We went to the Registro Civil to day to pick up our cedulas. We were told that it would take “maybe an hour or so.” Other gringos had told us to allocate all day. They were closer to the truth…
Bureaucrats the world round appear more interested in creating and making jobs rather than serving people in any way even remotely related to efficiency. The circus to get us this far has shown numerous examples of this, but today pushed far enough that I would have likely gone ballistic just a few years ago. Fortunately, I have become more patient in recent years, and am finally getting the hang of this “retired thing,” so mostly took it in stride.
One small example is that we had to pay the local cashier $22.85, then $2.60, then $5.00. Each was a different trip to stand in the same cashier line and pay. Each time it held up any progress in the office while the officer that sent me to pay just waited for me to return. No handling of other waiting people. No thought of having me pay it all at once up front, even though the total cost was known before I ever walked in the door.
After waiting hours for a notary to handle documents for us, an official told Evelyn she could not get a cedula and had to start over. WHAT???
Our names are on lots and lots of forms. On one of the forms, her husband is listed as ‘Burt Johnson.’ Looked fine to me (and her and our lawyer and the notary…). Nope. All the other forms had my middle name included. This form did not, and was therefore wrong, and her paperwork could not be processed. How do we get this fixed? It was a mistake by the Ministry and therefore can only be fixed in the capital of Quito — about an 8 hour drive from Cuenca.
Yep. The Ministry made the error, so they must fix it. No concept of simply entering the missing middle name in the computer here. Gotta make another job by doing it there. Of course, this is why we hired a lawyer. Though we could technically do this ourselves, it is now his job to fix the problem. Since we are paying a fixed fee for the entire cedula process, it only means that Evelyn must come back and do this all again on another day.
Meanwhile, I waited to be called up to the window to pick up my cedula. In the States, that would take about 5 minutes to print out the card. After an hour, two men stood by me and rattled off some fast Spanish I did not understand. I replied “no entiendo” (“I don’t understand”) and they called over another man who said “show him your hands.” Huh? I held up my hands, and the first man used an ultraviolet flashlight to examine my fingertips closely. After a couple minutes, they all walked away and said “es bueno” (“it is good”).
Another hour goes by and I am finally called up to the window, only to be told “necesita otra fotografia” (“another photograph is necessary”). hmmm… Did I smile too much (not allowed)? Oh well, I went back to the photo booth…..
Nope. It was “photographs” of my fingers they wanted again. They cleaned off the glass, put some grease on my fingers, and then practically stood on my hand while the computer scanned them. Apparently pleased with the results, they then did the same with the other hand and then with the thumbs. I was then told to return to the waiting room.
While there this time, I sat next to a gringo who told me his story of woe. He started the process last February and is just now getting his cedula — more than 11 months after starting. I won’t go into his full tale here, as it would make this post into a full book. Suffice it to say I suddenly felt pretty good about our own process…
20 minutes later we were both called up to the window again, this time to pick up our official cedula cards. I looked at the fingerprint on it:
Yep. Just one black blob. Absolutely no whorls visible at all. By squashing my fingers to the glass, they obliterated all traces of usefulness. But hey, they were able to spend three or four times the rational amount of time, thus cutting the flow of people and thereby requiring more staff to handle the same work. Sounds like success to me… if I were a professional bureaucrat anyway…
Update
Evelyn went back Monday morning, after our attorney sat in line for her to get a processing number. After the first official confirmed that Burt’s middle name was now in the Quito computer, Evelyn got in line to pay her $5 processing fee, then another line to get her photo and fingerprinting. The second official typed all the same information on the forms onto his computer. He questioned input from the first official, which started an extended conversation. The two officials finally agreed with each other, and told Evelyn to pick up her cédula “in 15 minutes” at the next counter.
After 45 minutes, Evelyn approached the counter, and they insisted “un momento.” After another 45 minutes, Evelyn approaches and asks again, and is again told to wait. When her name is finally called, she is told to return to the first counter for another photo and set of fingerprints (same experience Burt had the prior week). Apparently there was a third official checking the work of the second official (who had been checking the work of the first official), and they felt that an error had been made.
Three hours later, after what was supposed to be 15 minutes, Evelyn got her cédula.
Yay! We are now both legal!
And a lot of bureaucrats will keep their jobs, checking on the checker, ad nauseum, and making multiple mistakes because of multiple re-entry of all the information.
