I hate bureaucracy!

Despite the undisputed brilliance of German precision, I've come to realize that bureaucracy is universally senseless and inefficient. Today I wasted a good 2 and a half hours of my time traveling to Bergheim to try to get my visa renewed, again, and came home with nothing. My last visa actually expired at the end of March, and in the middle of March I had started to get the ball rolling so that the renewal went quickly and smoothly. It didn't, however, because I realized it was a stupid waste of 60 Euro to renew my visa for 3 months as a language student when I could still potentially get accepted to the university and thereby receive a visa for a much longer period of time (and which would allow me to work a certain number of days in the year) for the same amount of money. So I waited. Then I received a letter from the immigrations office informing me that I had 2 weeks to renew my visa before I was reported to the authorities and would be deported. Once I got word of my acceptance I started trying to take care of my visa again. It has been nothing but a hassle for the past month. I took all of the stuff that I was told I needed to Frechen, where I was supposed to drop it off to have it sent to Bergheim to be finalized. Then I tried to make an appointment with Frau Scheer in Bergheim, who handles my visa stuff, but I couldn't because she was on vacation. So I sent her an email requesting an appointment. A few days later, I received another letter from her office telling me to take the enclosed application and my passport to Frechen to hand them over. They would then be delivered to Frau Scheer. So I did that. A week ago. The day after I handed over my passport I got another letter from Frau Scheer to tell me we had an appointment for today at 9:30 am and to please fill out this application and bring it, along with my passport. So, her office never told her that they told me to give everything to Frechen. No big deal. I figured I would just go to the appointment, she would already have my stuff, and we could get it over with. Wrong. The first thing she did was ask me for the application and my passport. When I told her I gave them to the office in Frechen last week, she informed me that it takes longer than that for documents to be delivered from the office in Frechen to her in Bergheim. That's funny, because I traveled by bus between Frechen and Bergheim within half an hour. Why does that take more than a week? So, in the end, I went home with nothing. She has to wait for everything to arrive from Frechen, then she will finish it and send it back, then I have to wait until I get the letter from Frechen, and then I can go pick up my passport with the new visa. Rad. In the meantime, I still can't make an appointment to take my driver's test because I don't have a valid visa and therefore am not legally in the country and therefore cannot obtain a driver's license. What a pain in the ass.

Oh, and because I'm an idiot, it actually took about 3 and half hours total today. The chain popped off of my bike on the way to the bus stop this morning, so I had to quickly switch with Olaf's bike and try again. The bus comes at 8:40 am, which is exactly the time that I got there, so I hopped on the bus and away I went. But it wasn't 8:40 am, it was 8:42 am, and I was on the wrong bus. I got to Brauweiler, got off, waited 5 minutes to take the bus back to Königsdorf, and then had to wait until 9:40 to catch the next bus to Bergheim. All in all it was a good day.

As far as the bike goes, I'm ready to take a sledgehammer to it. Last week the chain popped off 4 times in one day, and I only took it to the train station and back. I missed 2 trains because of it and was late to my Latin lecture that morning. I took the bike apart on the weekend and tried to fix it, and it seemed like everything was ok. When the bike is flipped over in the seat/handlebars and the tires in the air, everything works fine. As soon as I flip it back over and try to ride it, I get about 10 feet and the damned thing comes off again. I'm going to have to take it to get repaired on Wednesday.

Aside from that, it's pretty much been business as usual. On Saturday I went over to babysit Zeynep and Elif for the afternoon/evening. I love going over there to take care of them. Elif is just too freaking cute! Unfortunately Zeynep had been sick and threw up the night before, but she wasn't feeling too bad. We just took it easy anyway and watched videos and played in the house all day. We also took Amelie for a little walk in the afternoon after Elif's nap because the family was in Münster for Günther's birthday. Because they were staying the night, though, there was no room for me and Amelie, so we stayed at home. I was watching over the 2 girls for a total of 8 hours on Saturday. Last weekend I did a little babysitting, too, for 2 little boys that live down the street. I've met them before, but never babysat for them. At first I had no desire to go over there because I was tired and wanted to relax, but I ended up having a lot of fun. The oldest of the two, Markus, is 6, and Viktor is 3. They're both very well behaved and polite and helpful. They wanted to watch a movie with me, but didn't have any that were in German (the parents are Swedish) so watched Toy Story 3 in Swedish. That was pretty interesting. Then we went to the playground and played soccer for a little bit until the parents came home. Markus was so sweet. When I got a call from his mom saying they were back, he asked me if I was going to leave right away, because he wanted me to stay longer. I would've stayed, too, but I had plans for the evening. It was really cute, though. I love the kids around here.