When my bag was stolen, I also
lost my residence permit. So I needed to renew it. That sounds much easier than
it turned out to be!
After being sent up and down
between Immigration and Judicial Police and waiting for two hours for the
Commissioner to arrive and sign my document, I finally got everything ready and
paid. But now, the real challenges came in…
I found out they have a new
computer system since about one week. It will (hopefully) give me a nice new
permit, and much sooner than it used to be. However, it seems I was one of the
very first ones (if not the very first!) for who they made the permit like
this. So the officer had to try out the system on me...
After an hour, he managed to
fill in most fields on the screen. But, ‘what is your nationality?’ I
explained; ‘I am from the Netherlands, so I am Dutch, neerlandaise’. ‘So you
are from Germany?’ ‘No, from the Netherlands, Pays Bas’. ‘Ok, so your
nationality is German?’ ‘No, it is neerlandaise.’ The system knew Hollandaise Caribbean,
but I don’t think I am very Caribbean. ‘So, NO I am from the Netherlands.’ ‘Yes,
but Netherlands is part of Germany right?’ ‘NO!’ ‘Ok, has it ever been part of
Germany?’ ‘NO!’ ‘But your parents are German?’ ‘NO!’ ‘So you are not German?’ ‘NO!’
‘So what is your nationality?’ ‘I am Dutch, neerlandaise.’ ‘So, German?’ I
spent literally more than half an hour like that.
When he finally thought he
found my nationality (Hollandaise Caribbean, so not even the correct one) he had
to scan my file. That was a step too far…
Then the next problem, they
needed to take my picture… Before that could happen, we were already four hours
later and someone had come to support the technical process. At least he pretty
much understood the program.
So, the picture… I understand
taking a picture of a white person against a white wall can be difficult. But
that was not the challenge. After twenty tries they came to the conclusion:
‘Madam you are too tall to take your picture!’. I agree I am not the smallest
person you have ever seen, but I am not extremely tall either! So in the end we
had to put the chair on its side and I had to sit on it. Then they finally
managed, but: ‘Madam, you are laughing at that picture!’ (Yes, sorry, I just
find it funny!)
At this point they had to take my
finger prints and signature. And scan my documents. One scan went wrong so they
wanted to delete it. And then all information got lost so we needed to start
all over!
By now they figured out what
my nationality was. (‘So you are Dutch right? Not German? Not Hollandaise
Caribbean either? So Dutch?’) That saved quite some time. But now they managed
to mix up my father’s and my mother’s name. Fortunately, the technical guy was
able to change it without deleting everything again. In the end I got my
temporary permit, which even says I am Dutch.
By that time, the office was
already closed. There was a Nigerian guy who came in together with me who was
still waiting. They still wanted to attend to him though. I only hope they do
know the difference between Nigeria and Niger…
hihihihihihihihihihi
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