA extolling me to open the two lighter boxes and consolidate the flat box (hardware) into the smaller big box (stool) and try as I may, I could not convince him that the things form the flat box could not and would not fit into the box containing the stool, either inside or outside the stool. We ended the conversation with Justin having the impression that I was really an incompetent buffoon. We agreed that I would simply carry the three boxes and he would show me how it is done once I get to RSA.
The next morning was taken up with last minute shopping for packaging tape and green (so that it would be distinctive, not with-standing the sizes of the boxes!) ropes. Back in the garage, re-taping the boxes and then using my extensive (but non-existent) boy-scout skills tying the boxes up with green ropes to provide handles for the boxes (and I guess to keep them from falling apart.) Finally I have all my luggage ready. It consisted of three big boxes and one really big roller bag and a smaller (normal size) roller bag and a carry on roller bag. Five items to be checked and one carry on. I had arranged to have my friend, Wendy, take me to LAX; Kathy and Lilian working that day and Violet not being able to drive to LAX and also attending church. Looking at the boxes, it was obvious that they would not fit into Wendy’s car. So now, transport to LAX was a problem. Fortunately my friend, Mary had a Humvee available and was free to take me to LAX.
Arrived at LAX three hours before the flight!!! Had a porter help with the luggage and his comment was, “you are allowed two bags of 30 kilos each, you will pay lots”. As we walked in, I slipped him $5 and his disposition changed and he then said to me to wait and not enter the queue. He went over to two guys in uniform (TSA baggage handlers) talked to them for a while, left them my luggage and came back to me to me and said they will look after me. One of the two came over and said that I was facing an excess luggage charge of over $1000. Did I want some help to reduce that? Obviously a rhetorical question! J On my affirmative answer, he started weighing each piece, did his arithmetic and came back with a solution. He would make the flat box and the smaller big box one item and my two roller bags one item and I would end up with 3 items instead of 5 and only get charged for 1 excess bag. I readily agreed, he, however, just stood there. I took me a whole 5 seconds to realize what would fire him up. I slipped $20 to him and that proved to be sufficient lubrication. He sent the older guy off to get binding straps while he examined the boxes. The other one returned with a bunch of tapes and they started tying the two boxes. As it turned out, the straps that airline provided were not long enough to go around the combined boxes and they had to create makeshift straps much like fat people have to have extension seatbelts. What bothered me was that they managed to break several straps buy pulling too tightly. After about 30 minutes, they were examining their handy work and pronounced it good. Next problem was to take care of my two roller bags. I was told tat I should go and buy a big box so that they could put the two bags into it. On my protestation of my ignorance, the younger one volunteered to buy the box for me. Another $20 proved sufficient to light the fire under him. Off he went and about 20 minutes later, he emerged with two old boxes and strong packaging tape. I decided not to question him, but I guess my facial expression could not hide my question. He then handed me $10 and said he got free boxes but had to go a long way to buy the tape. They put my big roller bag into the box and found that they could not figure out how to make the other roller bag fit. They then suggested that I remove the contents of the small roller bag and pack it around the bigger bag and then they inverted the other box and capped it off with lots of tape and then put straps around it. They weighed the result and it was 30.5 kilos. They proclaimed their job well done. I must admit that I was dubious that the airline would accept this jerry-rigged lot as 3 bags and only charge me for one excess bag. They took the bags to the counter for me and when it was my turn, they talked to the counter person who agreed to make me pay for only one excess bag at the rate of $250. The older of the two guy stood looking at me with a strange look on his face and I suddenly realized that he needed to be paid. So out 1 $20 bill and all was happy. My mind was racing; I managed to save $500 with an outlay of $50, not a bad ROI! J I thought that my luggage problem were over as I was given the claim checks, but no!
