Visa Shmisha

I am on yet another visa run to Penang, Malaysia. There are many things that confuse me in this world but none so much at this particular point in time as how a Thai visa works. A month after my arrival, when my 30-day tourist visa was set to expire, I came down to Malaysia and applied for my non-Immigrant B, which would give me three months and make it legal for me to work in Thailand. It would also give me /the school/the ministry enough time to process my documents and get me my papers to apply for a work permit. This 3 month working visa was set to expire the first week in May, but I sped up the process when I went to Tioman Island on a whim- I must be honest and admit I have done little research or questioning about my visa, and I failed to get a re-entry stamp (and pay 1,000 baht?) on my way out of the country. So when I came back in, the customs official stamped a nice, big “USED” across my non-immigrant B visa in my passport, negating my status. Woops. So I became a tourist again, but since I flew into the country again, I had 30 days instead of only 15 to “tour” Thailand. The timing just never seemed right for me to go, because it would mean missing school. There were many days that we had off, but we had them off because they were holidays- holidays the Thai embassy down in Malaysia also observed, and therefore would be closed for.

Long story that I unfortunately must make longer is that I finally came down here two days after my tourist visa expired. My hope was that I could leave on Tuesday afternoon, arrive in Penang late that night, and then start the visa process Wednesday morning first thing, as it takes two working days. This would put me and my visa back on a bus to Nakhon late Thursday afternoon. I would get to Nakhon late Thursday night/early Friday morning, and then have only missed two days of school and would have been able to review for finals on Friday with my students.

 But, as with all things Thai, you can’t expect time to be on your side. My driver was new, and he got lost. Twice. So I got to Hat Yai to change busses forty-five minutes too late, and they wouldn’t take any more people across the border. So I had to stay the night in Hat Yai. Very unfamiliar, dingy, strange accomodations made for a pretty poor night’s sleep. Then, there weren’t enough people for the mini-bus in the morning, and our 8:30am departure time turned into 10:30. Which put me in Penang around 2:30pm, too late to start processing my visa that day.

So it’s Friday, and I am still here, chomping at the bit to leave, frustrated by the fact that there’s nothing I can do, cursing myself for not researching and looking into this whole visa issue better. I feel guilty that other teachers are covering my classes yet again. There’s a bakery down the street from my guesthouse that I will be stopping at to bring lovely goodies back for them. Bribery? Maybe. Thankfully, my finals aren’t scheduled until later in the week, so my students will have time to come to me and ask questions. I have been doing schoolwork and WASC work for a lot of the time, and I know that the next two weeks will be absolutely CRAZY- finals Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Thursday, we leave with the 7^th graders for a cruise to Malaysia (yay… I am pretty sure I’m coming right back here to Penang…) and come back on Saturday. Monday and Tuesday are the last days of the school year. Somehow, someway, I have to grade EVERYTHING and get final grades entered and submitted by Wednesday at the latest, and then Meaghan and I are off to Indonesia for a month, meeting up with three friends!! All I have to do is keep my eye on this prize…