Biometric Big-Brother Bullshit in Bolivia (BBBB)

2 weeks ago I had an argument with the Mrs. Not even an argument,  a heated discussion in my office, probably about money (I’m a Jew, I mostly talk / think / argue about money). Anyway, 20 minutes later, I tried calling the Mrs. To say the final word in every argument (“I’m sorry babe, you were right”) when my cell phone gave me a very interesting message:

“Your phone line has been blocked due to irregularities concerning Decreto Supremo something-or-other” to which I replied (to a recorded message) “what the fuck?!?!?”

*** Decreto Supremo or Supreme Decree isn´t a chicken Burrito like it sounds but a type of Governmental law decreed by the president himself (the difference being, a Law requires the approval of the Senate, while a decree doesn’t)***

Back to the story, so after cursing at the recorded message, the phone, the phone company, the room, the town, this country, this continent, the world… I smoked a cigarette or twenty and called the ENTEL (my cellphone service provider) costumer service:

After 5 minutes of waiting and listening to bad jingles (why is there never any good music while you´re on hold) I finally get a human response:

Entel -“Entel Costumer Service, Good Afternoon, this is Dumbfuck, how can I help you?”

Me - “hi, it seems my phone line´s been blocked?”

DF (his name was probably Juan or Carlos, but for obvious resaons he shall be known as Dumbfuck for the rest of this text) – “there must be some kind of error in your registered details sir, let me verify them.” He then asked me for my full name / address / Phone number / ID Number / lucky number / EMI Number (serial code for your phone) / my Birth date / my pet´s name and a bunch of other silly questions and found no irregularities in my registration. “i´m sorry sir, I don´t see any problems with your registration in our computer, must be a mistake on our part, tell you what, in exactly an hour, turn your phone off for 3 minutes, then turn it back on and it shall work just fine” the reason he said “exactly one hour” wasn´t some sophisticated science, it was just the sad fact that the Technicians all left for lunch 20 seconds before.

Me – “Thank you very much” (just because he´s a dumbfuck working for dumber fucks   doesn´t mean I shouldn´t be polite)

An hour and 3 minutes later I turn my phone on, try call the Mrs. and get the same message:

“Your phone line has been blocked due to irregularities concerning Decreto Supremo something-or-other” to which I replied again “what the fuckin fuck fuckers?!?!?”

Once again, I call the costumer service:

 Entel -“Entel Costumer Service, Good Afternoon, this is StupidBitch, how can I help you?” (I guess DumbFuck went out for lunch)

Me - “hi, I spoke to DumbFuck an hour Ago, there seems to be a problem with my line, I´m getting a message about some decreto ?!?”

StupidBitch – “Sir, did you vote in the last Elections?”

Me – “No, if you look at my registered details, you´ll notice I’m a foreign resident in Bolivia, which I means I don´t have the right to vote in the presidential elections, and I was out of the country during the last municipal elections”

SB – “in that case there must be a problem with your registered data on our computer”

Me- “as I´ve already told you, and Dumbfuck an hour ago, my data all coincides with data on your computer”

SB – “Let me ask you a few questions” once again we go through all the details DumbFuck asked me an hour ago, which surprise surprise, all match the data on their computer. “Sir, I am gonna to have to ask you to pass by our Multicenter to verify this personally, since your problem can´t be solved over the phone”

Me – “there´s only one problem, I live in Rurrenabaque, your center is in La Paz, that´s 410 Km away, it takes my 18 hours on a bus to get there or 1000 pesos for a flight, plus losing at least 3 days of work, I work 2 jobs so I can´t really miss all that just to come and tell you personally my fuckin phone doesn´t work cos you cut my line off for no apparent reason”

SB – “I understand, let me see what I can do” (5 more minutes of annoying music) “Good news sir, we have another multicenter near your town, it´s in Trinidad, the  capital of your Region”

Me – “Yes, while Trinidad is the Capital of the Beni department of which I am a proud resident, it´s 355 kms away, but since it´s mostly swamp land it takes 26 hours to travel by bus or 1200 pesos to fly, so you can see how that´s not REALLY helpful…”

SB – “oh, I understand, let me see what I can do” (5 more minutes of what I can only assume was annoying music because I was busy banging the phone and my head on my desk) “Ok, how about this, we have another multicenter in the Beni, it´s in Riberalta, please present yourself there in the next 72 hours so we don´t have to disconnect your phone premanently”

Me – “listen dear, i´ll talk slowly so your Oxygen-deprived brain in La Paz can understand me, Riberalta is 490 kms away from Rurre-Fuckin–nabaque, it takes 36 hours on a bus, and once again, I already gave you all my details and you and Dumbfuck an hour ago both said they´re correct, now is there anyone in the building with a 2 digit IQ that can explain why the fuck you´ve decided to cut off my phone line on a random Friday afternoon?!?!?”

