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| My home for the year! |
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| The view from the balcony |
I’m slowly but surely settling in to my new life in Kolkata.Julie, Sarah, and I moved into our apartment on Wednesday morning, registered at the FRRO that afternoon, and managed to navigate the city in the midst of a transportation strike to arrive on time to our Bangla class on Thursday morning. While taking public transportation is always an adventure, one which I plan to blog about later, I would say getting to the FRRO was the adventure of the week. What is FRRO, you ask? Well, to put it simply, foreigners who will be in India for more than 6 months are required to register at the Foreign Regional Registration Office within 14 days of arriving in the country. You can’t leave the country without this registration so unless you want to register late and pay a heavy fine, it’s best to get it done as soon as possible. Although there was an FRRO right next to the hotel we stayed in last week, the office for Salt Lake (the area of Kolkata in which we live) was pretty far out of the city so we were driven by Sumanta (our program coordinator), a colleague of his, and our facilitator, Oisharjya.
What should have been an inconvenient 45 minute drive turned into an unbearable 90 minute
drive because our driver made a wrong turn.
Then, when we finally arrived at the FRRO, we
were greeted with boarded up windows and a locked door. The office had moved. Sumanta’s colleague was able to ask around to find out the new location of the FRRO and about 20 minutes later, we arrived. The process itself was painless. We filled out one form, gave them all sorts of paperwork and some passport photos, waited awhile, were asked a few questions to verify the information they were given, and that was it. We left at around 2:00 and thankfully the driver didn’t get lost on the way back. We’ll have to return next week to pick up the booklet that confirms our registration which means we’ll probably miss another day of Bangla. Ah well. I’ll have plenty of time to study on the way there!
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| A different view from the balcony |
drive because our driver made a wrong turn.
Then, when we finally arrived at the FRRO, we
were greeted with boarded up windows and a locked door. The office had moved. Sumanta’s colleague was able to ask around to find out the new location of the FRRO and about 20 minutes later, we arrived. The process itself was painless. We filled out one form, gave them all sorts of paperwork and some passport photos, waited awhile, were asked a few questions to verify the information they were given, and that was it. We left at around 2:00 and thankfully the driver didn’t get lost on the way back. We’ll have to return next week to pick up the booklet that confirms our registration which means we’ll probably miss another day of Bangla. Ah well. I’ll have plenty of time to study on the way there!
THanks for the pictures! Can't wait to hear about the car rides now too.
ReplyDeleteYour apartment looks beautiful! Hope we can visit soon.
ReplyDeleteAre we going to get an address anytime soon?!
ReplyDeleteI'm hoping to send you my address today. The reason I haven't yet is 1) I'm not sure of the correct format and 2) I haven't seen any mailboxes at my place so I'm not quite sure how I get my mail. I would hate for you to send me things only to find out they can't get to me!
ReplyDeleteNo mailboxes?! No WONDER the driver couldn't find where he was going--where are the street numbers?! I'm going to find Iron Davey's long lost Indian brother to help find your way in unnumbered streets. :-) Miss you & am loving reading your blog! :-)
ReplyDeleteOh I LOVE your pretty little room, Pam! Beautiful window and a great view. I am very much enjoying reading your blog. Miss you lots!
ReplyDelete@ Alexis: Our apartment's address is on the gate but I just haven't seen any mailboxes. I'm assuming our caretaker will just deliver the mail when it arrives...hopefully!
ReplyDelete@ Everyone: Thanks so much for the comments! It's much more fun to write when I know people are reading. I miss you all!
I have been crazy at work for a while, and one of my friend was found that she got breast cancer. That's why I haven't come here for a while. Any phone number you can provide? I miss talking to you!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, your apartment looks so nice!
Love---Wendy