So, today was gonna be the day of the BP Lunch, with the DD and BP guys at the Portuguese Embassy (AKA Dias Tavern)! 🙂 But first, I had to get my Visa Application in. So, I arrived at town, just on 08h and met the Old Man at Baby G’s in Thibault Square. He arrived a bit late, and we had a good enough breakfast. I arrived in the queue – there was already one other guy there – at 08h50, and as I looked around, I noticed the guy had is flight details in his hand. Bugger! I had left my flight details in my car downstairs after having printed them out the night before. I quickly gapped it down to the parking lot, and returned less than 3 minutes later to discover a 6 deep queue at the door. Man, talk about bummed! I did however manage to get through the door as number 4, which was great, as the other 2 people stepped behind me. Hey, their loss, not mine! 🙂

So, the interesting thing about the Angolan Embassy is that after you arrive at 09h, and take a seat and wait to be served, you notice all the staff arriving around 09h15. They saunter in not rushed at all, but they do greet all the people already waiting, and are all very polite to you.

So, I finally got called up, and after handing my documents over, DD was pretty jacked on this matter, I discovered that the processing period for new applications was 8 WORKING days, not just 8 days. The lady promptly told me I could and collect my passport on Monday the 18th. Hmmmm, this posed a bit of a problem as I was due to fly out on Sunday the 17th. So, I had to do some pretty good sweet-talking and get the buy in from the lady at the desk that I was new and that as being my first time I had misinterpreted it to mean 8 days, NOT 8 working days. Well, she consulted with 2 others, one even behind the closed door, and sorted my out. Really funny actually as I have been told by guys in the know that it only takes 1 day to get done. Government Departments and Red-Tape once again seem the same the world over!! After completing the forms that you can only get in the embassy, I was good to go, and left.

So, from there I shot back to DD for a meeting with Chris, which I was late for, care of the Angolans – it starts already it appears – and then at around 12h I managed to wangle my new laptop out of DD Stores! Sweet. HP/Compaq 6710b, extended battery, optical mouse, Kensington lock, and laptop bag, running XP SP2, so thank goodness for that. Not too keen on Vista at this stage to be honest. Bummed it doesn’t have a built-in webcam though!! Pity, as that would have been cool to chat to the folks back home with! 🙁 Maybe I can make a plan moving forward! 🙂

I made the 12h30 lunch on time, and this is where the day went pear. I was introduced to the BP contacts, and we ordered “the usual”: trinchados, sardines, livers, tenticles, bread rolls, chips – NOT chip rolls, and a few  other things that I didn’t really now the names for, but it was all good. Well, a good few HOURS later, we rolled out of there around 19h30. Yes, that IS 7 hours! As I said it was ALL GOOD!!! 😉

The night finished off with me heading through to Oblivion to meet Dave and Ilse, and I got home around midnight, considerably worse for wear!

Click.

Nunnsby

Easy going Guy 😉