After the airlines tag the bags, the passenger is obliged to take them over to security for screening. The two guys, bless their hearts, stuck with me and moved the boxes (3) to the screening area while I waited in line again. A few moments later, the older one waved me to get out of line and follow him. Why, I inquired! Too big, he answered. Bewildered, I followed him to the other end to the cavernous departure hall to a place where they screen over-sized bags. This time, the two guys left me to my own devices as soon as they deposited the three boxes into line. When it was my turn, I pushed the big box to the front of the line and the woman handling the machine struggled to get it up to the conveyor belt and screamed “stop”. The box was falling off sideways. What is funny now was then not very amusing. I was barred from going to help prop up the precious drum form dropping to the hard floor. She tugged and pushed and got the box to the edge of the screening machine and yelled “stop” again. The box was too big by 1 inch to fit into the machine! By this time, she was pissed and simply gave it a shove and the drum rolled over and dropped on to the floor. She then came for the combined boxes and tried and guess what, that too was too big. Now there were two big boxes that had been dropped from the screening machine on to the floor. She came back for my third box with a look of this better fit look on her face. Miracle or miracles, it went through without a hitch. She then came over to me and told me that they will have to open the boxes up. The look of horror must have been pasted on my face because she started beaming. They cut apart the combined boxes and sent the flat box through the machine. Then opened the smaller big box and riffled through it. Then the big box was taken apart. They, in about 1 minute, undid the tying and wrapping and roping that took hours to do! Tapped it up and waved me off. I was protesting that there was now 4 pieces of luggage, but I had only three claim checks and there were only three routing slips on the 4 boxes. My protestations were to no avail. Despondent and resigned to having to explain to Bridget how a piece of her drum set went missing, I went to the departure gate.
With one exception, the trip to London was uneventful. I was sitting next to a young boy probably about 10 years old. He seems very nice and was very quite. At about meal time severe turbulence (as is usual during meal delivery) set in and the plane was shaking very badly. Just as I finished my dinner, I noticed that the guy sitting next to the boy was opening a burf-bag, then I noticed that the boy was crying and grasping for breath. The older guy, who I surmised is his father, kept smiling and repeating, “be a man and beat it”. It was obvious to me that the boy was having great difficulty breathing. Not being able to hold myself back, I said to the guy that the boy was not breathing (this was of course obvious) and he replied that the boy had asthma and this was aggravated his fear of flying and the turbulence. I asked if he had the spry device that would ease his breathing and he replied that he did not bring it and that the boy needs to learn to get along without. I felt really bad for the kid and wondered what kind of man would let his son suffer like that without showing some sort of compassion. I guess it take all kinds to make a world. About an hour later, the boy did indeed survive and revive.
The transit in London was a 8 hour layover. I had originally planned to go into London during my layover, but was informed that going through customs and immigration would take up to two hours and that the trip itself was about an hour to and from the airport, leaving me 4 hours and that I need to, because it was an international flight, be at the airport 3 hours before the flight. That left me with an hour in London. Hardly seemed worthwhile. So I decided to be bored and just walk around the transit lounge. On my wonderings, I came across a Luffhaser booth that had a bunch of laptop for people to use to “get information from Luffhanser”. I looked around at the machines and everybody except the Luffhanser employee was surfing the net instead of being connected to the intended company. So I stood in line for an available machine and logged for my emails, expecting the get kicked off when the employee came around. She did, indeed, come around to my machine, but instead of kicking me off, simply said ‘good morning’. After my email session, I walked around some more and found a whole bunch of terminals that one could use for a fee. Boredom and lack of sleep was catching up on me and I found a chair that could recline and immediately claimed it as my own and fell asleep for about an hour. Walked around some more and it was time to catch my flight to RSA.
