The Ministry
I see by the only connection to North America I have- the little clock in the lower right hand corner of the computer screen- that as I sit down for the first time it is late afternoon yesterday in the other Capital City I live in.
The hotel internet connection is like a very expensive pay-phone. I have to plug in credit card information to get my ration of internet minutes. It is staggering expensive, and with access now free at the Ministry, I have to learn how to do things backwards in the morning, which is to say I have to think and write, and then learn, after it is too late.
That is closer to what I am doing than I would like. I am hoping things will be smoother today than they were at the ministry yesterday. They bounced me to another cube yesterday in the vast farm on the third floor, and my connection was lost for hours.
It was not all bad. I got a chance to talk to Evan, the stocky blonde IT guru, who explained the manifest problems of the Ministry, and the inadequacy of its backbone.
I think he meant connectivity, but I sympathized regardless, having similar problems myself. For all the wasted time, it was a useful day in the course of the business I have to do here. I know what they want, finally, and some of the political and personal agendas to illuminate the way forward. The topic is a little overwhelming, since it involves the quest for Perfect Knowledge coupled with the greatest regard for Personal Privacy.
There is clear and dynamic tension between the two, but I will give it my best shot and then fly home as scheduled.
It is queer, really, considering that they seem to view this with great gravity, and yet the whole process is do-it-yourself. It was hide-and-seek to find the place that could issue the actual paper visa necessary to get my citizenship waiver at the Ministry. It was a strange and archaic appurtenance to the Electronic Visa Information system, which informed the ticket agent back in America that the visa had been granted and I was free to travel.
Odder still that I am engaged on a campaign to fix this very problem, and yet no-one at the Ministry could tell me where the office was downtown that did such things. I had to ask another contractor who had been through the process a couple months ago. He said the office was near the McDonald’s and the Petrol station a couple blocks from the hotel.
That was specific enough information to set out on foot, and I did so about 0815, looking around with a mixture of hope and dread, hand stuffed deep in my pockets against the cold. I was able to find the Golden Arches, and then looked for official-appearing buildings hopefully. It was foggy and cold, hands-in-pockets cold, and after a stop at the Ministry of Training, was able to narrow my search to the low two-story building with the glass doors and the logo of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship- Australian Capital Territory etched upon them.
The office did not open until nine, so I got a cup of coffee- short black, as opposed to long white- done in the espresso-style that is the universal manner here. The application of the paper on my passport took about a half hour, and then I was free to retrieve the rental car from the warren under the hotel- the Camry fully fills the available slot- and weave my way out the Belconnen Road to the Ministry.
The roads are beginning to make more sense, and I frightened no pedestrians that I could see.
At the Ministry I was placed on my escort leash by the Technical Program Leader, a smart Indian man whose background sums up the Commonwealth. He grew up in South Africa, leaving for New Zealand in 1999 after living through the downfall of Aparteid. Now he is a New Zealander with resident status in Australia.
He was busy, and I remained quietly at my cube, attempting to log on to the server for two hours until the Big Meeting with the Deputy Secretary and Chief Information Officer.
He is the man with the plan, well spoken and confident, and I was a little startled at the scope of what they were asking me to do. If it was this important, why hadn’t they sent someone good?
I wrote up the meeting, and one of the two from yesterday in my cube, chafing at the lack of freedom to move about. They say I may be issued my no-escort badge along with the citizenship waiver today, which will be a vast improvement in the quality of life, since I will be able to move around the building.
In so doing, I will have to schedule a meeting with the ambitious American who is down here on a two-year rotation, to see if my vision is on the mark. Which of course means that it must comport itself with his vision of his future, and he has a lot at stake. Much more than I do, who only wants to write a roadmap to the future, balancing the twin missions of the Ministry: Welcoming and Enforcing.
I don’t know how those things co-exist, but they tell me they must, and so it shall be.
I typed quietly in my cube until the hands on my watch moved around to five pm and I could be escorted out of the building. I never had so much respect for the denizens of the cube farms who must stay there, fully visible, the entire working day.
When I lurched home in the darkness I made a sandwich and boiled a cup of soup, watching a bit of the Victoria- New South Wales Rugby match last night, which was billed as “the Origins” Trophy. Quite a rivalry, apparently, crossed with the hoopla of an NFl playoff match, but in the end I could not understand it, turned off the television, and thought about privacy and Passenger Name Reservation data as I turned over and let the blackness take me.
Copyright 2007 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com