New Authorization

My travel to Germany was scheduled to 27 September till 4 October 2008. As an Iranian who has a good amount of experience in consulates of different countries, I knew that I have to apply for visa in advance and to provide all necessary documents in order to prove that I am a good man. This time I was in doubt if I will get visa or not. It was less than two years that I was working in Brazil as a Mathematics professor and my two years Brazilian visa was expiring 30 September, exactly in the same time that I was supposed to be in Germany for a conference. I had just a sheet of paper issued by Brazilian Justice Ministry saying that I have applied for a permanent Brazilian visa for the period after September. Usually the consulates verify whether you have a permission to enter the country which you go after leaving their countries. I had two options. Either I could reserve a ticket from Brazil to Germany and then to Iran. With this, my documents would be perfectly complete, even if I had no intention of visiting Iran. Or, I could go to the German consulate with the document of the Brazilian Justice Ministry and my job contract in Brazil. I chose the second option because I wanted to be a honest man and my intention was to participate the one week of the conference and right after to come back to Brazil. I applied for visa in advance and, as I suspected, they rejected my documents. "I have to provide the consulate with a document of Brazilian Federal Police ", the officer said. Well, 10 September 2008, I had my Brazilian permanent visa and I decided to apply for a German visa. "The minimum time is 10 days and the authorization may not arrive at time", the officer said. I just made the risk and said no problem. I was supposed to fly 26 September and the authorization did not arrive until this day. After a long telephone conversation, the officer suggested me to postpone my travel for few days later. "I cannot postpone the conference, however, I am going to postpone my departure to few days later and so I will have the chance of participating just two days of the conference". I did so, and an hour later I informed the consulate of my new travel plan. "Well, now we have to ask another authorization for your new travel plan and it can take more ten days", the officer said. In this point I understood that some people are completely out of logical arguments of the daily life. I lost my conference, enough amount of time, visa fee and two penalties of the air-ticket, one for postponing and one for canceling the ticket.

Hossein Movasati
29 September 2008.