The BA ground staff was very organized in LAX and boarded everyone by rows and there basically order. This time round, there was a free for all and mass confusion. When I got on, the plane was full to capacity and I was sitting next to an elderly woman (probably one or two years older than I am!) and soon it was apparent that she was suffering from a bad case of some sort of flu. I was hoping that my constitution was strong enough to not catch what she had, but alas, that turned out not to be the case as I would find out a day later. Sitting behind me were two women and a man that were speaking a language that I did not recognize. It was probably Russian. They were very rowdy and the man decided that he was not going to allow me to put my seat back. The kept kicking the back of my seat even before the plane took off. After the plane leveled off, I put my seat back and he tapped me on my head and indicated that he wanted to push my seat forward. I gave him a dirty look and ignored him. Later he tried to push my seat, but fortunately dancing developed my leg muscles and he was not able to successful in pushing my seat forward. At meal time, as the stewards were coming around with the drinks, they helped themselves to bottles of wine while the stewards were serving other people and got caught and were forced to return the bottles. He then made a big fuss about the seat and the steward asked me to move it forward until the meal was over, which I did. As soon as the meal was over, I moved it back and he made another big fuss, this time, the steward told me to cool it. He tried pushing the seat a few more times and got tired of it and the rest of the trip was relatively peaceful.
On arrival at Jan Smuts, we were bussed to the terminal from the plane. Then proceeded to the immigration stations and went through without any fuss. At baggage claim, I waited and waited and waited for my luggage. Finally there were only three of us left who had no gotten their luggage. I had walked between the carousel, where the normal bags came out, and the over-sized conveyor many times, hoping that my luggage would show up somewhere. Eventually the box containing my roller-bag showed up at the over-sized area. I went to rescue it and one of the porters offered to help and I gratefully accepted. The intercom kept announcing that the going price for baggage handling was R5 per piece. I did not have any South African money. My second box, the big one containing the drums came and was out on the cart, which was now full. I went to get another cart by which time the second big box arrived and that was put onto the new cart. Waiting a few minutes, the flat box arrived. Miracles of miracles, all 4 boxes arrived despite the fact that I had only claim check for three boxes. Not sure how they did it, because one of the boxes did not have a routing tag! I now had two trolleys filled to capacity and one roller bag (my carry-on) and I thought ‘no problem’ as the porter would help me. I gave him US$5 because I had no RSA money. He accepted this with a big smile. As we walked towards customs, the porter said to me that he was not allowed beyond the red line and abandoned me with two trolleys and a roller-bag. I must have looked a sorry sight as I tried valiantly to navigate the three wheeled objects around the corner to the customs station. One of the customs officers came to my rescue and we managed to get all the luggage to the customs station.
The customs officer asked me what I had in the boxes. I told him my cloths in the smallest one, and a drum set in the other three and of course my carry-on. He wanted to know what I was doing with the drum set and I told him that I had just started drumming and that I was planning to practice on it while I was visiting my parents for 2 months. He then said that I was obviously going to take it with me when I leave and I replied that was the plan. He called over another customs officer who is supposed to be a musician to question me about the drums. He asked me if I knew what a 'riff' was and I gave a a blank look. He said to the first officer that I was abviously a real beginner. I readily agreed with him and he was satisfied. He asked how much it cost me and I answered that it was US$1,000. He spent the next 20 minutes trying to make me say that I was going to sell it while I was in South Africa and I would not admit to it. Eventually, he said that if I was going to take it back with me, then he would charge me a deposit that is refundable, but if I had a possibility of selling it, then he would charge me tax and that the tax would be considerably less than the deposit. When I asked how much, he did some calculations and told me based on US$1000, with some exemptions that he could apply, it came to R600. The deposit would be over R900 as the exemptions would not apply. I then told him that I would pay the tax. He then went to his computer and told me that he had to confirm the price of the drum set. My heart skipped a beat as I was sure that the internet price would show something like US$3000 instead of US$1000. (The actual price paid was US$1799 with a MSRP of $3000). He kept complaining about the slowness of his computer and then