Turkish bureaucracy

Well yesterday was a bit of a lesson on Turkish bureaucracy. Just recently the government decided that everyone must apply for their residence/work permit in person...which means the school is no longer able to just handle all the paperwork for us. No, it means they now have to escort us through the process. So I found out about 2 pm on Wednesday that I was int he group of 20 people that would be leaving lojman in the morning at 6:30 to go to the police station to do this. Of course it's not just any old police station we can go to, it has to be one which deals with the residence permits - on the other side of the city, of course. Its a good 1 to 1 1/2 hour drive (but only because we left so early - the group the day before spent over 2 hours in transit, hence our earlier start time - less traffic). We arrived somewhat aware of the process - or at least understanding we were going to have to stand in numerous lines, and defend our spots in line to prevent a large number of people trying to cut in front. First thing first, we're not even in the police station yet - we're more in a security/entrance building. We hand over a photo id (passport or [expired] residence permit) to a guy behind a counter and then just stand in the room for a while with a lot of other people. Half an hour in there's a flutter of excitement and people sort of surge forward. One police officer begins calling out names (oh, great - we're supposed to understand their butchering of our names?) and letting people through one at a time. I think this whole process was just about getting our name into the computer. As I stare out the window I notice people head into the courtyard and start running to the building. Clearly they'll do what they can to shorten what they know will be a long wait. We head in and join a line which already reaches down the stairs - yep we're a floor below where we want to be and at the end of the line (although soon it extends way past us). Did I mention we're only waiting for a slip of paper which has a number and which desk we'll be going to eventually? Oh, and the office doesn't actually open for another 30 minutes. Whatever. We wait in line, inching up the stairs only to have the woman roll her eyes when she finds out we're a group of 20. We get shepherded to stand in another line which reaches down the hall and turns a corner (can't really tell how far we're going to have to go) and Elif (the lovely woman from school who is in charge of all this this year) brings us our numbers. And we continue to wait, and wait. We start inching up and around 10:45 (the last group only reached this point around 12:30 or 1) we were close to the door we needed to go through. Hand our paperwork to a guy, he checks some stuff on the computer and hands it back. Move down a couple of steps and hand it to someone else - they write and stamp on a couple of sheets and hand it all back. Exit through the door, turn the corner and find I now have to fight my way through a crowd to my designated counter. Finally we're where the numbers matter - but we're also in the area where we have to fend for ourselves. "No, I'm sorry 14 definitely comes before 42...you can not push in front of me!". There's nothing like having to defend your place in line (or should I say in a crowd?) physically to start raising your adrenalin. I finally got to hand my stuff to the guy, who flips through it, writes some stuff, pulls out two sheets and says "blah, blah, blah, photocopy, blah, blah, ..." Hmmm, pardon? Elif! Yes, this is why they didn't dare send us alone to do this. Elif grabs the paper and disappears for a while as I continue to body block the man holding slip #42. When she comes back we hand stuff back, he complains she needs more copies since there are so many of us, but at least finishes processing my paperwork while she's gone. The guy writes on a lot of stuff, crosses out some other stuff and hands the whole stack back to me. Huh, I'm done. Not that I have my new residence permit, no that will take another 10 days (please don't tell me that we have to go through all of this when we have to come back to pick them up). By the lunch break at 12:30 we had all but 4 people through - they unfortunately would have to stay and wait until the officers returned from their lunch break. Thankfully they sent the rest of us home on the bus without them. We got back around 1:30 or 2 - a 7 hour trip for what amounted to maybe 10 minutes of work total. You have to love the system. Sometimes I think the point is to employ as many people as possible. But at least it wasn't the 11 hours it took the previous group.