Philly on a Friday

We woke up at 3 am. Got up at around 3:15 am. The boys were not getting up, they had gone to bed only 3.5 hours before the alarm went off. Dad was running around the house, he gets up at this time everyday to go to work. He is not used to getting up so early but it is a little bit easier for him. Dad kept pushing mom to hurry up and get going, and mom kept telling him to stop.

I get up and go to the bathroom to put on my clothes and my contacts. It's cold and the weather guy said that it was going to rain most of the day. Half awake i walk downstairs to have something quick for breakfast, otherwise i will fall asleep on the way to Philly.

When i get downstairs most of the family is there already, dad, the boys and Meche; Mom is still upstairs getting papers.

We get on the car at 4:05, and dad is yelling at everybody to hurry up. "We were supposed to leave at 4:00!!" My dad is very careful with details like this, but maybe i should tell him that the clock in my car is fast with about 15 minutes.... maybe not, he will yell at me and it's too early for me to pay attention.

We drive to Philly and there is almost nobody on the road, i mean it is 4 in the morning. Only mushroom pickers and truck drivers.

We got there at 5:30 in the morning. The door that we were trying to get in from was closed, the lights inside were turned on, then my dad looked in and saw people inside. We walked around the building to try to go in through the door and get in that line. I can not belive it, it's 5:30 in the morning and there is people there already.

We arrive and there is at lest 30 people in front of us, i can not believe we have to wait for 3 more hours until they open... and 4 before they open the shops.

People fight to stay on the line to get a "ficha" they are soo rude. While the women wait standing on line, the men sit down and drink coffee, just like my dad is doing.

At 8:00, half an hour later than they were supposed to, the people from the consulate open the doors and start giving out "fichas" just applications with numbers. We get # 7-11.

We, well I, hurry up to fill out the application, and go outside to make the copies. Then go back in the office to get the application in, pay for it and wait. We were done with the whole process by 11:30, starving and tired. The man only gave me a little bit of trouble when i didn't hand him everything that he needed at the second that he asked for it, he made me mad, but he is just a jerk and i do not plan on wasting my energy on him, i had been up since 3.

We had lunch at the new Mexican restaurant in the mall, it refreshing to see that somebody has finally opened a taqueria next to the Mexican consulate. I took the monkeys to the mall that was only 4 blocks away; it was raining, but i know that they will rather go out in the rain that stay one more minute at that place. We came back at around 2:30, couple of years ago they called our name while we were in the store. We wait and we wait, it's 3:00 pm and rumors are that the passports will not be done until 4:00. At 4:30 rumors are now that they won't be done until 6....

At 5:45 the passports are ready and we head out the door 12 hours after we arrived.