smiled broadly. I interpreted his smile as a “I got you, you bastard” smile. He pointed his finger at me and said with a broad smile “you have been had, my boy” and I gave him a quizzical look. He pointed at his computer and said the “yamaha drums are only $800 and you paid $1000.” I said with a sad face “even the best of us get caught” and he laughed again. I then asked him if I could pay in US$ and he said no but that I could change money outside and come back in through security and pay at the cashier. In the meantime he would hold on to my stuff. I thanked him and went off in search of Bridget who was going to come and get me, hoping that she had cash to pay customs. As I walked out, I was confronted by a wall of faces, none of which looked remotely like Bridget. So I proceeded to the money exchange area and stood in line. The line was relatively short, but was not moving after 5 minutes. Then I spotted an ATM machine and I said to the guy behind me that I would try the ATM machine and if it did not work, I would come back and claim my spot. The ATM machine accepted everything I told it and then eventually put a message on the screen that said something about coming into the bank to get an ID card. I thought that I had lost my credit card and that I would have to spend hours getting it back and getting some money to rescue my luggage. Just as depression sank in, I heard the clicking of the machine obviously counting out money. I grabbed the money, my card and the receipt and rushed off the customs area. The entrench was not obvious, and had to ask three different people before being directed to the correct security area. Went in and paid the tax and came out struggling with the two trolleys. As I got out of the doors, another porter came to my rescue and as we pushed through the crowd, I found Francis, my nephew with Helen, who was going to take ownership of the drums. I absent-minded reached into my pocket and pulled out a bill for the porter and gave it to him, only realizing that it was a R100 bill when he had his finger around it. I quickly grabbed it back and asked Francis to give him R10. We then walked the drum set to Helen’s car. And then went with my luggage to Francis’s car. The journey had come to an end and I was safely in South Africa.
I was later to find out that one of the three boxes comprising the drum set contained the in-correct stuff (reason why Justin was surprised that the flat box stuff would not fit into the box containing the chair), but that is the subject of another blog.
Thursday, November 25, 2004
First visit to the American Consulate in Johannesburg.
I called the consulate as soon as I arrived in RSA and after 3 days got through to someone live to whom I related the story of my Dad, who during a visit to South Africa in May, 1999 suffered multiple strokes, as a consequence of which could not return to the States until now. She asked if I had any medical reports, which would validate my story. I indicated that I could obtain them and she told me to get a police clearance started. We then went the second week to get the police clearance report started. I have since been calling them every second day to see if we can get the process rolling while waiting the 6 to 8 weeks for the police clearance. On Tuesday afternoon, I finally managed to get a live person, Erika, on the phone and she told me to come in at 9am on Wednesday morning and that the application fee was $360 per person. I prepared for the event by collecting all the documents I could get my hands on here and also took with me all my American dollars and R4500 figuring at the exchange rate of under 6 to 1, I should have sufficient funds for all eventualities.
The next morning, we started just before 8am figuring that it would take me about 25 minutes to get to the consulate. Well, I had not taken into account the traffic conditions in Johannesburg. The M1 freeway was packed and it took me just over an hour to get there. I was warned by Bridget not to drive anywhere near the driveways at the consulate because one of her friends drove into the driveway to make a three point turn and had her car impaled by spikes coming out of the ground, causing extensive damage. I parked the car at the mall across the street and then slowly walked Mom and Dad across the busy street to the consulate. This process took about 20 minutes and by the time we got to the entrance of the consulate, it was 9:20am and joined a long line of people waiting to get in. Mom started a conversation with the woman in front of us and brought her two children to have their fingerprints taken and interview for their visitor’s visas. This was her second trip in two days to get visa for her kids. As we neared the front after waiting for about 20 minutes, she told me to go ahead of her because she could see that Dad was having trouble with standing and waiting. She figured that by going ahead of her, he would save about 10 minutes of standing. I thanked her and went ahead. The process of getting into the consulate is to first wait in line for an entry pass, the wait in line for security screening. At the entry pass window, the people in front of me took forever (like 2 or 3 minutes per person) to get a green pass. So I walked up thinking another 6 minutes for us. When I told her that I came for immigration visa for my parents, she immediately gave me three red passes and we proceeded to the security screening line. Only one person is allowed into the screening process at a time, so I told Mom to go in first and wait for me at the corridor, she went right through without any trouble, then Dad went in and he to passed without a hitch. So confidently, I marched in and they asked for all electronic stuff. I had in my backpack not only lots of papers, but also a cell phone, a camera, a recorder and my American cell phone, which I used as a Palm Pilot to keep all my information some of which I needed for the immigration process. They wanted all devices to be switched off and left with them to collect when I leave. All the devices can be switched off without any problem except my cell phone with Palm Pilot. On this device, only the phone section can be switched off and the only way to get a blank screen is to remove the battery! Then started a 10-minute process of my trying to convince two security guards that the device is off even though one could read things on the screen. They were not convinced. Eventually in desperation, I told them that they could play with the buttons and that there was an off button and if they pressed it, it would switch on the device and after that if they held it down for more than a second, it would switch off. They did this and a message came on that said powering off, but the screen then switched to the palm functions and stayed on. I told them to repeat the process and as soon as they saw the message that said powering off, to close the clamshell. They did that and were satisfied that the device was finally off. On the other side of the door, I could see that Mom and Dad were getting anxious wondering what was keeping me. At the other end, people standing in line were getting pissed because I was taking soo long.
When the three of us got to the waiting/processing hall, I saw a big room filled with lots of people and numbered windows along one side of the room. Hanging from the ceiling were some confusing signs (all signs in RSA are confusing, especially on freeways where the sign indicating the off ramp is on the off ramp!). Eventually, I decoded the signs and figured out that of the 10 windows, 2 were for citizens and immigrants, one for the cashier and two for citizen services. I got Mom and Dad to be seated and went to one of the immigration windows and waited and the guy standing behind the window smiled and indicated to me to press the bell. In bewilderment, I pressed the bell and he then proceeded to walk away from the window! Having pressed the bell, I stood in front of an empty window for about 3 minutes figuring that the guy that walked away would eventually come back. Eventually, a woman turn up and asked if I had an appointment to which I answered yes. She then asked for my appointment papers and I told her I had none. She smiled and shook her head and said that without appointment papers I should not be here! She was about to send me away when I said "but Erika told me to come". I have apparently uttered the magic words because she said "then just wait here" and went off. Another 10 minutes of waiting at an empty window. It must have seemed strange to the people waiting there because I was the only one standing in front of an empty window, everyone else only went up top a window when they are called by name and there was always someone at the window processing them. Then two women came to the window, the original person and a blond woman who then introduced herself as Erika. I greet her with enthusiasm and repeated my story to her for the third time (twice over the phone). She asked to see Mom and Dad and waited for them to walk up to the window. She gave them the once over and dismissed them. They went back tot find a seat and I dug into my backpack and gave her documents that I thought were relevant. She was only interested in the medical report that Dr. Ernest had produced. She then told me that she had to go and consult an officer and went off. She came back and handed me two forms and told me to go somewhere and fill them in, then come back and ring for her. The reason she said somewhere is because there are no writing surfaces in the room. The cashier window had a ledge and there was nobody lined up for the cashier, so I made a bee-line for it and started with the forms. Mom and Dad saw that and immediately decided to join me. This completely blocked the cashier’s window and as I was busy filling in the forms, I did not notice that a line had formed behind Mom and Dad. I asked them to go and sit down, as they could not really contribute to the forms at that moment. In a huff, they went off to sit again. The line became pretty long and me using the ledge was no longer viable. So I went off walking around the room looking for a horizontal surface. I spotted the guard desk and as I approached, he went off with all his stuff. I now had a desk and chair all to myself! The paper work then became a breeze as I could spread the contents of my backpack all over the desk. Happiness!!!!
