One Stop Steps Up

Rumors are flying around town about an imminent coup and everyone’s got their version of how things have come to this point, who’s behind it, what democracy means blah blah blah.





I can’t predict anything and would rather express my gratitude to the wonderful folks at the One Stop Service Centre for Visas and Work Permits. Yesterday several of them manifested the caring, helpfulness and goose bump-producing personality traits of the many ordinary Thais who don’t dress in political colors, follow rabblerousing leaders or overrun airports.



Shackled by insane regulations and archaic definitions of “work,” these low-level functionaries and bureaucrats come up with creative Thai-style solutions to seemingly intractable problems. (On Tuesday one sent me home to “reproduce” a document certifying I'd terminated with a company that technically hadn’t hired me in the first place so his paper trail would be complete and I could continue the visa process.) And one hour before closing time on Wednesday, three people conspired to jump me from 106 to 70 in a queue of applicants that shouldn’t have exceeded 100 anyhow.

I don’t know why so many women (and one awfully handsome guy) went far beyond their job descriptions to help me complete their arcane bureaucratic processes in a single day. Maybe like me, they too were worried about the rapidly deteriorating political situation at the airport and elsewhere in Bangkok. If the army had held a coup or declared martial law today, I’d have been trapped in Thailand with a visa that expired on December 2.

Perhaps it was my unusual Jennifer-esque self that provided them with comic relief from the standard business types and sycophantic agents they normally deal with. On my annual visa/work permit renewal visits I always treat staff like human beings instead of faceless minions. (After their superhuman efforts yesterday I ran around taking photos and blowing kisses!)


Maybe I should just accept my age and apply for a retirement visa. Spending one arduous day a year queuing in the Dickensian bowels of Bangkok’s main immigration office at Suan Plu sounds way easier than what I went through from Monday through yesterday to get a new journalist’s work permit and visa. (Renewing an existing work permit and visa is much easier than applying for a new one which you must do if you change your sponsor.)


But then I’d have missed another heartwarming opportunity to appreciate the innate Thai kindness that's expressed in small and meaningful gestures. Yesterday reminded me why I love it here despite the incomprehensible and terrifying machinations of political power brokers.