FRO--Office of Foreign Relations

Well, I've heard lots about this and yesterday was my introduction to it.
All visitors who work in India for over so many weeks need to fill out this work visa stuff in Downtown Bangalore. This must be done by 2 weeks time after entering the country, I was down to my last day. This is how it all went down.
I needed to be there at 10:30am, so work had a driver to pick me up at 9am, or so I thought. I exited the hotel and told the doorman I should have a driver waiting. They called down and no driver. I called one of the guys who organizes the drivers. No answer. I waited a few minutes maybe he was running late. 9:15am came around and I called him again. Still no answer. So I decided to use one of the hotel drivers. I could see Arun, who had driven me from airport and to downtown before. I asked the doorman could I have Arun to drive again. He nodded yes yes. A car came around. The driver was not Arun. No I tried telling the driver, I forgot his name, where I was going and he seemed confused. The doorman came over, I said where I needed to go, he seemed confused. No Arun came over and he asked also, but he understood. I gave him the address and name of place, he quickly spoke Hindi to the driver. Looked like he knew where, but all I wanted was to jump out of his car and have Arun drive me. But it was a no go.
So I read my travel book on what I'll do the following weekends, during the ride I noticed the driver take his cell phone apart (while driving) and took apart a spare cell phone. He was swapping SIM cards and batteries. It made me a little cautious, because I needed to call him to pick me up after this.
We finally made it to the FRO office, which is on a super busy road with no place to park let alone pull over. He told me here you are. I asked him for his cell phone number. He rattled off the numbers while I typed them into my cell, then I hit send to confirm all was good. When he saw I dialing he quickly took his bits of cell phone and tried to put them together. While he was scurrying to do that, someone answered the phone number he gave me. Okay, what cell did he give me, because his phone was still not together. Cars are honking horns. A guard from FRO rattles on window telling him to move. The driver points ahead and says he'll be there. I'm like where? Just by the traffic light. So I jumped out of the car and figured this should be interesting for later.
Ah, now I'm at the FRO. I'm sorry to say it was this run down looking place. No signs telling you where to go. Just a chubby guard out front of a metal scanner. I asked the guard where do I go for the FRO. He pointed to left side where there was only a sign, VISTORS. I went over and had to fill my name, what my business for being here was, and my cell phone. They chuckled that I had to look at a sheet of paper for my cell phone number. Now I asked them where do I go? They pointed over to the right side building where all these people where just huddled around. The security guy had me go through the metal detector. Now, I'm at this mass of people with no sense of a line or what to do. Everyone had this thick stack of paperwork. I asked the guy out front of me where do I get the paperwork? He ended up being American and said around the corner. I went around and this inside room was just this mess random tables, paperwork and again no real signs spelling anything out. Everyone looked confused. This place makes the DMV look like heaven.
So now I dug into my bag and called two of the numbers I had received from work. The first guy, Ganesh, told me to call the woman, Sri. I reached Sri and she said she'll be there in 5 minutes. She finally came and had a stack of papers for me. She said she'll be right back. So there was indeed a line, kinda, she went to this little table where two guards were at. Here is where you sign in again, write your passport number, and they give you a blue chip. I was number 77. They had only called 30 just a few moments ago. Sri told me to sit on the left side where there were chairs, which put me right out front of the two guards who basically gave people entry to the inside door where we all wanted to go. Sri told me to wait there and they will call my number, once they do that go to the left and there will be a table of 3 people, give your paperwork to them. So I waited, and waited, and waited. A half hour went by and more people were there. No numbers had been called. One of the guards saw my number and told me to flip it over. I did so. Now all it shown was a blue back. This is when I realized something not too kosher was going on. Some people were allowed in and others not. It seemed all so chaotic. The numbers were now up to 100. Finally after an hour they called 31-35.
Sri came back and gave me a piece of paper and took my blue chip. One the paper it said #34. I had just jumped up 34 places in line. I told Sri that they had called that number and she pointed me to stand in this line. I was totally uncomfortable because it was totally apparent I skipped ahead. I had seen people yelling at those two guys that they had been there for over 2 hours and they hadn't been called. Of course on the other hand I was glad not to be there all day as it seemed I would with my old number.
I now got inside, if the outside looked bad then the inside definitely a step down. The walls were peeling where the old wall had peeled. Only vintage fans were running on the ceiling. Stacks of processed applications were huddled against the walls, and looked very old. No file cabinets could be seen. I was now out front of the 3 men who took my paperwork. One man flipped and re-flipped through all the pages. He asked me a couple questions for which I had no answer, Sri wasn't allowed in with me. He then gave my stack of papers to the guys next to him. I had to sign in various places. Now I was told to go into the office on left. I went in and a woman was there with you guessed it stacks and stacks of paperwork. I gave her my papers. She too flipped through and re-flipped through. She then left the office without a word and didn't come back till about 10 minutes later. She had me sign and show my passport. She told me to go to the counter over there. I was now at the counter and no one was working on anyone's paperwork but none of them looked like they wanted to help me. Finally one woman looked at me and asked for my paperwork. You guessed it she flipped and re-flipped through it all. I showed my passport again and had to sign here and there. Now she gave me a form and said to come back tomorrow between 4:30pm-5:30pm. I was done for today. I went back outside and found Sri. She took my form and said to come back tomorrow and I'll get my processed form then. My entire time at FRO was 1 1/2 hours, which was speedy considering everyone who was before me when I arrived they were still waiting. I saw the guy who was ahead of me in line who was still waiting for his number to be even called. I felt like a heel.
Now, to find my driver. I walked left down the street. I got to the street corner with the traffic light trying to find a place where my driver would have parked. Then I spotted my driver standing across the street jumping up and down and flagging me with his arms. My first thought, was he waiting there the whole time I was inside? What if it took me as long as everyone else. The ride back was another hour.
This was probably one of the craziest things I think I've seen here. I just don't see how things get done or processed speedily.
I just got back from my return trip to FRO. This was funny because it took me over an hour to reach FRO again only find I needed to pick up the processed form in like 5 minutes and then another hour long drive back to office.
The funny thing I ran into the American guy I talked to who said basically how'd you cut yesterday? Um, yeah...