Magistratsabteilung by Any Other Name...Would Still Require Me to Take an Anger Management Course!

After visit #4 to the Magistratsabteilung and still no sign of my residency permit, I am beginning to worry. And also become angry. Yesterday was my latest "encounter".

First, I wake up bright and early to get there when the doors open at 8:30. I wait in a long line, get a number, go up to the 5th floor waiting room - it's almost become a routine - and sit and wait. This time they made me wait an hour and a half before even calling my number. I remember it being much quicker the first time...unless I'm just delusional.

Well, in the meantime between my 2nd visit where the woman told me I needed to go to Amstetten (because I was still registered as living there) and the 3rd visit where they told me they had sent my paperwork to Amtstetten (after I had already de-registered and re-registered in Vienna, which meant I had to wait until Amstetten sent back the paperwork to be able to do anything) I received a letter in the mail from the MA 35 telling me I needed to bring in my birth certificate with apostille - and German translation - and a housing contract stating where I'm living and who's renting to me, a week ago yesterday.

I immediately went to the translator on Monday to get the birth certificate translated, just like they asked in the letter. I got the translation back Thursday, and, having to fork over 150 euros for the damned thing, I was already on edge - strike #1 - considering (if I had a translation degree and/or certification) I could legally do the translation myself. And with out a #$*@ing degree, I can do it myself, but would a ministry accept it as verified?

Anyway, I got the translation back Thrusday. I already had a Mietvertrag (contract) and first thing Friday morning, I thought I would try my luck, to see if I could get by without an apostille, which I thought would be the least of my worries. Not so.

I get in, and the Mietvertrag is not valid, for some reason. I now need to prove that my host mom/landlady can "legally rent to me" which I think is completely ridiculous, and some bull the MA 35 is pulling because they don't like me, or something. I've never heard of anything like this. I emailed the Fulbright Commission, and they were not terribly helpful as of yet, but I am holding out hope. Such things have to be researched, I suppose.

On top of that (the woman telling me the contract was invalid was strike #2), they did not accept my non-apostilled original birth certificate with State of Wisconsin seal and watermark proving authenticity. Which means I have to send the birth certificate back to Wisconsin to get it authenticated, wait for the Secretary of State to send it back, and then go back to the MA 35, on top of having to get some sort of legal authorization on behalf of host mom Johanna.

Not only that, they DIDN'T NEED A TRANSLATION! Upon hearing this (strike #3), and the woman telling me this was all my problem, not hers, I blew up. She told me to stop yelling at her, and I apologized, but I didn't mean it. I would have sworn at her and called her a spineless cretin and a big fat bitch to boot, except that I have to go back at some point and actually get my Aufenthaltstitel and seeing as she may or may not have the power to grant me one at all (better to err on the side of "may"), I held my tongue, stormed out of the office, and once out of the building and on the street, I started crying. Balling my eyes out. I was so frustrated! And the woman had no right to be rude to me.

That's what upset me the most. I know this is my problem, and that they sent the letter stating I need an apostille.  But I didn't have one last year when I went to the Austrian consulate in Chicago. They sent my stuff onto Amstetten anyway. And I didn't think it would hurt anything to try, even if I got rejected and had to go back. I knew I couldn't get anything done with apostille while the birth certificate was at the translator's.

I guess that's life in the big city. Don't expect kindness, or even politeness. In Vienna vs. Amstetten, Amstetten wins in the bureaucracy department. They were actually nice to me at the Bezirkshauptmannschaft in Amstetten!

I might have tried a bribe next time, but my pockets, unfortunately, are too shallow to allow it.

Magistratsabteilung, or: The First Canto of Hell

One of the first things I need to do in Vienna, after I settle in, is to register with the police and obtain my residence permit (Auftenthaltstitel) for this year.

Austrians love bureaucracy. It is one of the things that makes them happy, I think. I am starting to believe all the things I've read about Austrians and paperwork...almost as bad as the French! Having dealt with both, I still think the French are worse (I had to go to the French Consulate in Chicago 3 times, and even then they did not give me the "right" visa). Nevertheless, a thorn in my side may be what the MA 35 (Magistratsabteilung) becomes.

First, I arrive in Vienna, thinking I need to register with the American Embassy. Since Vienna is a lot bigger than Amstetten and I can't just walk down the street to register with the authorities. Fine by me. But, I have no idea where to go. So I go to the first logical place - the place they tell you to always go first when you're traveling abroad: the American Embassy. I take the U-Bahn to a place near the University, and walk out along the street looking for an official-looking building. Obviously, the one with iron bars, 6-foot high barbed wire and guard dogs is the American embassy. Easy to find, at least.

