RHUM

I have a fear of blunt objects. Featuring prominently among these are ceiling fans, getting hit by a car door while riding my bike, and complicated bureaucracy. But especially complicated bureaucracy. At least if a rapidly-rotating ceiling fan somehow comes loose from its mounting and falls on you while you're sleeping, you have a chance of comprehending what just happened and what you have to do now.

Anyone intending to remain in the Czech Republic for any longer than 90 days is required by law to register with the foreign police, who, I was warned early on, do not speak a word of English. So complicated bureaucracy, only in Czech.

My situation was a bit more complicated again. It takes 60 days to process a student visa application for the Czech Republic (or often more – it kinda comes down to their discretion). You can't apply, however, without first receiving an acceptance letter from the university you'll be studying at, which I didn't receive until 50 days before I left Australia. Luckily, though, I have two passports. So I had to travel on my Canadian passport, which meant that it held my entry stamp, while my hard-won student visa was in my Australian passport. Also, you're supposed to register within three days of arrival but I had to wait for my Australian passport to arrive in the post. I wondered if they would let me decide which country I wanted to be deported to.

“I honestly don't know what they'll do,” Cyril, the student services guy who's takes care of the foreign students, said. “We've never had a similar case." He told me to just go, register, and then deal with it from there. "There is a possibility you may have to leave the Schengen zone and then enter it again so that you can get an entry stamp in the same passport with your visa. Maybe you can go to Croatia for a few days, spend a weekend by the sea.”

So at 6:30am on Tuesday morning I crested the hill over my Foreign Police branch in Chodov (they're allocated based on where you live). The building is exactly how you would expect an instrument of Eastern – sorry, Central – European bureaucracy to look: big and imposing, a block of prison-grey concrete standing separate from its surrounds in a desolate field in the middle of nowhere. Beginning at the still-bolted glass doors, a line of roughly 150 people doglegged down to the path and all the way to the road. The place didn't even open for another half-an-hour. I trudged down the hill and took my place at the end.

How do you say "Will I be deported?" in Czech? The Foreign Police Part 2