It was the final step. I was sitting in the local notary office with my landlady waiting for the small, shrill, overly authoritative woman to give us the hand written document. I had just spent the last four days running around to various places to collect all the bits of documentation I needed to renew my foreigner‘s residence card. It all started when one of the three zaroofs of my school, (translation is principal but the position is more like vice-principal), spoke to me for the first time. This year this position was filled by a teacher I had not previously known. He’s an elderly, bespectacled man, with a permanent scowl on his bushy browed face which sits atop his lush, green velvet suit covered body. He told me the police station had called and told me to come down to renew my ID. I asked him what I needed. He shrugged and replied that he didn’t know. I called Jeyhun, our fantastically efficient head of security for Peace Corps, and he informed me that I needed a local’s passport and proof of their house ownership so I could be registered under their home. It was simple enough.
The following weekend, I paid a visit to my host mom’s sister-in-law who I give my rent to. It was a rainy Sunday afternoon which I spent playing with toy guns with her two overly rambunctious sons. She gave me her passport and the documents I needed. Done and done.
On Tuesday, I put on my contacts for the first time in months, put on make up, brushed my hair and wore a respectable sweater and scarf combo. I had to take an ID picture. This time, I found it less difficult to not smile in the Soviet-ski fashion. Although, I admit I practiced the expression in the mirror a few times before heading out the door.
On Wednesday, I met with my director at school. He drove me to the Police Station in his wide, burgundy Mercedes. It was raining again as we walked up to the small side building that takes care of the region’s registrations. In the back room, we chatted with a friendly. elderly gentleman who introduced me to his new employee and asked if I had remembered the last woman who filled that position last year. I hadn’t. After making copies of all the items I had brought, he explained to my director that he needed a notarized letter from my landlady explaining who I was, what I do here, and that I live with her.
The following day, I found myself meeting her in front of the notary. We shuffled our way in into the small waiting room with the other 20 people waiting, papers in hand, to receive the stamp. After 15 minutes, my land lady pushed me out the door and told me to come back at 4 o’clock.
There was no one there at 4 o’clock except for one man filling and signing a form. We went into the office, sat down politely, and my landlady began to explain what was needed. The woman impatiently listened, then went on with a long speech, much of which I couldn’t understand but could tell through my landlady’s reaction that the gist of what she was saying was that she didn’t understand. Finally she called the nice man from the police station in a telephone call that lasted about 10 minutes of friendly, personal exchange and not the professional information she required. My landlady intermittently gave small, soft sighs of exasperation. I smiled back sympathetically. Finally she told my landlady to write sentences she would dictate on a blank piece of printer paper. This would be the official document she would stamp and notarize.
At this time, an electrician came in to install an electrical line in the corner of the office. He brought in two worn out plastic bags filled with wire, plugs, tape, and screw drivers. He took out a long chord of electrical wire, still completely encased in rubber, an electrical outlet, a screwdriver, and a kitchen knife. While my landlady wrote the letter, I watched the electrician’s fingers which were thicker than they were long, expertly scrape off the rubber at the end of the chords with the knife letting the pieces fly at my face and feet. He quickly twisted the small chords together and inserted them into the outlet. Fumbling with the small screwdriver in his massive, almost clumsy fingers, he tightened the wires into place. My landlady had just started on a new piece of paper because she made a mistake writing the previous letter.
On Friday morning I went back to the police station. I handed the notarized letter to the nice gentleman and he began to fill out the form for my new ID card. While I waited to give him my signature at the bottom of the form, the two ladies who also worked there offered me a peroshki and a cup of tea. I didn’t hesitate with my acceptance. Thirty minutes later, the gentleman finished translating my name into Azerbaijani letters with precise, sharply, slanted cursive (for example, he replaced the “C” to a “K” because “C” is pronounced like “J”.) I signed the form and he told me to return on the following week to pick up the card. I said thank you, see you soon, and skipped out the door. I walked across the bridge to the avtovagzal, backpack on, iPod in hand, and headed to Baku.
0 comments:
Post a Comment