SB passes me to her supervisor who shall be referred to as SETREAHIR (Smart Enough To
Realize Everybody Around Her Is Retarded) – “Good afternoon, Mr. Agmon, how can I help you?” (Rule no. 1 while dealing with annoyed costumers or armed kidnappers, repeat their name as often as you can, it calms them down)

Me -  “you´ll have to excuse me, but there´s nothing good about my afternoon anymore, i´ve spent the last 2 hours trying to figure out why you guys blocked my phone line”

SETREAHIR – “I´m sorry for the hassle, Mr. Agmon,, the thing is we can´t help you, your phone has been blocked by the ATT because you didn´t register for the last election.” ***Quick explanation, ATT (Autoridad de Fiscalización y Control de Social de Telecomunicaciones y Transportes) is a government entity controlling Transport and Telecomunications, mostly by blocking your phone if you didn´t register as a voter. There are other government entities in charge of blocking your bank account / electricity / or leaving the country if you haven´t voted***

Me- “but I don´t have the right to vote!!, i´m a foreign resident,?!?!”

SETREAHIR – “Yes, Mr. Agmon, I understand, trust me, during the last few weeks we´ve had dozens of callers with the same problem” (rule No. 2 while dealing with annoyed costumers or people standing on the roof of a building threatening to jump, make them feel they´re not alone)

Me - “And? The fact there´s dozens of people with blocked phone lines because they didn´t vote for an election they don’t have the right to vote in in the first place should probably teach you guys that it´s pointless to block their phone.”

SETREAHIR – “I´m truly sorry, Mr. Agmon, the president issued the Decreto Supremo something-or-other, giving the ATT control over cellphone providers, and the law says if you do not register as a voter you can lose your phoneline. Furthermore, you can´t buy a new phone or change Cellphone provider either.

Me – “ So what you´re basically saying is, the fuckin President HIMSELF, told the ATT who then told you to block my phone cos i´m a fuckin Gringo and don´t have the right to vote???”

SETREAHIR – “while, I can´t publicly agree with a few of the words you used to describe the state president, but, yes, you could say that. But if you just come by our Multicenter in the next 72 hours we´ll be able to fix your registry once you show a written letter explaining why you didn´t use your right to vote” (all these calls are recorded so she has to say that) unfortunately for her it didn´t save her from another round of proud Agmonian shouting and cursing and hanging up on her.

But at least know I have managed to find the culprit for the reason I still haven´t called the Mrs. To apologize for our silly fight in the morning.

Luckily, Bolivian bureaucracy (check the other blog entries) is niftily divided by 50% Stupid and 50% percent corrupt, so after paying the salesman at the cellphone shop down the street from my office 40 pesos he called his friend at the ATT the fixed my registry in 20 minutes.

Unfortunately, that´s still a short term solution since this country has more elections than showers every year. For example, this October, the people will be voting for their Judicial Authorities (Supreme Court Judges and such), which means once again my phone can be blocked or even worse, they can stop me from leaving the country in December when I go diving in Honduras.

So, with that in mind, I went yesterday to register myself in the new Bolivian Biometric Voters Registry.

After a very long half an hour of a Lazy Fat Fuck Government Oficial  (LFFGO) trying to work a Laptop computer and a camera at the same time, he managed to get press the ON button, and we moved on to dealing with:

LFFGO – “How come you only have one name?”

Me – “For fuck sake, not again, just read http://gili-agmon.blogspot.com/2010/09/dumbass-penis-bastard.html”

LFFGO – “your ID looks fake, why is the plastic cut like that?”

Me – “I didn´t plastify my ID, Immigration did. Why the fuck would I falsify a Bolivian Foreign Resident ID??, If anything, I´d fake a proper Citizen ID and that way I can vote in the elections so your dumbass cunt of a president won´t win again and block my phone for not voting for him in the 1^st place”

LFFGO – “Fair enough, sounds reasonable. OK, I need the following details: Level of education?”

ME – (I really wanted to say PHD) “High School Graduate” it´s ok, in this country 12 years of school basically makes you a Professor.

