WHO INVENTED THE VISA PROCESS??????

WEATHER: Warm 23C

HIGHTLIGHT OF THE DAY: 2 out of 3 ain’t bad

BUMMER OF THE DAY: Not being able to set up my Playbook

BUYS OF THE DAY: My new gadget, my Playbook and some Harrods purchases

WORD OF THE DAY: Visa, Visa, Visa

I wonder whose bright idea it was to get visa’s for certain countries.  Especially these days when everything is obtainable on the internet, if you are going to make people get visas, let them get them at the airport on arrival for goodness sakes.  I am sure it is just a money spinner 75% of the time.  I had to see 3 consulates today and I couldn’t get started till 1pm, which is also frustrating, but that is what it is like dealing with consulates and you can’t be rude to them, as they wield all the power and if you don’t get a visa, guess what, you don’t get to go on your holiday.

So I needed to fill in my morning before I ran around all over London for my visas.  So I decided to spend my time in the Knightsbridge area, namely Hyde Park, climbing Wellington’s Arch and getting to Harrods.  I was on the road at 9.15am this morning; I wanted to see as much as I could before heading back to Bond Street and 2 of the 3 consulates.  Hyde Park reminds me a lot of Central Park in New York.  It is a little piece of serenity in a busy, bustling city.  The day was perfect, the sun high in the sky and not a cloud to be seen.  It really was an awesome day to be out.  I have always been super lucky with weather when I have been in London on previous trips and that run (touchwood) has continued. 

I entered via The Grand Entrance to the park, which is at Hyde Park Corner next to Apsley House, which was erected in 1824–25.  It is a pretty amazing way to enter.  I walked along the Serpentine, saw all the swans cleaning themselves, seriously there must have been 30 of them all out of the water, fluffy and picking their feathers and all standing on one leg, this must be the time of day they fluff and wash.  It then seemed that after that they stop doing that they have a bit of a mid-morning nap.  I know they are only swans, but to see so many all doing the same thing was pretty cool.  I then moved on to the Princess Diana Fountain, as they call it, but really is an oval stone fountain about 50 by 80 m that is surrounded by, a lush grassy field. The granite streambed is from 3 to 6 m wide and quite shallow and is laid out on a gently sloping portion of the park, so that water pumped to the top of the oval flows down either side. It cost 3.6 million pounds to build and was opened on the 6^th July 2004.  People are encouraged to put their feet in the water for quiet wading and contemplation.  I did sit down for about half an hour and took my shoes off and popped my feet in the water, it took a while, even thought it was a warm day, the water was freezing!!! 

Working my way over Serpentine Bridge and past the boathouse, there are people on bikes, loads of people running, mothers with children, roller blader’s and walkers, everyone making the most of the gorgeous day.  You can hire deck chairs for 1.50GBP for an hour, and I can see these would be popular on a day like this.  It is comforting to know, that even on the other side of the world, you get crap overcast days with a hint of sun on week-ends and then the sun shines high in the sky on a Monday morning.  Always the way hey!   I saw a mother swan with her 4 baby swans following her single file, swimming past me and then I hit over a hundred ducks all doing the same thing the swans were doing on the other side of the lake.  This must be wash day for the water birds.  I kid you not; there must have been 100-200 of them all there fluffing and preening, then sleeping!  Once again they are only ducks, but the numbers were pretty impressive.  I saw a few more monuments, but the last one that was pretty impressive was The Wellington Monument which is a monument to the first duke of Wellington.  It was funded by £10,000 donated by British women and inaugurated on 18 June 1822. Its total height, including the sculpture, the base and the mound on which it stands, is 36 feet.  The most impressive thing is the statue of Achilles, which is made from melted-down captured enemy cannons. The inscription on the statue’s granite base reads:

To Arthur Duke of Wellington

and his brave companions in arms

this statue of Achilles

cast from cannon taken in the victories

of Salamanca, Vittoria, Toulouse, and Waterloo

is inscribed

by their country women

Placed on this spot

on the XVIII day of June MDCCCXXII

by command of

His Majesty George IIII.

My next plan for the day was to go to the top of Wellingtons Arch, but would you believe the thing was closed.  How rude!  So I was going to walk to Marble Arch and Speakers Corner, but I was against the clock and time was ticking, so I just made my way straight to Harrods instead.  I tell you the best thing I have bought to date is my map of London.  It has come in handy for all the Consulates and finding the Australia Shop etc… but on my way to Harrods I got asked twice by two different people for directions, so I whipped out my trusty map and was able to point them in the right direction!!

Harrods was amazing.  I found Harrods Arcade straight up, this is how they try and contain all the small fish and I could probably guess they would want the ‘tourists’ to buy there overpriced souvenirs and get the hell out, so it leaves all the ‘real’ shoppers to get on with their spending.  Well it was easy to blow $111.00AUD, in the tourist trap, and I wasn’t and didn’t really buy much.  I had a quick walk around the ground floor and found the food court, so I decided to buy some lunch here, eat it at the park and then head on to my business part of the day.  So I ate the best quiche I have had since Shelly cooking my last one the night I left and a bottle of water under a huge tree not far from Harrods and then I hit the tube to get me to Bond Street.

