Run Around Monday

Monday was the day Leve was going to help us do all the in-between stuff that we have been needing to do.

First, since we mainly only buy groceries for two days worth of eating, it was time to go to the grocery store. It's always nice to see the different Actions (sales) that go on through out the week. Sometimes it's totally random, and sometimes it's because they are in season. Migros doesn't just have Actions because the first expiration (needs to be sold by date) is nearing. This comes in handy a lot. The more I look at the prices, the more I realize how cheap food really is in the States. Meat in Switzerland is ridiculously priced. Ground beef was the biggest shocker because in the US you can usually get ground beef very cheap. Brett wanted to see how much some ground beef was because it was on Action.... ready for this? $11.00 a pound! And that was on sale. It was just insane. So, we passed over that quickly. We got some bananas, lettuce, tomatoes, bread and some cheese. We also found some mustard, but not in a tube. Most of their condiments don't come in jars, but in tubes... like toothpaste. It's bizarre at first, but the concept makes sense... you can get everything out of the tube a lot easier compared to trying to get everything out of the bottom of a glass jar.

Next, we had to go register Brett in the city of Kriens. Even though we are still in the Canton of Luzern, we are no longer considered in the downtown city anymore, therefore, he must re-register. This was pretty confusing, because the address Brett registered in the city of Luzern with was the address of the hostel. You would think that they would understand that this was only temporary. Nope. We had to pay 35chf to register in Luzern, and now pay another 35chf to register in Kriens... Mind you that the first time Brett registered was about 3 days ago. It's pretty frustrating. Good thing we had Leve, because he knew exactly where the Kriens office was. Since where we live now is a bit outside downtown, less and less people speak English. So, it was a good thing Leve was there, because the people at this office didn't speak English. Leve was nice enough to be Brett's translator.

The reason why Monday was so crazy was because it seems like the offices within the country don't share a computer network. When Brett went to register with the city of Luzern, we had to bring in all this stuff saying that he was going to be studying at the school in Luzern, proof that his visa was in process and various other bits of information. Well, when we showed up to the Kriens office at first, we thought all they had to do was change the address. Well no, that would be too easy. He had to have all the paperwork with him again, this office had to make their own copies of it, and so on. So, before all was finalized, we had to go back to the apartment, pick up the paperwork, back to office, show them everything, prove that he was going to be a student, then pay. In the meantime, Leve had shown them his visa, which didn't have his new address on it, in which case, they made him do the same stuff to get it changed.

Leve has said time and time again, in Switzerland, you have to pay for everything. You have to pay to change your address, you have to pay the office of the city, and you have to pay the post office... two separate fees just because you moved. You have to pay for the garbage bags that you have in your garbage because those are the only ones that will be picked up by the garbage trucks. They are about 3-4chf each.

By the time this was all figured out, we had a moment to stop home and check our email. Brett got an email from the hostel saying he had received a letter in the mail and that he needed to go pick it up. Knowing that this was something about his visa, we wanted to go pick it up right away. The reason why it got mailed to the hostel is because that's the address he signed up with the Migration office in Luzern. Since we were changing the address today, it still wouldn't take affect for a few days. Good thing we got that email!

We took a 20 minute bus ride into Luzern, walked to the hostel and the letter. It essentially was a bill for his student visa. We took this as a good sign, because usually when they bill you for something, it means it's happening. He had his meeting with Migration set for Tuesday Sept. 13th, where they would take his picture and finger print him and then his student ID would be mailed. We brought the letter home to show Leve so he could make sure Brett understood the letter correctly; the letter was in German.

Now all we had to do was wait for the 13th. He needed his ID, because his registration with the city of Kriens wasn't completely official until Brett went back in there again and showed him his student ID. The constant back and forth, back and forth becomes a little annoying after a while. After a full day of that, we pretty much were done. We spent the rest of the day hanging out with Leve back home, eating dinner together and relaxing. At least today, Brett's student visa had progressed a bit and we finally have a new address at our new flat. Successful Monday.