Visa Extension Shenanigans

Bideshi 1 and I need to extend our visas in order to stay in Bangladesh legally until our August 7^th departure date. Because Jen is a Fulbright recipient with a scholarship to conduct socio-linguistic research from November 3, 2007 to August 2, 2008, we thought this would be no problem. Ha Ha Ha!

In Bangladesh everything is a problem. We know this, of course, but everything seemed to be going so well… until today.

We began the visa extension application process in early May. Jen’s visa which was initially granted so that she could attend the Bangla Summer Institute language program last summer expires (well, now has expired) on May 23, 2008. We had initially thought that it would be a good idea to take care of the extension at the end of April before going to Nepal. But time got away from us and suddenly it was a week until our departure date. By that point it was too late to risk applying for a visa extension because what if they needed to keep our passports for a week like the Indian embassy did?

So we waited until the beginning of May to apply for the extension. We tried to find some information about the process before going to the office – without much success. Several blogs mentioned that it was such a huge hassle you should just give up and go home. Our Bangladesh Lonely Planet guide book was not much better. It told us where the Dhaka passport office was located, but basically said that it’s easiest to apply for the visa from your home country. So we knew three weeks was probably cutting it close, but we figured hey, the worst they can do is deport us right? And would that really be so bad…?

We were prepared for the worst, but our first visit to the passport office really wasn’t so bad. We arrived at the office around 10:30 AM. As was to be expected, it was very crowded and not air-conditioned. There were five counters with various signs in Bangla and English explaining their various functions. We picked up our applications at Counter 3. Each application was two pages long and we were told to fill out three copies each. Three copies? Yes. Three copies each? Yes. We each have to fill out the same application three times? Yes, madam.

The application included the usual name, passport number, and nationality questions, along with questions about our local sponsor. In particular we were to provide the Name and address of persons in Bangladesh who will furnish information as to the applicant and also furnish financial guarantee for maintenance and repatriation if necessary. We were asked to provide those persons names and addresses and annual income!? How are we supposed to know that?

We did the best we could, then went to Counter 2. The woman there looked over our applications and mentioned that passport photos were also needed, one for each copy. Luckily we had anticipated this and had enough photos. Also, we need a copy of your passport, one for each application. We had those too. You’ll also need a cover letter explaining why you need an extension, she said. Well, we just happen to have this letter here from Our Sponsor, at the American Center in Dhaka. Perhaps this will satisfy the requirement. Yes, yes okay that will do nicely. (Whew, another narrow escape! We had not known we’d need this before hand – how would we – but luckily Our Sponsor had given us a letter three months ago explaining our purpose in Bangladesh for when we left the country to go to India, just in case we had any problems at the boarder.)

Finally, the application was accepted. The lady at Counter 2 scrawled something unintelligible on the front and sent us to Counter 1 to pay. We took a place in line at Counter 1 and waited several minutes. Just as we stepped up for our turn, a man rushed up from the side and shoved his arm in Jen’s face and pushed some documents through the window. Excuse me, we were standing here, Jen says. Oh this will only take a minute, he says. The hell it will, I’m thinking, he’s got six names on his application.

He continues to stand there with his arm in Jen’s face, shouting at the guys behind the counter. Jen says to me, plenty loud enough for everyone to hear, lines don’t exist in Bangladesh, huh? No response from the man with his arm in her face. Another minute passes. There is some problem with the man’s application. Clearly it will take more than a second. Finally, Jen gets in his face and yells, you can’t wait just one minute!?

Okay, okay, he says and goes to the back of the line. Slightly incredulous, Jen says to the guys behind the counter, lines don’t exist in Bangladesh, huh? They laugh and say, sometimes we have lines. I hear the guy behind me, who’s been standing there patiently the whole time, say, actually lines are good. There seems to be general approval that Jen has put the obnoxious man in his place.

We hand our application through to the guys at Counter 1. Okay, they say, that will be nine-thousand-thirty-nine taka (about $130). Come again? Nine-thousand-thirty-nine taka!!? For both of us right? No, no each. Total for two… (punch punch punch on the calculator)… eighteen-thousand-seventy-eight taka. We look at each other in dismay…Umm, we don’t have that kind of cash on us. Really!? They can’t believe it. You don’t have that much money? Nope, not today. Actually, we don’t usually walk around Dhaka with 260 dollars cash in our pockets. We’ll have to come back tomorrow.

Rats…things had been going so well. Still we figured, if we only have to go back once, that’s not so bad, is it? But $260 dollars, that’s a lot of money. How much would it cost if we just over-stayed our visas? We knew that the fine is 200 taka per day for the first fifteen days, and 500 taka per day after that. We started doing the mental calculations. My visa would expire July 19^th. We are leaving August 7^th. So 200 X 15 = 3000 gets us to August 3^rd. Then four days at 500 is another 2000. So I could save 4000 taka by not applying for a visa extension.

