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African Immigration Departments hold a fond place in my heart. Many the long afternoon I spent sitting on a hard chair in a narrow, airless corridor at the Department of Immigration in Zimbabwe, waiting for the chance to hand over a few more pieces of paper to Nyani’s case officer in the hope that eventually they would agree to let him re-enter the country in time for our wedding….
Fortunately today’s visit to Immigration in order to have our status “normalised”, ie. apply for a visa extension, was a painless affair. The chairs were hard, the water cooler cupless and the air conditioner broken, but we were assigned a very helpful man who facilitated the entire process and that was luxury enough.
The highlight of the visit though was when we discovered that we would need a letter of guarantee from Nyani’s father. Anywhere else we would have had to go home and type up the letter or seek out a business centre, however, on the street outside the Department a woman has set up a booth only slightly larger than a phonebox, that contains a photocopier, a printer and a computer and provides secretarial services. For two cedis she typed and printed the letter (for another five she probably would even have signed it!). On the other side of the road was an equally resourceful enterprise. A young man with a sheet taped to a wall and a polaroid camera who was taking passport photos beneath the trees.
Hopefully the visas will be sorted by Friday and then we can begin the process of applying for a Ghanaian passport for Teya. After that she will be well and truly normalised. For me, however, normalisation may take years. To be honest, I am resigned to the fact that I may never be normal…
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