in which bitterness is contemplated.

Mom tells me that a tiny smidge of bitterness came through in that last post. In my defense, you would be bitter too if you went through what I went through to get that freaking visa. I did try to subdue the anger, though.

But still it came through. I am shocked, shocked I tell you.

in which visas are, or are not, acquired.

Visa received, finally. I had to check it several times in order to convince myself that it was, in fact, there, and not just something that I had temporarily made appear by the force of my wishing.

Granted, I don't have much experience with the French, and bureaucracy is uniformly irritating, but my dealings with the French bureaucracy have surpassed any frustration I've ever had the displeasure of meeting. A word of advice, if you ever need to get a visa from the French consulate: do your research approximately six months in advance. You will probably need to take a several-hundred-dollar flight to a city that you may or may not have ever visited; then you will need to stay overnight in order to make it to your appointment (remember to schedule an appointment) between 9 and 12 in the morning, because you cannot possibly request that the people whose job it is to issue visas actually issue them more than fifteen hours a week. Read every page on the consulate's website, because essential documents that you will need for your application are listed in various unassociated locations; you'll think you've found everything, but trust me, you haven't. Bring everything you have that you think might be even tangentially relevant to your application, and bring them in originals and several copies. Do not call the consulate for anything. They will not answer questions about visas over the phone (this is an actual policy). They will tell you to email them for answers, but they will not reply. They will tell you that everything you need to know is on the website. It is not. There is nothing you can do about this, except maybe pray.

I made the mistake of calling the French consulate not once, but several times (and several consulates; trying to figure out where to apply, I talked to multiple people in the New York, Atlanta, and Houston consulates). The people who work in the consulates are not, shall we say, happy people. When you call them, don't be surprised if they don't like you. In fact, they hate you. There is nothing you can do about this either. You are a) American (probably), b) speaking English (unfortunately, speaking French doesn't help much, though I tried it), and c) asking them to do their jobs by helping you. And there is nothing a French bureaucrat hates more than being reminded that they are required by their job description to help you.

The difficulty of getting a French visa, my Parisian professor tells me, is in direct proportion to the difficulty of getting an American visa. I've never had to do this, clearly, but I did make an offhand comment on this subject to a Chinese friend and, normally quiet, he flipped. Getting an American visa is a royal pain. In response, the French (in a spirit of scrupulous fairness, I suspect) have made getting a French visa an equally painful experience. When I called a professor to ask her advice on my visa predicament (namely, that I was convinced I would not get one, and was on the verge of ditching the program), she calmed me down, offered alternative tactics to try, and, in conclusion, clucked her tongue and said, "You know, I don't mean to defend them, but when I was trying to get an American visa ..."

in which i am in connecticut.

I am not in Paris.

Yet.