Tajikistan's National Motto: "You Wait!"

Not one for having much of it, patience is something that I have had to acquire ever since arriving in Tajikistan. From the 9.5 hours I waited to be sprung from airport immigration, to waiting to get my 2 week visa extended and waiting for another permit to visit the region where Anne is currently living, I have done quite a bit of sitting on my butt.

"Here in Tajikistan, you wait!" says Manucher my Tajik-born friend. Having experienced the waiting game over the past couple of weeks I wholeheartedly agree. Back on September 29th we stood outside the local registration office, frustrated as we waited to get Manucher's wife and I registered with the local police. We both hold foreign passports and foreigners must register with the police within 48 hours of arriving in Tajikistan. It would make perfect sense to have it done at the airport upon arrival at the same time one gets their visa, but that would be too easy. Instead we had to trek to some local office in town to get this done ourselves.

Normal tourists can get this registration competed by the hotel they are staying in, and people working or volunteering for an NGO can get it done easily by the host organization. But because I came on my own without help from an organization and because I am staying with friends I got to experience Tajikistan's bureaucratic maze firsthand.

After much confusion and discussion with various office staff we submitted our passports along with a 105 somoni fee and a requested additional "handling fee" (bribe) of 20 somoni each (a combined $36US per person) so that we could get out passports back the next day. In the end they provided us with a little piece of paper stapled to our passports that basically mirrored the information on our visas. Money well spent!

Having had my fill of navigating Tajikistan's bureaucracy on my own I decided to enlist the help of Anne's host organization, the Aga Khan Foundation, to help me get my 2 week visa extended for another month. Organizations such as AKF have full time staff and logisticians dedicated to dealing with such government bureaucracy so I was glad they agreed to help.

As well, in order to visit Anne, who is currently working in the south-east region of Tajikistan called Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast (GBAO), I needed to obtain a separate permit. But of course in order to get this permit I needed to get my visa renewed first. Requests for both have been submitted and the waiting begins again for the efficient Tajikistan government bureaucracy springs into action.

The bureaucracy is something to behold, even for a Canadian! All this waiting rivals the time I went to the Passport Office in Vancouver at 3:30am on a wet and cold morning in May to line up just so that I could make it into the office to get my passport renewed. I feel like I'm home!