Life has been pretty hectic this whole month. I have been travelling all over the country.
In India, we have a tradition wherein we are supposed to visit all our elders and take their blessings, before embarking on a new journey.
Therefore, before I leave for IESE, I am supposed to meet up with all my family members.
I have nothing against it and I really do love meeting up with my family, but having them scattered to the two ends of our country does not make things easy :) .
Also, I am a spoilt Bangalorean, I just can not tolerate extreme temperatures :)
Going to Delhi in the peak of Summer is something that I really was not looking forward to.
I did not have much choice here though. I had to go to Delhi to finish off with my visa formalities. Therefore, I decided to club my family visit as well.
I took a week long vacation and managed to go to Amritsar and Delhi. It was a lot of fun. Amritsar is heaven for a food addict like me. I must have put on an inch more around my waist ;)
After getting back to Bangalore, I again took a day off and drove down to visit my gandmom at Puttaparthi. Got to meet up with a couple of cousins as well.
Am again going this weekend to Hyderabad to meet up with my brother and then onwards to Delhi to (hopefully) pick up my visa.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Pointers for visa applicants
Just putting in the list of documents that I took and also some pointers to make your visa application process a bit relaxed :)
Documents to take:
Documents to take:
- Application form - Take 3 copies (only 2 are mentioned in the site). They are really not very bothered about the photograph as long as you face can be seen clearly... so, no need to get any special thing done.
- DD
- Admission letters from IESE
- Financial proof - Bank statements, loans etc.
- Police clearence certificate
- Medical certificate - They didnt ask anything about the tests done.
- Copy of passport - All pages with info need to be there..
- Travel insurance
The following documents are required, even though they are not explicitly mentioned in the website. Most of the rejections that we faced was because of not attaching these documents:
- 10th and 12th std marks cards
- Degree certificate along with the mark statements.
- Last 3 yrs IT returns.
- Copy of PAN card
I even gave a letter from my employer stating that I have been workin with them since dd-mm-yyy and also gives the breakup of my annual salary.
Tips to make your visa wait not that bad :)
- Carry something to eat. You get nothing there and its gonna be a long wait. There is a person whoz selling water. So, thats not a problem.
- Keep something to entertain you. Books, Music player... anything that will keep you occupied and make you not curse out loud :)
- Make sure you go real early. The later the you go, the more time you take, and the more you need to stand in Delhi heat.
- Try to go with someone you know. Its always better to have someone to talk to rather than standing their like a mute pig :)
- Carry your bedsheet/matress in case you wanna relax in the middle :)
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Embassy of (S)pain
It has been a long time since I wrote my last Blog. Apologies for that, but I have been still recuperating from the trip to Delhi.
I thought we were the lucky batch as we had to submit our applications at the IVS centre at Delhi and they would take care of everything else. However, I guess my luck ran out. All long term visa applicants had to go to Delhi and personally submit the document.
I had read a lot about the pain one goes through while applying for a visa at the Spanish embassy. I thought we were much better coz only the long term visa applicant were supposed to come to the embassy. I realized how wrong I was....
I reached the embassy at 8 in the morning. The embassy opens at 9 and i thought that reaching at 8 was more than enough...
I was shocked to see the number of people who had come. It was like a carnival. There were people who had got their own bed sheets and were sleeping on the pavement. apparently, they had been waiting at the embassy since midnight. I realized my mistake. I had come to the embassy on the day it had reopened after a week long holiday. So, the crowd was expected.
Well, I had no choice but to get in the line ( the very end). Luckily for me, I had a couple of IESE batchmates who were also in the same boat. So, I thought it would not be that bad.
Now, let me give some background on how the Spanish embassy works.
They have no reservation system. You can not book any appointment and you are supposed to come to the embassy during the embassy hours and just wait for your turn.
There is no token system in place either. So, you will have to wait in the queue till your number comes. In case you go out of the line, you can just pray that the person behind you is good enough to let you get back into your original place.
There are two kinds of people who come to the embassy (now that IVS takes care of the short term). One is the long term visa folks (includes students, migrants, people going on work permit etc) and the other are the people who come for enquiry. We long term folks are given the lowest priority. Hence, we are let in only after every enquiry candidate has finished.