With paperwork completed, I then signaled Mom and Dad to come over and go through the papers carefully to make sure that I had gotten all the fact correct. They then signed the papers and I proceeded to the window to call for attention while they went looking for a seat again. It took Erika only about 3 minutes to get to the window. She looked at the papers, the medical report and asked for the passports and green-cards. She then went off to talk to the ‘officer’ and came back to tell me that it is possible, because they had been out of the country for so long, for me to make a 'new filing' instead of a 'filing for re-admittance'. The paperwork would be identical and the time to grant would be the same. I would have to fill in another longer application, but that I would save about $20 for the filing fee. Faced with the prospect of having to do additional paperwork for a saving of $20, I told her that I would prefer to use the paperwork that I had already handed in. she then contemplated for a while and said that we should first go with what we had and if a road-block should appear, then we can change it to the new application. I accepted her decision graciously and she returned the passports and issued me with a payment request for the two applications and sent me off to see the cashier.
The line at the cahier’s window was mercifully short and soon it was my turn. The first thing I noticed was a big notice that indicated that the dollar-rand conversion rate was 6.6 instead of the of the 5.9 that the rest of the world used! I gave her the paperwork and she went to her calculator and came back asking for R4752. I collected all my money and had only R4500, being short R250. I asked if I could make up the rest in US$ and she answered ‘definitely no’. I went to Mom and Dad and see if they had any money and came up with only R150. So near yet so far. Going to the bank outside the consulate was out of the question as I would have to make another appointment and they had a slot scheduled for us today. In desperation, I asked if I could pay half in US$ and half in Rands and she said that everything had to be paid in one currency. Creativity kicked in and I asked if I was paying the fee for one or two people. She answered that it was obviously for two, so I asked if I could pay for each of the two separately, one in Rands and the other in US$. I finally got a smile from her face and she went back to her trusty calculator and came back with a Rand figure of R2376. I immediately counted out US$360.00 and I had already given her the R4500 previously. She then examined each of the dollar bills and gave one back to me to change for another one. Fortunately, I had one extra and could make the exchange. Not sure what was wrong with the one she gave back to me. She then gave me the change in Rands and told me to and sit and wait for the interview.
I then paced the room looking for a place to sit and eventually found one and started to nod off to sleep. About 40 minutes later, a call was made for the “Kong family to window 3” and I darted to the appropriate window. This time Erika was waiting and she was accompanied by “an officer” whose name was not disclosed. I started giving them as much papers as I could get out of my backpack while Mom and Dad came up to the window. When they got to the window, I gave them each a phone to use to talk to the officer. She asked them if I was the son in South Africa and I told her no, I was the one making the application for them and that the South African son was not here presently. She then addressed all her questions to me. I immediately wrestled the phone form Mom’s hand (she could not hear anyway) and answered he questions. The crux of the questioning was to ascertain that I was aware that I would be responsible, as the sponsor, for their financial welfare and that the State would not be responsible, especially for medical expenses. When I satisfied her that I understood it all and that my daughter would, if necessary, be the co-sponsor and that she too was fully aware of her responsibilities as a co-sponsor. I was then given two packages and told to call Erika for an appointment when I had complied with all the instructions in the packages. I thanked them both profusely and went to collect Mom and Dad to leave the consulate.
This visit had taken the better part of half a day. The trip from the consulate to the car was uneventful!!! Thanks god for small mercies.
