Its been almost a year since I first landed in France and each time any encounter with the "FRENCH ADMINISTRATION" has left me (and many others I know) flabbergasted. As I elucidate my experiences it shall be lucid to one and all why the French Administration is one of the biggest conundrums in the universe yet to be fathomed by man!!!
First encounter with the French administration upon arrival - Need to sign a rental contract for residence and open a French bank account. You see, in France, in order to obtain a rental contract one needs a bank account in that country and in order to have a bank account in that country one needs a residence in that country. I could not prove my rental contract until i got my bank account and I couldn't get a bank account until I got a rental contract. This I called the "Hen or the Egg first" conundrum. It was then I realised where and how the famous "Devil wears Prada" originated from.
My second encounter was when I had to apply for the so called "Housing Aid" the french government benevolently provides to the students here. Its not an "AID" trust me. Its a quagmire you will never get out of. They ask you all the possible documents one could ever have ( or not have). Then after an era of finally managing to acquire these documents and submitting them, they tell you that its no point anymore because they have closed your request. So you decide to give it up and go on with your life, secretly relieved of finally being able to get out of that morass. But just when you think that you have escaped the blackhole you get drawn into the system again by the requests for more documents in order to reactivate your request. But you ignore them for sometime until the frequency of the letters increase furthermore because they really want to give you the money you do not wish to take any longer. So after almost a year of sending your request you still are sending documents which you have submitted a zillion times before and they keep on sending you requests for the same documents over and over again. I think if I keep on sending more documents I will break-even the cost of all the stamps, photocopies, print-outs and envelopes I had sent them (if they ever give me the money.)
My third encounter was when I had to change my address on my residence card (as told by the prefecture) after I moved to another place for my internship. I had to submit a plethora of documents again (nothing extraordinary anymore, but even my birth certificate, god knows why!) to the new prefecture. And after waiting for 5 months to receive a reply when I visited them again asking what happened to my request, they nonchalantly replied that it was unnecessary! When I told them that the previous prefecture told me to, they shrugged and said they cannot change it. It seemed like a sinister mind was playing tricks with you for its own amusement.
My fourth encounter is (present tense because I am still struggling with it) when I applied for my residence card again for the second year and they wanted me to get the job contract for the same. But the people in my office say that they cannot give me a job contract till I have the residence card!!! So here I go again!! In another wild goose chase, running to the prefecture every other day where every time someone hands me a different set of documents they require from me and each time i ask my company for it they say that they can give it to me only after the residence card is issued!!!
Being from India I thought our administrative system was as bad as it could get but the French have definitely changed my opinion on that if not anything else. So here I am bracing myself for another long crusade and I ask "Mais encore?"
First encounter with the French administration upon arrival - Need to sign a rental contract for residence and open a French bank account. You see, in France, in order to obtain a rental contract one needs a bank account in that country and in order to have a bank account in that country one needs a residence in that country. I could not prove my rental contract until i got my bank account and I couldn't get a bank account until I got a rental contract. This I called the "Hen or the Egg first" conundrum. It was then I realised where and how the famous "Devil wears Prada" originated from.
My second encounter was when I had to apply for the so called "Housing Aid" the french government benevolently provides to the students here. Its not an "AID" trust me. Its a quagmire you will never get out of. They ask you all the possible documents one could ever have ( or not have). Then after an era of finally managing to acquire these documents and submitting them, they tell you that its no point anymore because they have closed your request. So you decide to give it up and go on with your life, secretly relieved of finally being able to get out of that morass. But just when you think that you have escaped the blackhole you get drawn into the system again by the requests for more documents in order to reactivate your request. But you ignore them for sometime until the frequency of the letters increase furthermore because they really want to give you the money you do not wish to take any longer. So after almost a year of sending your request you still are sending documents which you have submitted a zillion times before and they keep on sending you requests for the same documents over and over again. I think if I keep on sending more documents I will break-even the cost of all the stamps, photocopies, print-outs and envelopes I had sent them (if they ever give me the money.)
My third encounter was when I had to change my address on my residence card (as told by the prefecture) after I moved to another place for my internship. I had to submit a plethora of documents again (nothing extraordinary anymore, but even my birth certificate, god knows why!) to the new prefecture. And after waiting for 5 months to receive a reply when I visited them again asking what happened to my request, they nonchalantly replied that it was unnecessary! When I told them that the previous prefecture told me to, they shrugged and said they cannot change it. It seemed like a sinister mind was playing tricks with you for its own amusement.
Being from India I thought our administrative system was as bad as it could get but the French have definitely changed my opinion on that if not anything else. So here I am bracing myself for another long crusade and I ask "Mais encore?"
so how did you get out of the "hen or egg" situation anyways?
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