The Brazil Consulate opened for visa applications at 1pm.  I decided to get there right on 1pm, which would give me an hour there, before I had to go and collect my passport from the Tanzania Consulate at 2pm.  As you walk through the doors at the Brazilian Consulate, there is a machine there, that you tap on what you are there for and it spits out a number and tells you what floor you need to go to.  What a great system!  As I took my ticket from the machine, it flashed up on the screen that there were 19, yes NINETEEN people in front of me.  It was only 1.02pm for goodness sakes, how the hell did they all get there before me?  My magic number was 919.  I made my way to the second floor (you can only use the stairs) and I found a seat in what was like a doctors waiting room and just about all the seats were full.  They were also doing Brazil applications from this room as well.  They had an automated voice and a TV telling you when your number was called and the TV showed what numbers they were up to.  Well after 40 minutes they had called 13 people ( I was the 19^th) so I decided I would wait till 2 as the Tanzania Consulate was only 2 streets away from Brazil.  So I waited till 2pm, making it an hour that I had waited, I was going to give my number to some-one else, but thought hey, I rekon I could go to Tanzania, pick up my passport and make it back before my number was called.  If I didn’t then I hadn’t lost anything but the hour I waited, so I kept my number, walked the 7 minutes to Tanzania, and there were 16 people in front of me there, but as this was for collections only, I ended up waiting for about 15 minutes, got my passport (with visa) and then bolted back to Brazil to check out what number they were up to.  As mentioned my number was 919 and when I got back to the room they were up to 918!!!  I am so glad I didn’t give my number to some-one now.  I decided I could stay till 3pm, and then I would have to go and get my passport to the Mozambique Consulate.  I got called at 2.30pm and I got a really friendly lady, that pretty much told me Australia could have issued my visa and doesn’t know why they didn’t as there isn’t an expiry on them, which I knew, that’s how I read the conditions, but who am I to argue with the consulate in Sydney?  Anyway I basically just wanted some advice, as I couldn’t get my visa issued this time round anyway, as I just ran out of days, but I did leave Brazil with a game plan which is to visit the Brazil Consulate in Paris in October, as I have 10 days there.  I did email them and they said they don’t do foreign visa’s, but my lady said that sounds weird, so rock up there, otherwise my backup plan is to go back to Brazil in London and hope I get some-one nice and that they will issue my visa in 4 working days rather than 5.  I don’t have a backup backup plan, and I am hoping that I won’t need it.  I’m hoping Paris will come to the party, if not then I will have to cut my time down there and head straight to London to get the job done.  Bloody visas.

So back on the Tube and off to the Mozambique Consulate.  It was a lot more quite here  and there was only one couple in the consulate when I got there.  Now this is more like it.  I was at the counter and I provided my forms, my passport photos and…….. Where is my passport?  I had to go to some chairs on the side, and I emptied my whole bag and no passport.  F#@k......  I only just had it at Tanzania, so I went through my whole bag and its contents again, and at this point I have all my shit spread out over 3 chairs and I am feeling a little rattled,  to finally find the bloody thing inside my marvelous map that I was only raving about this morning.  BLOODY HELL talk about a near heart attack!!  I was frazzled and not an impression I wanted to give to the Consulate, but thank goodness I found it!  So I am able to pick my passport up tomorrow morning at 9.30am and then I am going to head to the Rwanda Consulate and try and find out what the hell is happening with my visa application with them.  I have a feeling they are going to palm me off, as I have applied online and it is processed in Rwanda, but they may be able to pull me up in their system.  I have some tracking numbers, so let’s see what they can do.

I decided to buy the Playbook, so back on the tube to Oxford Circus, where I had spoken to these friendly guys at Carphone House a few days ago.  I couldn’t see them in there today, so this chicky helped me.  She was really nice and even did me a favor and got me 2 adapters from their ‘spare’ box out the back, so I now have the Europe, the USA and of course the British plug and I only need to buy the African plug at the airport on Friday and I can sort out the Aussie plug when I get home.  So that was nice of her, she saved me over $50AUD by not having to purchase the plugs in a pack!  One of the guys did see me while I was paying and he said hi and welcome back – so he remembered me, which was a nice customer service touch!  So I am now the proud owner of the Playbook.  I just can’t use it yet, as you need to have the internet to do the initial setup, which I do have here at the hotel, but I am having a problem with the connection, so I can’t play on it till tomorrow.  I have googled the closest free Hotspots and there is one right near the Mozambique Consulate tomorrow, it’s a Burger King, so I will try it there and see how I go.  How frustrating that I can’t play with my new toy!!!

So quite a productive day all round.  My feet are killing me though and it was time to head home. 

I need to start getting my stuff together and separated before Friday.  I have a bag of stuff that needs to be sent home, so I have done that tonight and got that ready for the post.  I enquired downstairs the other day if they have storage here at my hotel in the hope that I won’t have to tramps all the way across town to leave it at the Royal National.  Well they do have a storage facility here but it is 2GBP per DAY!!!  The Royal National is only .50p a day.  BIG difference and certainly worth the trek across town.  But I did speak to the front desk again on Saturday, I explained my situation and she said she would check with her manager on Monday and see if there was something they could do.  At least I asked, and if it’s no then that’s fine.  I haven’t been able to catch up with her again yet, but either way, I need to pull out my stuff I’m not taking to Africa and get that stored on Thursday.  I still also need to get a haircut, so I will endeavor to get that done tomorrow with 2 Consulates and get some sightseeing in the afternoon, maybe get to Wembly Stadium and then out Eton College on Wednesday.  I also need to get my washing all done before I go, so I think I will drop that in on Wednesday AND  I also need some more USD for my local payments in Africa; I haven’t quite worked out how I will do that yet.  I may just have to double exchange my money to do it, but I’ll work that out on Wednesday.   Wednesday seems to be shaping up to be busy!!!  So no rest for the wicked but I think I am under control. 

I can’t believe this time next week I will be in Kenya J