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Bureaucracy is the national passtime of governments throughout Central Asia and jumping through hoops becomes the unwanted hobby of any passing visitor.Take Turkmenistan who bug hotel rooms and cafes where tourists my congregate and talk about the country without permission.You may go there but you will have a shadow in the form of an official and expensive guide.Then theres Uzbekistan who ,for centuries has had thousands and thousands of visitors and traders pass along its ancient silk road,buying and selling all kinds of goods,bet they didnt need pre arranged accommadation and reciepts for every night of their thirty days stay.They need to know where you are and where you have been,keeps them happy.
At least mighty Kazakhstan only make you register once and not at all if you arrive by plane ,unless you arrive on a Tuesday,or if its cloudy,actually its if its raining,then you register twice but not on Wednesdays.
You'll be passed along to the next town,then probably the next.It reminds of our time in Russia where we sought out the mysterious mr Twister agency who could register us,well they didnt exist and we decided to keep as many hotel reciepts as possible which was about
Ballroom dance in the park
getting social with the chinese on sunday 7 out of the 30 days of cycling around.There were no questions asked at the border of Estonia when we left,only ''wow youve been cycling in Russia,well done comerade''.
Our problems began when we decided to cycle through Kazakhstan.A one month visa can be obtained in 5 days from the consulate in Urumqi,no drama's just a bit of granny elbowing and some preferential whiteboy treatment at the gate.Kazakhstan being the 9th biggest country in the world will take more than a month to cross the 3000 odd km especially when you consider the state of the roads in the west, not even Lance Armstrong would take that on.With no internet in Xinjiang,when it came to organising our LOI(letter of invitation) for the 2 month visa we got headaches that became migraine's which ended up like a medieval beheading.
Lets cut to the chase.With all details finalised our agency(Advan tour) sent the details to the Ministry of foreign affairs(MFA) insert your own acronym here,guess what mine was.They in turn send a copy onto the consulate in Urumqi.Easy!
Unfortunatly they put the wrong passport number on my invite,they were almost right getting seven of the nine numbers correct but
still it was a useless form.It took one week,three broken promises and three more visits to the disneyland destination of the consulate for them to rectify the mistake.No doubt the one handed misshaped drunken monkey that deals with such international issues needed to have a lie down after dealing with this demanding project.
I wasnt supprized when on my return to 'El Dorado' for the 5th time to hear that theyve fixed my passport numbers but they'd managed to alter my arrival date.According to them a two month visa would begin on the 9th august(we want to go on the 9th June) and would end on the 8th of August giving us the grand total of minus one day and allowing us to leave the day before we arrive.Confused!Well so are they.
That was the final nail in our coffin of faith.
''come back on Monday,talk to the agency'' our man at the agency said once again.
''no thanks,just give me the month''
To go back again for a sixth time to find my name spelt wrong or its a blue pen not a black pen today, definitely a no go.Had enough of my 20km round
trip on the bike ,cheers.
Annoyingly Tati got her 2 months no problem but times up for us here in China.Come monday we have nine days left on our visa extension so we'd rather have 700km more of China's Tian Shan instead of 1000km of western Kazak steppe.Still really gutted to miss out on any of our trip.Tried but failed to get this mess sorted out.End of the day ive been really unlucky.
Thought about the visa in Almaty for Krgystan then another Kazak visa for me in Bishkek but how long will it take and more importantly how much,we can ill afford more waiting in capital cities after more than two weeks each ,waiting in Hong Kong and here in Urumqi for visas to come our way.
Theres nothing for it ,we will take a train from Aralsk to Aktau,zig zagging our way across the steppe and take the plane to Baku.
We used Advan tour and would again as Elnora the lady who dealt with our visa invites did all she could to sort things out but she like us was at the mercy of imbeciles who can neither spell or count.Wasted alot of time ,hasstle and money on this,at least we get back one lot of 110 dollars for this invite.
Dear traveller,of course I was unlucky but remember just because they provide visas for your visit,approach with an open mind,cross thou fingers and pray the monkey is on holiday.
Two and a half weeks in Urumqi waiting for this bloody visa were spent well.Its a great city regardless of what you may of read about it being ugly.Theres great food at the night markets , a couple of good parks, a fantastic museum but the best part is the Uyghur area.So different from the rest of town,you ARE in another country.Lots of mosques,markets,food stalls ,carpets and people and unfortunatly police and military.What! Incase someone undercooks a kebab or sells a rug with a loose thread.Yeah, thats how to solve all the problems,police the minority.
Lets not go there.Two weeks of waiting, internet,bike repair(will my new rack last more than 5 minutes)so many bike shops here but no really decent strong bike racks.Weve wandered all around the city.Its worth a visit and the Xinjiang hotel at the south end of Changjiang was a good cheapie to stay at,theres even english movies on channel 43.Now there a good tip.
I hope my passports ready tomorrow.Its time to go.
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