How Not to Do Your French Visa Part 6

Moez, his friend and I all piled into the car the next morning and arrived at the courthouse around 10:10am. We hoped to get everything done that day, although I continued to have my doubts.
 
The woman behind the counter told us to please wait – so we did. We waited…and waited…and waited…
 
As it turns out, it is incredibly hard to get this request done. The person actually has to take the file folder, cross the hallway, and the people at the desk in the room across the hall have to put a seal on it. Arduous task.
 
Oddly enough, Moez got his done after about an hour. However, mine still sat and we waited. Why they didn’t take both at the same is a testament to the excellent organizational systems that have been put in place by French inspiration.
 
Sometime around 12pm, approximately 1 million people showed up and stuffed themselves into the tiny office. The woman became more and more exasperated as she tried to deal with incredible numbers of people who desperately wanted to eat.
 
At first, I pushed my way in with everyone. After being reassured she had not forgotten us, I went back outside to wait. Once the door started to be closed, she called us and handed over the request – both of which came back without the brown folders she had insisted on the previous day. Maybe there is a black market for file folders and the people in the office are making a small amount to pay for their lunch.
 
Finally, with both requests in hand and nothing to do until 2:30, we drove back to downtown Tunis, wandered around, ate, drank coffee and finally made our way back to the secure section.
 
The police reassured us that we could not pass through until 2:30, so we stood there looking annoyed. Finally, at 2:30, Rambo came and took everyone’s identity cards or passports. He took them back to the headquarters (a small observatory box) and then came back and called us one by one.
 
Once back into the proper office, we were asked to sit by someone we hadn’t seen the first time. After a few minutes, because 2-1/2 hours isn’t enough time for lunch, the first man we had seen came through the door to help us.
 
Quickly taking the info, he requested a copy of my passport. For the 15th time since starting this process, I repeated that the French had my passport, which is why we were participating in this fiasco in the first place.
 
Stapling the copy of my resident card with everything else, he put both of our requests on the pile, informed us it would take 7-10 days and went back to doing nothing.
 
Leaving, I encouraged Moez to pay a third month to extend our short-term housing. Were they to even get it to me in one week – which I seriously doubted – it would be the 28th of February. We still had to take the bulletin de mouvement to the agency, which would take a day to transfer the paper to the consul, which would go down the list to the next missing paper.
 
We resigned ourselves to a longer fate in Tunisia as we listened to our neighbor’s dog bark hysterically through the night.