To catch everyone up, I drove to Atlanta Tuesday instead of Wednesday to avoid what was being termed "horrendous weather" by most of the weathermen in my area. Personally, I don't care about weather, since I will drive and have driven in tornadic weather before and for FAR less important reasons than getting my visa paperwork filled out. In fact the reason was a concert. For three bands I didn't even really like. That's my level of dedication to making ill-advised decisions.
Since I write this mainly for people hoping to follow in my expat footsteps, here's a few things that I learned from my visa paperwork experience.
Expat Negro Tips:
1) Each consulate has a jurisdictional area. You can't turn in your paperwork if your home address is outside of your consulate's jurisdiction. Take the time to check, just in case.
2) There are several forms necessary for your visa paperwork. Your consulate's website may have a list of what you need, but they may not have links to download them. In my situation, I had to email a request for the forms. The response was fairly quick (within 24 hours) but if you're like me, I asked at the last minute and the response wasn't quite quick enough.
3) Having all your paperwork filled out makes the turn-in process go by faster, however it doesn't speed up the return process. Neither does turning in your paper by hand. Same three to four business day response time either way. Though you do cut out half of the mailing time and half of the chances for failure. That's always a win right?
I also got a flu shot. Intradermal flu shots hurt a bit more than a normal one. Pharmacies are not awesome places to hang out. But a little bit of patience and small piece of courage and now I have an immunity to this seasons strains of H1N1 as well as H3N2.
One other thing. I got a call from The Arrival Store, which is essentially a business which procures cellphones, towels, pots and other amenities for expats. Their approach to customer service is best described as compassionate hand holding (?). The first twenty minutes of their courtesy call to me was a conversation. End of sentence. And it was extremely disarming. I went to college for communication arts and marketing. I pride myself on being able to recognize manipulation and subtle forms of marketing. Completely caught me off guard. And each interaction is in line with that. I hate to admit it but I would recommend using the Arrival Store just for the customer service experience. Seriously. I was able to bounce ideas off of someone that had been to Korea before and listened to and had an answer for quite a few of my concerns. In fact, I think I steered the conversation towards what the Arrival Store could do for me, not the other way around. I'm a charming dude, but I'm not THAT charming. That's either an amazing customer service rep (which is entirely possible) or (and this is my guess) an amazingly well though out customer service experience. Either way, get out there and experience it.
Stay classy.
...my flu shot hurts.
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