What the hay?

Last week, I went to extend my tourist visa. I swear, I don't think the process could have been more tedious. Well, it's not the process that is tedious, it's what happened to me specifically.

Two weeks ago, I tried to extend my visa by going to the Immigration Bureau on Soi Suan Plu. When I arrived, a big sign told me that visa extensions were now being handled at the new government center on ChaengWattana Road. This is way out near Don Muang and I was not too happy to have to try to get out there after work and before 4:30pm when they close.

I took the MRT up to Pohon Yothin and grabbed a cab. He assured me he could go to Soi 7, then proceeded to drive there. After about 20 minutes, he pulled into some huge building complex thing and told me it was Soi 7. I got out, but didn't recognize anything. After asking around a bit, I found out it was not Soi 7 and that I need to walk up the road a bit more. The road was full of construction, and was not easy for pedestrians to walk. After reaching soi 7, I walked all the way down to the end where the new government center is. I walked in the door at about 4:10.

After consulting with the government agent, I found out that I had copied my passport incorrectly. I quickly ran downstairs and made some copies (the building is absolutely enormous, mind you), and returned to Immigration 4:23. The government officer then processed my extension and returned it to me promptly.

It was 4:30pm by this time, which meant that the office was closing, which meant that every single employee in the building was going home. Also, the road outside was congested very heavily with traffic. I couldn't catch the first few buses because they were already packed. After a while, I took a different bus that went to where I need to go in a kind of indirect way. This was fun because I got to see some new stuff, but took a long time. I got home at about 8pm. Whew!