The next morning, we started just before 8am figuring that it would take me about 25 minutes to get to the consulate. Well, I had not taken into account the traffic conditions in Johannesburg. The M1 freeway was packed and it took me just over an hour to get there. I was warned by Bridget not to drive anywhere near the driveways at the consulate because one of her friends drove into the driveway to make a three point turn and had her car impaled by spikes coming out of the ground, causing extensive damage. I parked the car at the mall across the street and then slowly walked Mom and Dad across the busy street to the consulate. This process took about 20 minutes and by the time we got to the entrance of the consulate, it was 9:20am and joined a long line of people waiting to get in. Mom started a conversation with the woman in front of us and brought her two children to have their fingerprints taken and interview for their visitor’s visas. This was her second trip in two days to get visa for her kids. As we neared the front after waiting for about 20 minutes, she told me to go ahead of her because she could see that Dad was having trouble with standing and waiting. She figured that by going ahead of her, he would save about 10 minutes of standing. I thanked her and went ahead. The process of getting into the consulate is to first wait in line for an entry pass, the wait in line for security screening. At the entry pass window, the people in front of me took forever (like 2 or 3 minutes per person) to get a green pass. So I walked up thinking another 6 minutes for us. When I told her that I came for immigration visa for my parents, she immediately gave me three red passes and we proceeded to the security screening line. Only one person is allowed into the screening process at a time, so I told Mom to go in first and wait for me at the corridor, she went right through without any trouble, then Dad went in and he to passed without a hitch. So confidently, I marched in and they asked for all electronic stuff. I had in my backpack not only lots of papers, but also a cell phone, a camera, a recorder and my American cell phone, which I used as a Palm Pilot to keep all my information some of which I needed for the immigration process. They wanted all devices to be switched off and left with them to collect when I leave. All the devices can be switched off without any problem except my cell phone with Palm Pilot. On this device, only the phone section can be switched off and the only way to get a blank screen is to remove the battery! Then started a 10-minute process of my trying to convince two security guards that the device is off even though one could read things on the screen. They were not convinced. Eventually in desperation, I told them that they could play with the buttons and that there was an off button and if they pressed it, it would switch on the device and after that if they held it down for more than a second, it would switch off. They did this and a message came on that said powering off, but the screen then switched to the palm functions and stayed on. I told them to repeat the process and as soon as they saw the message that said powering off, to close the clamshell. They did that and were satisfied that the device was finally off. On the other side of the door, I could see that Mom and Dad were getting anxious wondering what was keeping me. At the other end, people standing in line were getting pissed because I was taking soo long.
When the three of us got to the waiting/processing hall, I saw a big room filled with lots of people and numbered windows along one side of the room. Hanging from the ceiling were some confusing signs (all signs in RSA are confusing, especially on freeways where the sign indicating the off ramp is on the off ramp!). Eventually, I decoded the signs and figured out that of the 10 windows, 2 were for citizens and immigrants, one for the cashier and two for citizen services. I got Mom and Dad to be seated and went to one of the immigration windows and waited and the guy standing behind the window smiled and indicated to me to press the bell. In bewilderment, I pressed the bell and he then proceeded to walk away from the window! Having pressed the bell, I stood in front of an empty window for about 3 minutes figuring that the guy that walked away would eventually come back. Eventually, a woman turn up and asked if I had an appointment to which I answered yes. She then asked for my appointment papers and I told her I had none. She smiled and shook her head and said that without appointment papers I should not be here! She was about to send me away when I said "but Erika told me to come". I have apparently uttered the magic words because she said "then just wait here" and went off. Another 10 minutes of waiting at an empty window. It must have seemed strange to the people waiting there because I was the only one standing in front of an empty window, everyone else only went up top a window when they are called by name and there was always someone at the window processing them. Then two women came to the window, the original person and a blond woman who then introduced herself as Erika. I greet her with enthusiasm and repeated my story to her for the third time (twice over the phone). She asked to see Mom and Dad and waited for them to walk up to the window. She gave them the once over and dismissed them. They went back tot find a seat and I dug into my backpack and gave her documents that I thought were relevant. She was only interested in the medical report that Dr. Ernest had produced. She then told me that she had to go and consult an officer and went off. She came back and handed me two forms and told me to go somewhere and fill them in, then come back and ring for her. The reason she said somewhere is because there are no writing surfaces in the room. The cashier window had a ledge and there was nobody lined up for the cashier, so I made a bee-line for it and started with the forms. Mom and Dad saw that and immediately decided to join me. This completely blocked the cashier’s window and as I was busy filling in the forms, I did not notice that a line had formed behind Mom and Dad. I asked them to go and sit down, as they could not really contribute to the forms at that moment. In a huff, they went off to sit again. The line became pretty long and me using the ledge was no longer viable. So I went off walking around the room looking for a horizontal surface. I spotted the guard desk and as I approached, he went off with all his stuff. I now had a desk and chair all to myself! The paper work then became a breeze as I could spread the contents of my backpack all over the desk. Happiness!!!!
