“Hallo” Ich habe gesagt. “Ist alles in ordnung mit mein Visum?”

It’s snowing as if it were Christmas, and tomorrow is the day I drive back to Bonn to collect the Kazakhstan visa. To save myself an hour’s drive in what can only be described as blizzard conditions, I thought it sensible to ring the Consulate (or Konsulat auf Deutsch – makes all the difference) and check that the journey would be worth while.

Obviously I have to do the journey whatever (unless I want to leave the passports languishing in a draw on this tiny piece of Kazakh soil in Germany), but if I needed something else, or if they wanted to actually interview us (which the Consulate website does say they have a right to do before granting our visas) then I didn’t really want a wasted journey. Besides, I am taking time off work for this which means forfeiting time that could be spent shopping/drinking/eating with friends which is normally what I do on mornings off.

The Consulate lady told me that I could collect my passport tomorrow. “So, alles in ordnung mit dem Visum?” I asked again, in a somewhat higher key and slightly louder voice; like that would make me more understandable – a native English speaker speaking to a native Russian speaker in German on the telephone was never going to be easy, and whatever made me think that volume would have an affect on my ability to be understood I don’t know.

She didn’t actually say to me I had the visa; just that I could collect the passports. Thinking about it, I’m also hoping I can collect them both without Nige being there. Well, I’ll find out tomorrow.