There are a couple of security guards outside who try to maintain order (and fail miserably). There was this one guard who kept going around and counting the number of people left... and eveytime he counted... my number always remained the same :).
There was this other guard who tried to act tough. Everytime the line used to crawl a bit, he used to come and push everyone back. So, I stayed at the same position that I started from almost till the very end.
June is the wost month to visit Delhi. The heat is at its peak and is just unbearable. It was around 45 degrees average. Luckily for us, it was not very sunny. But we were still sweating like Pigs.
Finally, after 10 long hours in the line ( without any break), my number came at 6 PM.
When you go into the visa section, you realize why its taking so much time. There are only 2 window. One window is where they issue the visa at and the other window is the one where they are accepting the applications.
In other words, only one person takes the visa applications from everyone that wants to apply to Spain :o
Anyways, once I got in, it was over pretty quick. The person just scanned the documents, and asked me to come after a month for the final decision. He didn't even ask me a single question. I don't blame him though. He himself must be pretty tiered, working for 8 hrs straight.
It was such a great relief after getting out of the embassy. Even though it took 10 hrs, I'm sooo happy that I was done with it in the same day and didn't have to come the next day...
I'm sure IESE is worth all the pain that I have gone through.
Now I need to go there again on the 9th of July to get the final verdict. Lets hope that its not this painful :) .. Keeping my fingers crossed...
I thought we were the lucky batch as we had to submit our applications at the IVS centre at Delhi and they would take care of everything else. However, I guess my luck ran out. All long term visa applicants had to go to Delhi and personally submit the document.
I had read a lot about the pain one goes through while applying for a visa at the Spanish embassy. I thought we were much better coz only the long term visa applicant were supposed to come to the embassy. I realized how wrong I was....
I reached the embassy at 8 in the morning. The embassy opens at 9 and i thought that reaching at 8 was more than enough...
I was shocked to see the number of people who had come. It was like a carnival. There were people who had got their own bed sheets and were sleeping on the pavement. apparently, they had been waiting at the embassy since midnight. I realized my mistake. I had come to the embassy on the day it had reopened after a week long holiday. So, the crowd was expected.
Well, I had no choice but to get in the line ( the very end). Luckily for me, I had a couple of IESE batchmates who were also in the same boat. So, I thought it would not be that bad.
Now, let me give some background on how the Spanish embassy works.
They have no reservation system. You can not book any appointment and you are supposed to come to the embassy during the embassy hours and just wait for your turn.
There is no token system in place either. So, you will have to wait in the queue till your number comes. In case you go out of the line, you can just pray that the person behind you is good enough to let you get back into your original place.
There are two kinds of people who come to the embassy (now that IVS takes care of the short term). One is the long term visa folks (includes students, migrants, people going on work permit etc) and the other are the people who come for enquiry. We long term folks are given the lowest priority. Hence, we are let in only after every enquiry candidate has finished.
There are a couple of security guards outside who try to maintain order (and fail miserably). There was this one guard who kept going around and counting the number of people left... and eveytime he counted... my number always remained the same :).
There was this other guard who tried to act tough. Everytime the line used to crawl a bit, he used to come and push everyone back. So, I stayed at the same position that I started from almost till the very end.
June is the wost month to visit Delhi. The heat is at its peak and is just unbearable. It was around 45 degrees average. Luckily for us, it was not very sunny. But we were still sweating like Pigs.
Finally, after 10 long hours in the line ( without any break), my number came at 6 PM.
When you go into the visa section, you realize why its taking so much time. There are only 2 window. One window is where they issue the visa at and the other window is the one where they are accepting the applications.
In other words, only one person takes the visa applications from everyone that wants to apply to Spain :o
Anyways, once I got in, it was over pretty quick. The person just scanned the documents, and asked me to come after a month for the final decision. He didn't even ask me a single question. I don't blame him though. He himself must be pretty tiered, working for 8 hrs straight.
It was such a great relief after getting out of the embassy. Even though it took 10 hrs, I'm sooo happy that I was done with it in the same day and didn't have to come the next day...
I'm sure IESE is worth all the pain that I have gone through.
Now I need to go there again on the 9th of July to get the final verdict. Lets hope that its not this painful :) .. Keeping my fingers crossed...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)