Good news Today!
The morning started with a routine spraying of the roads to the tune of a musical truck, nice!. Then a 1hr metro ride back to the city to sort out my visa, where I couldn't but sip into a Burger king for a double chicken and salad-only meal.
30 mins prior to my appointment I made my way to the building, realizing as before I had to scan a QR code, only to find my mobile was being a bitch and will not connect to mobile data.
This went on for about 10 mins and I decided I was not going anywhere with this shit. So the alternative was to go to the Starbucks I know 10 mins walk away. There I logged on and applied my checks, nothing was wrong data was OK too as disabled the WiFi?
Murphy's law you may suggest!
Perhaps, I power cycled the phone and tried again, disabling the WiFi leaving data only.
Still didn't want to play...what the heck! anyway, for the sake of sanity, I again powered off and on the mobile. This time crikey it was working? I scanned the Starbucks QR code to check and yep we were operating.
Hurrying back I now had 10 mins to my appointment, and who knows what was going on there. I arrived and provide my collection receipt to reception, excellent I was given a number, and off I went to join the hoards milling around inside, encountering crazy queues and mismanagement of the situation, and updates on payment on a notice board:
Written in Chinese Mandarin?
yeah right, that helps lots!
Head scratching and shuffling around by nationalities was something to behold.
I came across an old acquaintance, he was looking bedraggled sitting with a perplexed face on what was happening.
We exchanged pleasantries and comments and he wandered off to get in the queue to haggle his way to the front of what was clearly a bloody mess of lost people. We both received our visas and are happy to get out soonest
This is not for the faint-hearted or gently, gentle types. Walking out of the building was like walking into Sunshine after a storm, relief!. Meeting my friend 1 hr later we decided to meet halfway from her workplace and where I was, this was another interesting observation
Watching the business period after work 18:00 to 20:00 is impressive, I planned to meet at the metro station and while doing this witness the flow of traffic flowing like sea waves.
Filling up and Emptying in Seconds.
We met as planned and had dinner in a fish restaurant, around £20 all in, tea, snacks, and the good size fish in a sauce with vegetables and fine handmade noodles
perfect!
All was much better by the end of the day
Chris
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