To pass a port..

My job requires frequent abroad travels. My destined affair with passport had to finally start.
A lot many things of my life now a day’s start with Google. Online forms, no standing hours at the queues and an appointment on my chosen day made me wonder why didn’t I gave it a try earlier? Though the government registered portal didn’t had a security certificate yet I was able to trick Mozilla. I filled up the form and clicked. For my appointment I was assigned a month, a year but not a day. Yeah, the day drop down was empty. As a web developer I still don’t have any clue how that could have happened or how someone in charge could have missed that. With due respect to effort and hope, I tried the page a number of times without success.
Why not try out the agents? I caught a Hindi speaking agent, got three copies of Xerox done and paid my agent a visit to finally learn that I had lost my original 10th certificate. It was a copy, and I was confident that I had the master piece. That was all he needed to get me and there I was, once again lost and confused and irritated and frustrated and mad and tiered with bags of hope. He was an optimistic chap and soon he came up with an affidavit certifying that I can sign but am unable to read and write. An awesome joke that it was, it certainly made a good read and I wish I could had it scanned and pasted here for reference. He had his own rules which I was supposed to abide by and as per his version; even a birth certificate was of no use. A couple of more tries followed without success.
I feel trying is fun as long as you don’t have any options. But sadly I had some left.
Again with no idea as to what made me do it, I tried the online application portal as I was waiting patiently for one of my friends to be available for a chat and it clicked. I got a date and it was there all populated. I was scared enough to suggest my own and a couple of screen shots, downloads and self addressed mails followed with attachments so as to make sure that I don’t lose any a bit of it, if at all needed. It was supposed to be the coming Friday. I took a leave, asked a friend to come along and after an hour I was at the main passport office. The guard over there shooed me off to the gate no-2. It was pretty organized and for a moment I was feeling good. There was no chaos, all rules at play and ten faces was all I had for a passport crowd. I delivered a patient wait of 40 minutes with my friend outside. Knowledge session followed. I was in the Tatkal queue and to my surprise online applications were supposed to be that only. And since it was the Tatkal scheme I was supposed to procure three residential proofs. I didn’t had any. More learning was in store as my friend suggested me to try out the nearby police stationIt was 13:40 and the counter was to open at 14:10. Printed information suggested that we didn’t had any registered office to apply for passport as it depends on the place you presently belong from. JNTU rocks. I had never heard of a sad adventure.
What about fresh general applicants? Three hours of sleep (blame it on being a Friday) and one hour down, we were instructed that the main office is only for renewals and tatkal services. Begumpet and Osmania university post office were the options and applications would be accepted based on tokens and that were distributed before ten in the morning. Tokens were limited. It was already thirty five to nine, and there was no point even in going for the nearest one. Still just to have a taste of things, we went ahead to the office and as expected everything was done. But as the person over there had to say, the Osmania one was a special one and tokens were available till two in the afternoon. I had cabbie….
Osmania was on the outskirts and above all it was a city in itself. Two hours under the sun and after loads of confused roads we finally had it in front of us. It took two minutes to get the thing done with. Tokens were over by as scheduled ten in the morning. The info with us was wrong. Post offices don’t accept cash for passport. It has to be a DD. Well, I never have options and it was certainly foolish of me to have gone for one. With that the story ends for that day at around four in the evening with the meter adding up around hundred kilometers.
I got the DD prepared. Again a few hours of sleep (blame it once more on being a Friday) and me and cabbie were at the post office, with around fifty people in front of me, all waiting since five in the morning. It was seven thirty and it was certainly our best score to reach at the earliest. No complaints, the wait had to be done and my iPod co-operated quite well.
I was numbered fifty-two after one and half hours of standing ovation for the policies of my land. It was nine and my slot was timed eleven thirty. More songs, a few puffs and a few calls. With a state which can’t be put into words, I finally was in there waiting for my turn. With trepidation I approached the counter and was turned down coz I didn’t had the current moth’s bank statement. Last one year’s statement certainly did matter but still the current one was mandatory according to the whims of the man. He had all the power to quench his foolish curiosity. After many a pleadings to adjust he approached a senior lady to consult and with a smiling face she turned it down. LOL.
I got that done too. Once again, with all hate in me for keywords hope and faith, I was ready once again for the same venture. This time it was all me. With no one and again a few hours of sleep (this time you can blame my work) I was there quite early with six on the clock. Pheww…..songs, few puffs, a few calls and yeah, an audacity which I always feel usually in my second attempts. I waited three hours on two bones and I was ranked fifty first. An improvement of one with one and half hour as a bargain. My slot was again scheduled to be at thirty minutes to eleven as I missed the earlier one by a count of one. Nez…I was ready for whatever. I passed those same hours, minutes and seconds all alone, sitting there, thinking of nothing which always feels awesome and expecting whatever to happen. I was in, was at the same counter in front of the same person. Re-review of documents followed. This time it was the discrepancy in the way my permanent address was written on the form and on my voter ID card. Though a voter card in my case has nothing to do with the documents that needs to be provided yet it was a passing thought of the gentlemen at the counter and that of course needed to be treated with respect. The same old lady, but this time it was a go. To my utter disgust I got to know that she belongs to my apartment. I didn’t feel a bit as finally the thing got done. Neither was I happy nor sad. I was simply alive.
It was my longest and the toughest slog. Some may say it an effort or something quite natural or a struggle against fate, but ask me and I would like to put it as that there comes a point when you just want to move ahead, face the things without feeling a bit or care for them and that’s exactly when things start working for you. It’s simple by me. Either you give up or make things give up. Depends who’s got more to show and how badly one can make a go for it.