With paperwork completed, I then signaled Mom and Dad to come over and go through the papers carefully to make sure that I had gotten all the fact correct. They then signed the papers and I proceeded to the window to call for attention while they went looking for a seat again. It took Erika only about 3 minutes to get to the window. She looked at the papers, the medical report and asked for the passports and green-cards. She then went off to talk to the ‘officer’ and came back to tell me that it is possible, because they had been out of the country for so long, for me to make a 'new filing' instead of a 'filing for re-admittance'. The paperwork would be identical and the time to grant would be the same. I would have to fill in another longer application, but that I would save about $20 for the filing fee. Faced with the prospect of having to do additional paperwork for a saving of $20, I told her that I would prefer to use the paperwork that I had already handed in. she then contemplated for a while and said that we should first go with what we had and if a road-block should appear, then we can change it to the new application. I accepted her decision graciously and she returned the passports and issued me with a payment request for the two applications and sent me off to see the cashier.
The line at the cahier’s window was mercifully short and soon it was my turn. The first thing I noticed was a big notice that indicated that the dollar-rand conversion rate was 6.6 instead of the of the 5.9 that the rest of the world used! I gave her the paperwork and she went to her calculator and came back asking for R4752. I collected all my money and had only R4500, being short R250. I asked if I could make up the rest in US$ and she answered ‘definitely no’. I went to Mom and Dad and see if they had any money and came up with only R150. So near yet so far. Going to the bank outside the consulate was out of the question as I would have to make another appointment and they had a slot scheduled for us today. In desperation, I asked if I could pay half in US$ and half in Rands and she said that everything had to be paid in one currency. Creativity kicked in and I asked if I was paying the fee for one or two people. She answered that it was obviously for two, so I asked if I could pay for each of the two separately, one in Rands and the other in US$. I finally got a smile from her face and she went back to her trusty calculator and came back with a Rand figure of R2376. I immediately counted out US$360.00 and I had already given her the R4500 previously. She then examined each of the dollar bills and gave one back to me to change for another one. Fortunately, I had one extra and could make the exchange. Not sure what was wrong with the one she gave back to me. She then gave me the change in Rands and told me to and sit and wait for the interview.
I then paced the room looking for a place to sit and eventually found one and started to nod off to sleep. About 40 minutes later, a call was made for the “Kong family to window 3” and I darted to the appropriate window. This time Erika was waiting and she was accompanied by “an officer” whose name was not disclosed. I started giving them as much papers as I could get out of my backpack while Mom and Dad came up to the window. When they got to the window, I gave them each a phone to use to talk to the officer. She asked them if I was the son in South Africa and I told her no, I was the one making the application for them and that the South African son was not here presently. She then addressed all her questions to me. I immediately wrestled the phone form Mom’s hand (she could not hear anyway) and answered he questions. The crux of the questioning was to ascertain that I was aware that I would be responsible, as the sponsor, for their financial welfare and that the State would not be responsible, especially for medical expenses. When I satisfied her that I understood it all and that my daughter would, if necessary, be the co-sponsor and that she too was fully aware of her responsibilities as a co-sponsor. I was then given two packages and told to call Erika for an appointment when I had complied with all the instructions in the packages. I thanked them both profusely and went to collect Mom and Dad to leave the consulate.
This visit had taken the better part of half a day. The trip from the consulate to the car was uneventful!!! Thanks god for small mercies.
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