When Bureaucracy Works

My visa arrived today!!!!  A hearty thanks to the Ghanaian consulate in DC for completing this mysterious transaction in a timely and officious manner.  It's a bit unsettling to send one's passport off with a $100 cashier's check (granted, in a trackable envelope) with a second trackable envelope enclosed, hoping to the gods of bureaucracy that you are correctly following the detailed instructions and the whole thing gets there safely and returned to you.  Well, by virtue of the trackable envelope, I knew it arrived safely, but I didn't hear anything else.  I was just starting to fret yesterday and today, and then as I left the house this afternoon to head downtown, up rolls the FedEx truck.  Hooray!  I wouldn't say bureaucracy is a beautiful thing when it works, but it is gratifying, and you feel like maybe you pulled one over on the whole Murphy's Law-ness of these types of things.

Since I seem to be keeping a running to-do list here, this is where we are:

*decide on anti-malarial and call ARC for prescription
*pay program balance
*get travel/health insurance
*get TDap vaccination at doctor
*figure out my work absences
*hope my visa and passport are returned to me

That's what I call some progress!