We pondered this for a moment. I wonder, when do you pay the fine? Do you just show up at the airport and hand over the cash? Or do you show up at the airport and get told that you have to drive across town to pick up such-and-such a paper and take it to the other side of town for so-and-so’s signature before taking it back across town to pay your fine, by which point you’ve missed your plane out of this godforsaken place? Surely it’s not that bad… On the other hand we really don’t know, do we? So maybe it’s better to play it safe and just apply for the legal extension.

We caved to our law abiding inclinations and returned to the passport office the following day, cash in hand. We went straight to Counter 1 and paid. Then we took our receipt to Counter 4 and handed it through the bars. Come back on June 30, the man behind the counter said. June 30? Yes. June 30! That’s like seven weeks from now. Yes, madam. My visa will be expired by then. Yes. Won’t that cause a problem? No, no. No problem. Come back June 30. Do you need our passports now? No, no. Bring them back on June 30.

So we left. By this point we’d visited four out of the five counters, some of them more than once, but things actually seemed to be going smoothly. Though it only occurs to me now, Counter 5 which is labeled “Passport Stamp”, has been closed with a large plywood board each time we’ve been to the office. I did not realize it at the time, but clearly it was a portent of things to come…

The next several days passed uneventfully. Then we got a call from Our Sponsor from the American Center. A police investigator assigned to our case had been by to see her. She had confirmed that Jen had a Fulbright scholarship and was doing linguistics research. She said the man was very friendly, but apparently needed some photocopies of our current visas or something. So we should get in touch with him at such-and-such a number. Our schedule was a little busy that week. So we didn’t get on it right away.

Then, a few days later the investigator showed up at our house. Oh, shit! We don’t have the copies ready. Thank you, sir, for making this trip. Really it is very considerate of you, but so sorry, can you wait while we run and make some copies. No problem. I run off passports in hand and leave Jen to answer some questions about her work in Bangladesh.

While I’m gone, it comes to light that the investigator would like to have copies of more than just the visa pages from our passports. He’d also like to have a copy of the Fulbright award letter. So Jen sends Shohag, the darwan’s son, out with the letter to find me at the photocopy shop. Unfortunately, we must have passed in the street without realizing it because he never found me. So the three of us, me, Jen, and the investigator, are now waiting for Shohag. Eventually he shows up. Rather than wait for me to go out, make the copy, and come back, the investigator decides to go with me to the shop – it’s on his way anyhow.

En route to the shop, I tried to make some polite conversation. I asked the investigator where his office was. How long had he been doing this work, and a few other banal questions like these. We’d said on my application that I was learning Bangla, and I figured I’d better try and keep up appearances.

He was polite in answering my questions, but then he said, you said on your application that you are here to learn Bangla. But you are not affiliated with any institution. How do you explain that? Or at least that’s what I thought he said.

I said, I’m sorry I didn’t understand everything you said. He repeated himself. This time I know he said what I thought he said. I wasn’t sure how Jen had explained my situation, and I didn’t want to put my foot in my mouth. So I said, I’m sorry I don’t understand. He let it go.

Back at the house, I asked Jen how things had gone. She said she thought they’d gone well. The investigator had been very polite. He had asked a lot of questions, but just seemed to be trying to get the situation figured out. She thought that in the end he’d been satisfied.

So we didn’t think about it again until today. This morning we braved the flooding in our neighborhood and went back to the passport office and stepped up to Counter 4 labeled “receipt and passport.” The guy asked for our receipt. We showed it to him and he told us to go to Counter 3. Luckily it wasn’t crowded today.

The man at Counter 3 took our receipt and began riffling through an ominously large stack of papers. Not to worry, he soon found ours and brought it to the window. You have seven days to leave the country, he says, come back this afternoon and get your exit stamp. What? Seven days to leave the country, did he just say? I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t catch that.

Your application has been refused. You have seven days to leave the country. This is not right, Jen says, I’m here doing research. I have a grant through August 2^nd. My plane leaves August 7^th. I’m sorry, madam, you will have to talk to the Assistant Director. Please have a seat.

Not knowing what else to do, we have a seat. Ten minutes go by. Nothing seems to be happening. Neither of us feels like we really understood what the guy at Counter 3 said. So I get up and go back to Counter 3. Who am I supposed to talk to, I ask. What? the man asks. Who am I supposed to talk to? She hasn’t come yet, he says, we’ll call you. What is her title, I ask. What? he says. What is her title? The one I’m supposed to speak to, what is her title? Assistant Director, he says, we’ll call you. I go back and sit down.

