A nightmare I had called 'Getting a visa'

(Sorry, this story's got no room for pictures)

Japan's rail system is one of the most extensive and efficient ones in the world. Generally speaking, the trains are so frequent you could never use them as an excuse for being late. Buying tickets and navigating your way through the stations are also pretty easy things to do once you've got the overall gist of things. It's when you need to catch a train out to woop-woop to get your Chinese visa when things go pair-shaped. To get out there, you need to travel by a couple of different local trains and also divert to a subway during the latter part of the journey. I suppose it doesn't help when you go to ask one of the rail-masters where Azawa is and they have no clue.

Pioneer readers of this blog would recall a time when I commended the Japanese race for their helpfulness when it comes to a lost foreigner. Today was a perfect example of this. At Namba (the major station I would travel from) I was loitering out front of the station with a rough page of directions from the internet in one hand and a rather dazed expression. Just before I thought about heading back to centre station, this bloke with a suitcase walked past, looking back every couple of steps at me as if to offer guidance. Once I noticed this, I asked him if he knew where to catch the subway from. Briefly scratching his head, he asked me where I wanted to end up. I told him Awaza, and he said "Let's go". As we ascended the major staircase, I was confused as to whether he was heading out to work, if he was returning home or even if where ever he was going was in my general direction. I soon found out that he was a police officer heading home from a night shift and that his home was in the complete opposite direction to the way we were headed on the train we'd caught. I was, of course, in shock when I found out he had delayed returning home to his girl friend to take me out to this place called Awaza. To this moment I wonder whether he did it simply to hear more about Australia or just because he saw it as his duty.

When we finally arrived at Awaza, the consulate was closed for another 15 minutes so he asked me if I liked Japanese food. I replied yes and suggested that we grab a bite to eat whilst out this way. After a quick walk around, I was a bit hesitant to go into the local restaurants which weren't as cheap as I was hoping, with a budget like the one I have. This didn't turn out to be a problem however, because this guy, whoever he was, insisted on buying me lunch as he "understood that I'd be tight for cash". At first I refused to do so, as he had already done so much, yet he seemed so persistant, so I gave up and went along with it.

After lunch and about 30 thank-you's, we parted ways and I headed up to the consulates office. I knew I was in a bit of trouble from the start when there was a choice of 20 forms to fill out and most of them were in Japanese or Chinese. So I picked the one with the most English in it and went at it. After I had filled out the form, I took a seat in the passport-photo booth which was conviniently in the same room. What wasn't convinient, however, was the machine's inability to deliver very important passport photo regulations in English! It was Chinese or Japanese. So, taking my best guesses, I got some photos printed out which looked something like what they should be.

This is to re-invigorate your attention..

Once I'd got all that sorted, I lined up in a monster of a line headed towards "Visa Counter". I was a couple of people before the front of the line when, for the third time I'd gone over the application, I'd found the spot to ammend your photo in half Japanese. So, with a "Don't talk to me" look on my face, I made my way out from the front of the line to a desk with a glue stick and a pair of scizzors on it. With about 20 minutes to spare, there was of course, an old woman sitting there cutting the edges off her photo to the micro-millimeter. At this point I was risking another marathon out there to get it all done within business hours the next day. The old lady finally finished and in about 3.5 seconds, I'd fixed up the photo, glued it to my application and rejoined the line. Wondering if the visa-god could make things any harder for me, I'd once again approached the front desk, slapped down my application and was told by the woman in a mildly Chinese accent "Oh, I forgot. You also need a photocopy of this page from your passport." (Note: this was not the passport page itself, but something else that wasn't mentioned on any of the consulate websites). Once I'd coughed up another couple of bucks to get this done and rejoined the now shorter line, I was just about to put a gun in my mouth when the woman called me to the desk once again, took my papers and told me to come back in three days to collect my visa.

To top this all off, I caught the express train home, which of course, flew right past my station and the four after that.

Finally, in tears, I decided then and there that this trip isn't about doing everything right... It's about making as many mistakes as I can and learning from every one of them. I'm off to a good start.