my complicated life

• i woke up so late that i wasn't able to take a decent breakfast. i just snatched the choco-mocca biscuit at the cupboard and munched it when i reached the office. oh, i also brought sliced pears and 2 bananas from home. =)
• i had tons of desk work that i only had chicken soup for lunch (a soup where i couldn't find a single chicken strip...). the soup for the hungry soul and bulgy stomach..hehe.
• the recreation committee's organizing an Egypt trip slated on April 8-12 and staying at Hilton Hotel. why, oh why??!!! of all times, do they have to schedule it on days i can't possibly go?? nakakainis! i repeat, nakakainis to the max!!!!
• our PRO refused to attend to my request of visa application for my sister. he suggested i go down to the Abu Dhabi Immigration Department myself. ako pa??!! nway, straight from the office, i went to the said government agency. i got there around 4:15 PM. the guard was nice and he instructed me for the procedure and where to go to. i went first to have the application written online and printed out (this is outside the immigration building, right side) to be attached to the required documents. the documents that i brought are me and my sister's passport copies, her photo (which i just grabbed from her friendster account and printed from my office's printer, hehe) and my salary certificate written in arabic. it costs me 25AED for that application letter which was also written in arabic. then, i bought an e-card with empost (courier) entitlement that costs 117 AED in all (100 AED for the visa, 10 AED for the empost and probably 7 AED for the card?? hehe). i finished attending to with these documents at around 5 pm. i went back to the immigration building (left side), took a number slip which serves as a queue. my slip reads i'm customer #0631 and they are currently serving customer # 0540!! ohmigosh! quite a long queue and my baby's having his tantrums already because of hunger. since i am pretty sure it'll take me centuries before i can have my turn, i went out and luckily found a vendo machine and had a cup of hot choco instead. i climbed up the stairs going to the big building where there are 3 adjoining seats at each side of the stairway. i sat on one of the seats, drank my coco and ate one of the bananas i hurriedly placed in my bag this morning. i don't care whether walang ka-poise-poise yung meal ko and that i had to bite into that banana in public! gutom na si baby and i don't think i could last that long with him doing somersaults inside my tummy until i don't give in to his demands. =) after a couple of minutes of being full, my bladder felt its needs to empty out as well. i went down, checked the queue... customer #0584... still a long way to go! so, i surveyed the whole immigration department for a sight of a john, which i luckily found at the left side of the big building, ground floor. ang galing mo talaga, myleen! haha. i took a refreshing leak and went back to the visa (leftside) building afterwards and waited there for my #0631st turn. however, with angels on my side making up for my bad day, the person seated beside me seemed to have lost his/her patience that he/she left his/her slip. i dunno the pronoun to use since i wasn't able to see the person responsible. all i did noticed was that a #0621 slip was at the seat beside me ready for taking. syempre, i am just a smart human so i innocently slid my hands into it. hihi. yeepee!! customer #0621!!! around 7:00 PM, "my" new number was called and i was able to submit my sister's visa application which i will just wait after 3 days for a courier to deliver right by our doorstep. before i left the building, i gave my customer # 0631 slip to a fellow kabayan na kahit na ini-snob ako, it's my way of paying it forward to the good angels and grant to her my unused slip. at exactly, 7:15 PM, i was out of the immigration department. =)

some things to take note though...

• the immigration department do not take cash for payment. that's the use of the e-card that i bought from the typing folks outside the immigration office.
• i saved roughly 50 AED, against having this visa processsed by our PRO who charges me 220AED/visa. hmp!
• i only had a regular visa for processing which was 100 AED. an extra 100 AED is required should one wants the visa processed and claimed after an hour.