I saunter into the interrogation booth waiting room, confident for the first time in several months because I (me!) possess an American passport. Well, so what? So do at least 100 million other people. Plus, the guards tell me, You don't go to the American embassy to "register" you go to the consulate. On the other side of town. Bye-bye now.

Right. So I run up to Parkring from Boltzmanngasse (inconvenient seeing as I have to take 2 street cars and it takes 20 minutes from door to door) to get scanned - again - and interrogated. I wave around my passport, which indeed helps this time - I get to go to the front of the line! But it's a small victory, because the guy behind the desk tells me I'm in the wrong place. Again.

Fortunately, the gentleman behind the desk does give me an informative sheet of paper with an address and a list of services the Magistratsabteilung 35 provides. "This," he explains, pointing to the bolded heading, "is the place you want. People coming to the consulate want to get out of Austria, not stay here." Fair enough, good sir.

By now, I have wasted my whole morning running around. Yes, literally. It is now just after 11:00, and the problem with bureaucracy, the biggest problem, is that these buildings, which house "employees" to do "services" for the public have very short working hours. 8-11:30am. M-F. Or, if you're lucky, they'll stay open until noon. With another 1/2 hour on public transport ahead of me, I won't get to the MA in time to do anything but be handed a number. So the finishing of my quest needs putting off for another day.

Next day: out the door by 8 to get to the MA 35 in time to get my papers finished. YES! Today is the day, I tell myself. Today I will arrive home with a brand new Auftenthaltstitel and a feeling of accomplishment!

From the street car stop, I walk along a row of imposing metal and glass high-rises straight out of 1984 into #93-C and swarms of sweating, tired-looking people (it is August), crying babies and that smell you always get in European waiting rooms from the one or two people who are for some reason anti-deodorant.

I grab a number and am directed by the woman behind the desk to take the elevator to the fifth floor. From there, I wait for my number to be called. About an hour. I walk into the room to a weary-looking man behind a desk, who despite his "casual" summer office apparel (Tevas and a short-sleeved plaid shirt) does not have a "casual" attitude. He informs me that 1) I missed the deadline to extend my visa and will thus have to sumbit an Erstantrag rather than a Verlängerungsantrag. But he seems to take pity on me...I think? and decides he can go through with my request as soon as I get all of my forms copied and signed in triplicate. I may use the pay-per-copier outside his office. 20 cents a page.

Once I return to submit my triplicated forms, Mr. Casual has already moved onto someone else. And I thought I was special. Over his shoulder, he tells me to wait a little longer. My number will be called again shortly.

I sit back down. 10:42, my watch reads. Not bad. This gives the guy over an hour. And he did say "shortly" so I wait and watch the screen for my number.

At 11:12, I am sick of staring at a screen, so I whip open my book. I read one chapter, and then two. And by the time I know it, I've read 50 pages but my number has not been called. It is nearly 2:00. Supposedly the MA 35 has closed. I look around the waiting room to see a Turkish couple buying sandwiches from the vending machine. Has anyone told them the MA 35 closes at noon? A woman comes up to me and asks why I'm  there. I tell her about renewing my visa, and that Mr. Casual told me to wait. OK, she nods. It'll be another minute.

Around 2:30, a younger, plumper woman comes to get me. She scans my fingerprints. She takes out my triplicated forms. She prints out a form and tells me to go to the cashier to pay for my Antrag. I can almost taste my victory!

I run up one flight to the cashier, who takes my €80 and hands me a receipt. I rush back down to the plump woman, who asks me for a Mietvertrag. A what? She repeats herself. I tell her I don't have one. She gets her colleague in from next door, who translates for me into English: a contract.

Yes, thanks for that, but just because you translate it for me doesn't mean it will magically appear in my backpack. I only have a Meldezettel - a residence registration form. Which has the same information, but is apparently completely different.

No dice, the ladies say.

Then the new one says something mean about me in German, thinking I won't get it, and the plump one laughs. I feel like calling them a couple of cows - in German - but I realize that would hurt my case, and seeing as I now have to return to the MA 35 to finish my business, the least I can do is hold my temper until I'm out of the building. Play the bureaucrats' game and sometimes, when they feel like it, they might just let you win.