They are both good and bad aspects to the culture that are particularly ingenious, intriguing, and at times downright frustrating. But hey thats all part of the fun.
Bureaucracy - The word is French, and it is everywhere. 25% of the population of France work in the public service. Their job is to make sure that the other 75% of the population, keep in line, fill out their mountains of paperwork correctly, and file this paperwork away never to be seen again. If one letter is even out of place, it is also their job to make sure that you fill out the paperwork again. This also does not take into account the millions of people who fill administrative jobs within the private sector, in order to do all of the above jobs and ensure the running of their own personal fiefdom.
This lists of duties for an administrative Frenchman or Frenchwoman however discounts the most important job of an administrative worker in France. Which is, the collection of passport sized photographs. I wish I could find on the internet a statistic on how many passport sized photographs are collected in France each year. My guess is it would be somewhere in the order of several hundred million. Oh how I wish I had shares in the company that own all of the photo booths located at all of the supermarkets and railway stations. Day after day, hundreds of thousands of people all over France, put their 5 euro note into one of these machines and sit down in front of the camera to pull a bland face, in order to satisfy the devilish photography requirement of some sort of menial administrative bureaucrat. I myself have been relatively lucky (i think) in that so far in my six months here, I have only had to hand over the relatively meager total of 7 passport sized photos for various purposes. A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to a fellow Australian who recently filled out some sort of complex application for something in France and required that she provide 14 passport sized photos. (Yes I said fourteen!)
But hey you would think that with so many people actually working in the public service that things get done really quickly with a minimum of fuss, right? I mean with all of that man power and a population of a mere 62 million, there should be no hold ups at all.
Oh how wrong you are my friend. You see in order to make sure that people actually have work to do, (or in reality have work to palm off onto colleagues or other department) meaningless paper work and rules have been created.
For instance, when I arrived here, I had to go to my local 'council chambers' to get the ball rolling to get my residency card. This involved rocking up, taking a number, waiting about an hour, and then showing a lady all of the paperwork I had while she told me exactly what I would need for my next appointment at the big main police centre slap bang in the middle of Paris. Then after about 5mins of this, she wrote my details, on a piece of paper.(which was the official booking sheet.) It already had about 20 people written on it who would be having meetings before me on the same date. Obviously the use of computers would make tasks just far too efficient. At the end of this little process I had been to a meeting, for the purpose of making an appointment for 7 weeks in the future.
After the 7 weeks, I arrived at the big police centre with all of my paperwork, unsure of the next step but hoping that this would be the end of my little process. I guess it was rather naive of me to think that everything would be done on this day and I would be walking out of there with a residency card. First of all a little geography lesson for the woman who made my appointment, Australia is in Oceania and not North Asia. This little geography problem cost me my spot at the head of queue for the day (my appointment was at 1st up at 8:30) and I had been given an appointment at the wrong office. So I had to go to another office, which I did, only problem was I had to go after the 20 or so people who already had appointments for the day.
After about two hours, my number was finally called and I went up to the little desk where the unfriendly bureaucrat processes person after person all day. After a few questions and an in depth eye over my paperwork, it was decided that my paperwork was inappropriate (as my bank statement was not written in French) so all of my copies of paperwork that passed muster were placed into a manilla folder, and I was given an appointment to come back in 4 weeks, (with the appropriate bank statement in French) and hopefully all would be well.
In the intervening time I arranged to open a bank account in France and thus everything was written in French and I was hoping that all would be well. So after 4 weeks, I went back and waited about an hour this time. (Already a little more positive) My number was once again called, and I nervously went to the desk and joined a gentleman this time. I sat there for about 20 minutes while he read some emails that were attached to the outside of my file. He then fingered through all of my paperwork again (even though it was already passed as ok last time) and barely spoke a word to me throughout the whole ordeal. (Which was not so bad, as I have a feeling my French would have been rather poor due to how hot and tired I was) Anyway, after about 20mins It appeared all was ok, however I would not be getting my card today, as I had one more step, which was to go to the mythical land of ANAEM, which is apparently where my 'Carte de Sejour' (residency card) will be living.
So I recieved another peice of paper, telling me that I would be having another appointment in about 4 weeks time at different place in Paris, and if all goes will I will get to leave with a couple of exciting presents.
So four weeks later (are you keeping track of time?) I was one of the 100 or so people who each day queue outside ANAEM in Paris waiting for them to open so they can go inside and argue with the French bureaucracy as to why their family should be allowed to join them in France after they have been denied. This office also serves as the place where strangers in white coats, get to measure your height and weight, ask you some questions about your health and you get to stand there with your shirt off while a strange Frenchman takes an x-ray of your chest.
Once they opened I got to sit in a little waiting room, just like at the doctors. My name was called after only 10 minutes! and I went inside and my height, weight (I had lost 11kg since I arrived here) and my eyes were checked. This was all passed easily, and then I was hearded into a room with a cold metal bench that somehow resembled solitary confinement. I was told to take off my shirt and shortly a man will open the door and ask me to step through so I could have an x-ray taken of my chest. (This is done to check for TB) After sitting on the cold bench with my shirt off I was called in, and an x-ray was taken. WOW, the most exciting thing was that afterwards, I was lucky enough to keep it. It hangs on my wall now as a reminder of how much fun this entire process had been. Well after the x-ray, I was told by another doctor, that I was fine, and I had no health problems (and no TB) and obviously I was a model French citizen, and that I would be allowed to stay.
So I then had the privilege of paying 300 euros, to finally be handed the much sort after "Carte de Sejour" after 15 weeks of fun, fun, fun. I walked out of ANAEM with a big smile on my face and a peice of plastic with my face on it (and a chest x-ray) The long complex and amusing process had finally come to an end and I was officially a resident of France. I celebrated with a crepe.
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