LFFGO – “Occupation?”

Me – (wanting to say Military, Ret.) “Employed” (lovely thing here, employed means any work that doesn´t involve a university title like Dr. or Enginner, basically anything from garbage picker to the current president).

And, half an hour / 10 fingerprints / 7 signatures later, I have it, i´m registered in the Biometric Voters Registry, too bad I can´t vote, but I have this little piece of paper I have to carry with me every time I go to the bank or pay my bills or get my phone blocked…

Dumbass Penis Bastard

***YOU SHOULD READ "The Bald Red Headed Eagle" FIRST ***

May 2005

So, I’ve decided to stay in Bolivia and work, and i need a working visa to stay in the country for more than 90 days.

I’ve got all the certificates, already bribed 3 cops, a lawyer and a doctor (gotta love 3^rd world countries), and now only have 1 more thing to do, deal with Immigrations in La Paz.

Immigrations is like going to the dentist, nothing good ever comes from it... you need it, they might help, but it ain’t fun...

Beaurocracy is Satan’s middle name. It’s the 5^th rider of the Apocalypse. It’s Lucy Liu with Vagina Dentata (my worst nightmare), or Angelina Jolie with Komodo-Dragon Saliva (it´s melts the meat it touches)...

But, being a brave warrior, I challenged Beaurocracy to a duel...

First, I had to fill some papers... usually an easy enough task (god bless the Israeli school system for teaching me you get points for writing your name on top of the page...it’s the only thing they taught...)

Usually there’d be a short line, e.g. _________________ _________________

                                                                          (NAME)                    (LAST NAME)

But in Bolivia, things are a bit more complicated.

You see, the average Bolivian has at least 5 names, (First – middle – paternal last name – maternal last name – grandmother’s last name (seriously)),

For example, Juan Carlos Rascaculo Comemierda Suarez.

So, when you get to fill in official looking papers it looks more or less like this:

_______________________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________  

And with my 8 letter name made it look like this:

Gil Agmon ______________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________  

Now, people always say beaurocrats have no sense of humour, but all you have to do to make a bunch of them laugh their asses off is write my name,

Unfortunately, “Gil” means "Dumbass” in Spanish, great way to start the day...

*** people always talk about how cruel kids can be, making fun of each other and their names... it’s not the kids that are cruel, it’s the parents, If you give your kid some silly new-age name like “Rainbow”, “sunshine” or “Gaia”, or even worse, one of those “I read the bible so much instead of a fuckin dictionary” names like “Caleb”, “Jezebel” or “Nebuchadnezzar” you should either home-school them Or just send them to school with a baseball bat to even their odds...                          back to the story ***

This was obviously a problem, first because beaurocrats don’t like funny things, and second, having an 8 letter name is a big No-No around here.

So here starts one the best conversations I’ve had in my life...

(Dumbass Bolivian Immigrations Officer) – You have to fill in your full name

(Me) – That is my full name

(DBIO) – Where’s your middle name?

(Me) – I don’t have a middle name, that’s a Christian thing...

(DBIO) – Okay, at least write your maternal last name

(Me) – Officer, I don’t have a maternal last name

(DBIO) puts on a very sympathetic face – I’m sorry for you

(Me) What the fuck are you sorry for?

(DBIO) for you not having a mother, you obviously don’t know her, otherwise you’d have her last name, and since you don’t, must mean you’re a bastard...

(Me) what do you mean I don’t have a mother, everybody has a mother, I was born, wasn’t I? And who you calling a bastard, fool? Of course I know my mom, I´ve known both my parents my whole life.

Ever heard of Jewish mothers, you could be 13,000 km away from home, but you’ll still feel guilty on the phone every week for not being there for family dinner...

(DBIO) so, why don’t you put your mom’s last name on your papers?!?!

(Me)  listen, in my country, we don’t have maternal last names, when a couple gets married, the wife assumes the husband’s last name, so both my parents are called Agmon.

(DBIO) so your parents are brothers?

(Me)  No, they’re not brother and sister, they’re husband and wife. Back where I come from you CAN’T marry your sister or your cousin, not that I’m criticizing your life, officer...

(DBIO) well, you still need more names on your application.

**** Now, some of you might ask, why didn’t you just write Gil Beelzebub Agmon Lindenboim Alkalai and got it over with? But my passport only says Gil Agmon, and they have to match... ****

(Me) well, would this do?