Another ten minutes pass. It has been our experience that as long as you sit quietly and wait for something to happen, nothing will happen. So Jen goes back to the window. Excuse me, she asks, I just want to know what is going on. Why was our application refused? The police rejected your application. What? We spoke to the investigating officer. I told him about my work. He knows what I’m doing here. I’m sorry, madam, the police rejected your application. Can I see, Jen asks. He shows her a small piece of paper written in Bangla. She studies it for a minute. But this says I’m not doing research. Yes, madam. But I am doing research. By this point the Assistant Director has appeared.

Can you explain this, Jen wants to know. No, the problem is not with us. It is with the police. You must leave Bangladesh in seven days. But that’s impossible, Jen says, we have an apartment here. I have work to do. We can’t just leave. Then you must appeal this decision with the police. How do we do that? You’ll have to submit a new application, with a letter asking for the police decision to be reconsidered. A new application? The application that we already filled out three times? Yes. With more passport photos? Yes. Jen’s so mad she can hardly see straight. We leave.

Outside, we call Our Sponsor and explain the situation. She’s incensed. This is the first time in the history of the Fulbright program that a student hasn’t been granted a visa! Who did you talk to? I want names!

Good, at least we’ve got her on our side. So we go back into the office and get names. Again they repeat, the problem is not with us it is with the police. You must talk to the police.

Jen calls Our Sponsor and gives her some names and numbers. A few minutes later she calls back. What is needed is a letter from the Vice Chancellor at the Independent University of Bangladesh confirming that Jen is in fact doing socio-linguistic research. Apparently the police investigator has never heard of the field of linguistics and, despite his civil demeanor, remains unconvinced that Jen is here doing research. Arrrgh!!!

To be continued…

Flooding

Here are some photos to go with the bit about sewage treatment in Dhaka. They're not great, but they'll give you the idea. I took them from the window of our apartment.

More from The Daily Star

Every other day, it seems like, there is some news story in The Daily Star that makes us shake our heads in disbelief and think, “where are we?” I keep thinking that nothing will top the current story for sheer absurdity but inevitably another story comes along that’s even crazier. I’ve decided to share some of the highlights.

Several weeks ago there was an article about sewage treatment in Dhaka. The article was based on an interview with one of the head officials at WASA, the local water supply and sewage treatment company. According to the WASA guy, WASA has the capacity to treat one-third of the sewage produced in the city. However they are currently only operating at half-capacity because a vast number of home and building owners prefer to connect their sewage lines directly to the city’s storm drains in order to avoid paying a sewer bill. This means that only one-sixth of the shit from a city of 15 million people is getting treated, which means that the shit from 12.5 million people is going straight into the rivers that run through Dhaka. Gross!!

It also means that the shit from 12.5 million people is flowing through the storm drains. When it rains, especially in our neighborhood, the drains overflow and flood the streets. The water can frequently be over a foot deep in several places between our home and the local markets. And what are you walking through if you have to walk through that water? The shit from 12.5 million people!!! Argggg!!!! Naturally we take rickshaws as much as possible when it rains.

On a related note, there was another article about pollution in Dhaka’s rivers on June 15. It was titled Rivers void of life forms. There are three rivers that flow around Dhaka, the Buriganga, the Turag, and the Norai. The article reports that a recent three-year research project found that basically nothing lives in these rivers. It said that when the monsoon comes and the water flow increases on account of the rains, then “some invertebrates and small organisms come into being…But these life forms completely disappear in the dry season…” Bummer man.

Another common theme in the Daily Star is ‘corruption.’ Recently an article caught my eye titled Bridge built without approach road. It’s about a bridge that is being built under the supervision of the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED) on the Shibu River in the Rajshahi district. The construction company doing the work, which is owned by the vice-president of the Rajshahi chapter of the Bangladesh National Party (BNP), was awarded 39,200,000 taka (about $580,000) for the project despite the fact that neither they nor the LGED owned any land around the bridge site on which to build an access road. The article was mainly about the details of this one case, but it mentions 20 other bridges that were built during this particular BNP coalition rule that are still unusable. The article concludes by saying, “the number of unusable bridges is 600 in Rajshahi division. Contractors, chosen allegedly at the behest of former ministers and lawmakers, have reportedly withdrawn all the money for the constructions.” The organization and prose in this article, which is typical of The Daily Star, leave me somewhat skeptical and confused as to the actual facts, but it seems pretty weird to build 600 bridges and no roads – and this is just in one district!

