Making our Visa (version Unsuccessful- I need a Letter from your school)

On a bright and sunny morning, we met up to apply for our visa to the Land where we are gonna spend our long one year in- Seoul, South Korea. We were quite excited initially as with the visa done, all our necessary admin work would have been done and we set to leave Singapore.

Our que number was 23. Our number was called within minutes after obtaining the que ticket.
"23" appeared on the screen. We walked calmly towards the counter while hiding our excitedness within us ;p

Below is our conversation with the lady: Strictly no Coincidences
Us: We want to make a D4 visa. (Passed her all our relevant documents)
Lady: I need a photocopy of your admission letter and a letter from your school
Us: We are not on exchange. (Gave her that can't you see the letter is directly from EWHA WOMEN UNIVERSITY look)
Lady: I still need a letter from your school.
Us: We have graduated.
Lady: I still need a letter from your school. You can go and take a proof to show that you are a student because you wrote your occupation as student.
Us (thinking): Don't write student write unemployed? But we just graduated. Haven't even get our certificate.
Lady: Something to prove that you are a student in that school.
Us (thinking): Maybe our transcript will help!!
Us: Can we make a 1 year visa?
Lady: No. Your letter of admission says you only qualify for a 3months visa.
Us (thinking): But Ewha advised us to make a 1 year visa. hmmm....kinda lost!!!

We left the embassy in search for a printer. We went to ask the security guard of that building where we could find a printer. He advised us to go to Novena Square.

We set off to Novena Square happily. Prior to that, we went into Newton Station's 7-11 Store to ask if we can print off some stuff from their printer. The staff in it kindly told us that we can go to United Square.

When we reach Square 2, we asked the information counter where we could find a shop with printing service. The shop opens only at 11am. We thought that it would be too late to wait till 11am. The embassy closes at 12pm!!!! We decided to explore Square 2 and Velocity. Why do Singapore shops open so late???!!! It was already 10.30am. So....we went to United Square. On our way, we saw a stationery and supplies shop. The shop does provide printing service, but we did not have our documents in a thumbdrive. We left the shop sadly:( But, we realised we have a SD Card, so we went in to ask if they can print from SD Card. "Yes, we do". Woah, our eyes sparkled IMMEDIATELY!! We went to the starbucks at Novena Square to tap on their wireless service. Time was ticking, internet was damn slow, unofficial transcrip not running properly, we were a little kan cheong. What to do, Singaporeans what.

Anyways, we went back to the shop with High Expectations and head straight back to the Embassy. This time round our que number was 50. We waited and waited and here's back to our conversation, this time with a guy and again, history repeated itself.

Us: We want to make a D4 visa. (again we passed all the relevant documents THINKING this time sure all OK)
Guy: I need a letter from your school.
Us: We are not on exchange.
Guy: I still need a letter from your school (this went on for about 5 mins with the main message of the conversation- the Letter)
Us (thinking): Seriously man, what letter are you talking about. There are all sorts of letter. We tried to probe up exactly what kind he needs since our transcript is not recognized.
Guy (asked Lady afterwhich he gave the Ahhh I got it look): Can you please ask your school to state that you have studied there from when to when. Also please come back with everything original the next time. Original letter, don't print from your school email. Original bank book. Okays, so much for Originality.

Conclusion:
WE GAVE UP (haha). We decided or rather we advised future applicants to come with all, i mean ALL the documents you have so that you can ask them "You want this? You want that?" Please don't forget to be ORIGINAL!!! and A letter from your school!!!

We were so pissed that we became SO hungry. We came to ION for lunch and here we were "complaining" on our newly set up The long One Year blog!!



We hope this first entry will not bored you to death from all the complains and wordy post.
We will try to make it more interesting in the future posts. Actually, just check out and compare our 2 conversations with the natives.

With much complains
Thatdaph and Shewenlor
Names are changed to protect identity**