So. How about them immigration regulations?
When you come to Ireland, you can be here for 30 days, it's your free 30 days card. Well, there's no card, but you get the idea. After that you're supposed to leave or else be registered with the garda, and to do that you have to have a legitimate reason to stay. My reason is school.
In order to prove that I am fo realz and won't be a burden on the Irish State I needed:
My passport
My NUIG student ID card
A letter from the International Affairs office at NUIG verifying my program and its start and end dates
A proof of address, eg a bill or letter from the landlord or in my case, the signed lease itself
Proof of finances in the form of an official bank statement with a balance of at least 1000 euros
Proof of comprehensive medical insurance that includes hospitalization cover
A credit or debit card to charge 150 euros to because that's what the card costs
Already had my passport, picked up my student ID card second week here (because it wasn't available at my orientation because I'm not super special like the little study abroad students), picked up a letter from the office after I had signed my lease, had the lease when I signed the lease, and then I hit the wall. I wanted to open a bank account here right after I arrived, but the international office said I'd need my NUIG ID card to do so (which turned out to be false), and I needed a permanent address anyhow, so I did that my second week here, the same day I signed the lease. Then I had to wait until the end of the next week when the materials came in the mail to activate my account. At that point, I realized that it was cheaper for me to withdraw money from the atms here in 220 euro increments and pay the $5 fee than to transfer it all and pay Wells Fargo's 3% commission, so I did that over the course of the next week and deposited it all into my account last Friday, and went to ask for a printed statement.
"We can't do that."
"You can't just print out my account info and stamp it?"
"No. You have to order it and it'll come in 3-5 business days. We do have a statement printing machine out there, hopefully that's good enough!"
Well, I ordered the statement and hoped it would come on Monday or Tuesday.
As for the health insurance, I looked at a couple of different plans and talked around, and last Thursday I decided to go with VHI, which has an office right in town. I went down to the office, bought my plan... and discovered that they couldn't give me any proof of the policy. Once again... I'd have to wait for it in the post. Oh, but she'd write out a receipt with the policy number and start and end dates and stamp it, that'd work.
So by Tuesday nothing had arrived, so I called the immigration office to ask if the bank statement from the printing machine and the hand written insurance receipt would suffice. Apparently those are just ridiculous questions, of course not. Logical substitutions don't fly here.
So I only had permission to be here until tomorrow, Friday October 1, and I am also leaving the country early tomorrow morning, so today was the last day I could register, and the lovely office is only open from 7:30 am - 2:00 pm. By Wednesday, the insurance info had arrived but still no bank statement, but I figured it'd come today and then I could go down to the office and register, although I'd have to skip class. Then my housemate told me that on Tuesday, a classmate of hers went to the immigration office at 4:30 am and there were already 6 people ahead of him in line.
Then I freaked out a little. I decided that calling the office again would be the thing to do.
"Do you have an account with an Irish bank? Oh, well you can just go to the office and they'll print you out a statement and stamp it." I very anxiously replied that I had asked for that and they had said no! "Well, people are coming in with those from the bank, and normally we wouldn't accept them but we are because there is such a backlog right now." So I marched myself down to the bank.
"Oh, I'm not supposed to do that, but I'll go ahead and print one for you," the teller said when a very flustered me explained the situation. With my new stamped and printed statement in hand, I was ready!
To leave my house at 3:15 am and sit outside, in the dark, for 4 hours.
When the cabbie dropped me off he was a bit concerned, but I assured him that I really meant to sit there alone, and then did just that for the next hour and ten minutes. In the dark. And cold. In a strange industrial area. For the first 40 minutes I literally just sat there and tried not to be freaked out, then finally pulled out
Manchester Park and calmed down with some Jane Austen. At about 4:25, it started raining, and did so in sporadic drizzly showers for the rest of the morning (and I of course had forgotten my umbrella, but I did have my fancy raincoat, several layers of clothing on, and most importantly, gloves). At 4:35 am, a taxi pulled up and a young man got out, who tried to open the doors before making small talk with me and resigning himself to the 3 hour wait. He even stood close to me so that his umbrella protected me too for a while. After that, it was insane, a new person arrived every 3 minutes until 5:00, at which point there was a break until 5:30, when it happened again. By the time the doors opened at 7:30 am, there were about 40 people waiting. And I was first in line!
At this point I was still freaking out. I kept thinking, "I know they said 1000 euros (I had 1115 in my account), but what if that was just for the one semester study abroad students? Are they going to give me grief for not having enough money for a year? And what if they get mad because my health insurance does not include day-to-day coverage?" I also just assumed they'd be grumpy and rude based on my past experiences at the Dublin airport and on the phone with the office.
So what a surprise when the man who helped me was friendly, courteous, and made jokes and small talk throughout the registration! He laughed at the picture in my file that was taken at the Dublin airport and asked where my fancy hat had gone, and talked about how handy claddagh rings are for showing your heart is taken (he noticed mine as he took my fingerprints on the fancy fingerprint machine). He glanced at the bank statement and said, "Yep, that's grand," before handing it right back to me. And he didn't even ask me about the health insurance.
By 8 am, I was packing my stuff back into my bag (including my super spiffy garda card with a picture where it is very clear that I had been awake since 2:30 am) and the immigration officer was wishing me good luck and a good day.
 |
| I make one unhappy lookin alien |
I got myself some hot chocolate (I had been shivering convulsively throughout much of the registration process as my body recovered from its chill), and walked home.
So good times! After all that time, it was actually a pleasant experience (when I finally got inside and was not sitting frozen in the rain). I'm gonna go sleep now, and then pack for Deutschland. My classmates are all going out on the town tonight and I'm torn about whether or not I should join them, as I have a 6 am bus to catch and a 2 mile walk to the bus station, but either way, this weekend is gonna be AWESOME! And I'm totally gonna just sail through immigration on my way back in with my fancy card. Awww yeah.
Or maybe this:
