July 27th, 2009: We traveled four hours or so from Bloomington, Indiana to the Greek Consulate in Chicago down by the Loop. The drive was uneventful mostly, aside from the absolutely maddening rush hour gridlock up I-90 just north of Gary. Now, first I'd just like to add that I have never driven through Gary, but even off the interstate we felt like we were traveling through a warzone, a wasteland, a trauma ward. The dark and decaying downtown atmosphere was only matched by the overgrown landscape surrounding the rail line and the factories spewing chemicals into the air. Rust belt cities such as this one have no doubt made efforts towards urban renewal and restoration, but Gary seemed, at least from our vantage point, to be a few eons behind. Locals of Gary are free to contradict my (Rob) perceptions of this town.
Approaching the downtown skyline, which in itself was beautiful to see, the traffic confirmed my mother's comments about why we never went to the City when we visited my grandparents in Elgin. You just never went down there unless by rail. I assume plenty of folks have driven in Chicago or any large metropolitan area, so I'll spare you the commentary!
Ok, so we reached the consulate, one block east of Michigan Ave. Nice location with a convenient parking garage complete with mini-Starbucks kiosk. What more could you ask for? The building was totally low-key, like a large house. Upon entering, the fact that we were leaving for Athens set in immediately, as evidenced by the half-dozen or so people speaking Greek on the phone and with customers.
The secretary was a rather large young Greek man, who between waving us through to a waiting room managed to converse with someone in Greek on his bluetooth, browse Italian motorcycles on Youtube and answer the desk phone.
After about 15 minutes a man asked us into a large side room to review our documents. Starting with Kate, he began listing the documents required and spoke quickly. Kate plopped her stuff down in a big stack and said, "Just take what you need." He rapidly shuffled through the documents, "Yes, yes, I need this and this and this...yes yes." At one point the phone rang. The person on the other line had some problem with the Consulate, something about a representative on vacation or work hours or whatever. For 15 minutes we sat and waited, and every so often our guy, reclined in his chair with his legs crossed, nonchalantly put his hand to the receiver and said, "So sorry."
Following that annoyance, he said to each of us, "Ok. fifty-two fifty. Give me." Cash only. Kate got her cash out and I did the same, but, idiot that I am, spent a buck fifty of my cash on a Diet Dr. Pepper earlier at a gas station in Crown Point. Swell. So we had to scramble for all the change to make up for it and noticed that the man was becoming increasingly impatient. I couldn't believe THAT, considering a few of the pennies we found to pay for the visa were holding up a leg of his desk. Kate, angel that SHE is, mocked me most of the trip thereafter,
"We almost didn't go to Greece, all because of your stupid Diet Dr. Pepper!"
In the end, we learned that the Consulate takes your passport (along with all your tax forms and bank statements. Security risk?), processes your visa application, and mails it back to your home address. Kate brought bubble wrap envelopes for just this reason, but the Consulate representative requested that we get USPS envelopes with tracking numbers, envelopes requiring a walk to the nearest post office at a cost of $17 each. Asked whether or not the envelopes Kate procured would be good enough, he offered his Hellenic opinion, "Well....eh, I generally have faith in the United States Postal Service...But, eh," throwing up his hands to say, "Just get out there and get me the envelopes."
The post office trip itself was hilarious, mostly because we thought we were going to witness a hate crime and beatdown all in one day. We stood in line behind a well-dressed, leathery, skinny white woman barking at a black female postal worker. The postal worker was probably double the customer's size, and remained calm and pleasant as this woman barked off some complaint about not being allowed to walk behind a counter or something. Apparently what triggered the postal worker to restrict this customer's access happened right before we entered. Anyway, the woman finally screamed, "Oh, you are just so rude and inconsiderate!!! I need to speak to your manager!!!" I thought the postal worker was going to smash her head in or choke her. I wanted to. But no, she handled it like a pro and merely dialed a number to the manager, ending the call by directing the frazzled crocodile-skin skeleton to a conference room door. To her complete surprise, the manager turned out to be a black woman the size of Lisa Leslie. Very satisfying for all those present to see. The door shut behind her and that was it. We felt that the $34 paid both for the envelopes and for the show.
We returned to the Consulate, turned over the envelopes, and left. A tasty lunch up the street at Gino's East followed, then a stroll along Michigan Ave. Mission Complete!