A third theme that appears practically every day in The Daily Star is the ‘mob beating’ which usually results in the death of several people. An article from June 13 serves as an example. It was titled, 8 bandits beaten to death in Natore with the subheading one shot dead during Rab-robber gunfight (Rab stands for rapid action battalion. They are the elite military branch that has carried out numerous assassinations over the past two years.) The highlights are as follows:

The incident occurred around 1:30 am when the gang of at least 13 gathered on Adimpur Primary School ground prior to launching an attack on the village…But more than 100 villagers were lying in wait for them around the field with the gang oblivious…The villagers chased the gang and a few of them managed to flee while most jumped into a pond, finding no escape route, on the northern part of the school compound. The villagers encircled the pond as announcements were made through loudspeakers of mosques alerting other villagers about the criminals. The gang opened fire on the villagers in a bid to scare their way out of the situation. Rab personnel tried to negotiate their surrender but the criminals kept on firing forcing Rab to retaliate…The criminals later ran out of ammunition and the law enforcers asked villagers to get the criminals out of the pond. The villagers got them out of the pond, took them to the school ground and gave them a mass beating. Six of them died on the spot and the law enforcers were able to rescue two of them but they died on their way to Singra Health Complex…The body of the other criminal was found in the pond with a bullet wound in the head…

These articles typically refer to the people beaten as ‘robbers’, ‘bandits’, or ‘criminals’ and never mention any charges being levied against the ones doing the beating. As in this example, the scenario is usually something like this: criminal observed being a criminal, someone gets on the horn at the local mosque, a chase ensues, one or more criminals are beaten to death by the mob, end of story. And it happens every day. Sometimes there are several articles like this in a day. I would really like to know how the number of people beaten to death by mobs in Bangladesh every year compares to the number killed by handguns in the US. If anyone can answer this, let me know.

Finally, in the category of sheer absurdity, one of our friends pointed out an article last night at dinner about the international airport in Chittagong. It needs to be read almost verbatim to be fully appreciated. The title was Ctg airport faces risk as fire tenders out of order.

Aircrafts are facing serious risks while landing at or taking off from Shah Amanat International Airport (SAIA) in Chittagong since all the airport’s three fire-fighting vehicles have been unserviceable for about two months. Airport authorities have made arrangements with the fire service stations in Chittagong city for sending fire-fighting vehicles daily to attend aircraft landing and takeoff. But the authorities often have to advise planes awaiting landing to fly slow or hover in the sky when fire-fighting vehicles delay in reaching the airport…Airline officials fear that if the international aviation watchdogs come to know about this situation at the SAIA, they might downgrade it from its present status of an international airport. According to rules, the presence of fire-fighting vehicles at an airport is a must at the time of aircraft’s landing and take-off. On June 12, the pilot of an aircraft of Biman Bangladesh Airlines landed the plane at the airport at his own risk after hovering in the sky for about 40 minutes although fire fighters had not yet arrived…”We ask pilots to fly slow or hover in the sky when fire-fighting vehicles arrive late or when an aircraft arrives before its scheduled time,” a high official of the SAIA told The Daily Star seeking anonymity. He, however, initially declined to provide any information, saying as a government official he cannot give journalists any such information…

Vehicles out of service for two months? Fly slow? Hover? What more can I say…?

A Joke

The other night Bideshi 1 and I had dinner with some Fulbrighters and friends at a local restaurant. One of the people in attendance was a Bangladeshi man who had gone to the US on a teaching Fulbright. He told a joke that was pretty funny and captured a certain Bangladeshi cultural motif. I’ll do my best to retell the joke for your reading pleasure, but first you need some Bengali vocabulary.

The vocab: Bhai-jan, kemon acchen? means Brother how are you?

Bhai-jan, ami bhalo acchi means Brother I’m well.

The joke:

Bill Gates recently put out an add seeking a regional manager for the Pakistani branch of IBM. The position was to be a lucrative one and would confer much honor on the chosen candidate, so about fifty-thousand people applied. As part of the selection process Bill Gates called a meeting with the candidates to expound on the necessary qualifications for the job.

First, he said the successful candidate would need to be able to program competently in the Java language. About half the people present did not know Java and promptly got up and left. Now, among the applicants there was a Bangladeshi man. He did not know how to program in Java either, but he looked around and saw that no test was being administered. So he figured what the hey, I’ll just hang around and see what happens.

Next Bill Gates said that the successful candidate would have to be familiar with current semi-conductor manufacturing techniques and supply chains. Again, about half the remaining people got up and left, realizing that they did not possess the requisite qualification. As for the Bangladeshi man, he didn’t know the first thing about techniques for manufacturing semi-conductors, but still no one seemed to be administering any tests. So he figured what the hey, I’ll just hang around and see what happens.

This process continued for quite some time. Bill Gates would name a requirement for the job and about half the people would get up and leave realizing they lacked this particular qualification.

Eventually there were only two candidates left, the Bangladeshi man and one other guy. Bill Gates said, “since this job will be located in Pakistan, there is one final qualification. The successful candidate must be able to speak Pakistani. You are the only remaining candidates. Let me hear you speak some Pakistani.”

So the Bangladeshi man turned to the other guy and said, “Bhai-jan, kemon acchen?” To which the other guy responded, “Bhai-jan, ami bhalo acchi.”

The End