beaurocracy

It is important, when you're visiting a country, to never write home dissing your hosts. So I won't. Sort of. It isn't really our hosts, see - it's the system. We came down here to help out in an orphanage. We called and wrote ahead and they seemed happy with the idea, if decidedly un-curious about us. Then the fun began.

Step One: Called the orphanage. The director said he'd had no idea we were coming. He said we could come on a certain time on monday and talk to him.

Step Two: We show up at the orphanage at the appointed hour and are told the director is gone. The guy at the gate won't let us in. He shuts us outside the gate, goes inside, and comes back five minutes later to tell us that we can come in. We enter the sala and wait, sweating, in a claustrophobic little room without a fan. Eventually, the director's wife invites us into the office and tells us to come back the next day with a letter with references, requesting permission to help out at the orphanage.

Step Three: We return, in the morning, and end up waiting at the gate again, and eventually being let in to wait in the same sala for about an hour. The director shows up, goes into his office and after about fifteen minutes decides to invite us in. He talks a bit with me, and then tells us his boss isn't there for him to ask, so could we wait outside some more. We wait some more, and then he sends his librarian out to give us a tour. The tour is very nice, but we end up waiting again. After about fifteen minutes of this, the director tells us that his boss won't be around for a while, so we might as well come back the next day, bearing a program of activities we'll be conducting when we come with the kids. Not exactly what we'd planned on.

Step Four: We come back again the next day, as told. This time, Juan the gatekeeper lets us right in. We go into the sala of the office. We wait a while, and then the secretary tells us the director's out. "Well, when should we come back?", I ask. "A half an hour", she replies. So we walk around the block in the blinkin' heat and come back, dripping with sweat, a half-hour later. We enter and sit down to wait. After a while, the secretary comes in to say that the director is on a trip, and won't be back until the next day at two-thirty. It is one o'clock. This time, we're calling first.

Beaurocracy is fun. Make no mistake, though, there are also lots of other great things about being here. Right now, though, I'm just hungry for lunch and rather tired of it all.