Gil Mumu Agmon_________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________   _______________________________    __________________________________  

And that was it, my name on my official papers in immigration is:

Gil Mumu Agmon

Or as they call it here

Dumbass Penis Poor-Bastard-With-No-Mom-Or-Whose-Parents-Are-Brothers

Kinda catchy, isn’t it?

When hell freezes over

Imagine life in hell.                                                                                                           

Not the classic hell full of torturous dungeons and lawyers.

Not the journalistic cliché about spousal abuse “made their life a living hell”.

But rather hell as the hottest place existing, like a small town in the Bolivian Tropics, A small, warm place with a yearly average of 34 ° C and 85% humidity. Probably sound horrible, hellish even.

And then, the worst happens, hell freezes over.

A horrid cold wind leaves Antarctica heading north, Chile and Argentina at freezing point, southern Bolivia with -14, La Paz with 4 to -3… but who gives a fuck about them, they’re all used to the cold… they have winter coats and hats and scarves and gloves and stoves and alpacas to snuggle with and hot drinks and central heating and houses with proper walls and windows with glass panes you can actually shut.

You see, for me, Rurrenabaque is heaven, heat’s good, sun is fun (yeah yeah, don’t spend too much time in the sun, you’ll get cancer, blah blah, spare me), the sun makes you feel young, heat might be tiring, but it’s easy to solve, grab a cold drink, stand in front of / under / over / next to a fan (I’d say AC, but we don’t have those here), slouch in front of the TV in your underwear sipping on a fresh cold Pineapple-Mango-Coconut-Star fruit shake from your garden…

But the cold, cold is evil, it makes you feel old, your bones ache, you need to pee every 5 minutes but you can’t really bother finding your pecker when it’s that cold, and the mere thought of sitting on the cold porcelain bowl of a toilet gives you the shivers, you keep sniveling because it’s the only way of stopping your nose from falling off, and you keep blowing on your hands like some cinematic homeless person, and you fart under the covers (well, frankly, men always fart under the covers, but when it’s this cold, you stop denying it).

And yeah, it’s only about 8 ° C here. Not exactly ice cones on the tip of your nose, but this is hell, who bring a coat to hell?? Besides, a dry cold in high places like La Paz is one thing, but this here is a wet cold (8-12 ° C, 85-90% humidity), I don’t know if you’ve ever encountered that, but it’s the worse, it’s a slick, slimy cold that slithers through the space between your jumper and your long johns and freezes your bum.

You feel so ridiculous, taking out the long johns and gloves and wooly jackets from the attic, and spend a moment pondering if it’s cold enough to wear a scarf (I have an unexplained hatred for scarves and men who where scarves), and miss your lovely fleece cap, nice and black, covered my big ears too, but I left it in the car last time I visited Israel.

And at night you sleep under 2 thick blankets, a sleeping bag and 2 cats (I know that’s disgusting, but I’m cold), and strict rules are set with the Mrs about touching, because your hands are too cold, and even if we get them warmer , you don’t want to start anything you’ll be too cold to finish…

You try and calculate how long it’s been since our last shower and how much longer you can wait until the next one (who’d thought of installing hot showers in hell?), and you stay away from the huge windows you have in every room of your house, always open, no window panes or other things that will block the usual hellish heat locked inside your house, and you drink so many cups of tea, in one day you’ve probably killed 400 Indian or Nepalese or Burmese old ladies breaking their backs picking tea leaves like slaves, but frankly, fuck it, slavery I mean, not the old Burmese lady.

And the worst part is, you just hide all day under the covers and ignore the cold outside, but then evening comes reminding you the capitalist greedy pig you are, a slave to the $ or the Peso, working 365 days a year, in a lovely restaurant, where people usually wait in line to get a good table outside, or one right under the fan, because in hell, who cares if food is expensive, as long as the place you’re eating it is not as hot as everywhere else… but that’s exactly it, it’s not warm, it’s all open, cold, and we don’t do warm beverages, who the fuck wants a coffee in hell?!?, and while I’m shivering and my teeth chatter, with gloves and a coat, some asshole orders a beer, or a Coca-Cola, now usually, I’d serve it with a smile, nice glass bottle, frozen on the outside and say: “can’t get any colder than that”, now I just mumble “ hijo de mil putas, my fingertips are stuck to that bottle…”

But then, you work for a renowned chef, the man’s a genius, he knows exactly what food to make in cold weathers a Spicy Tunisian Chicken, or an Indian Curry or a nice steamy chili, that warms your stomach, but you gives you such horrendous farts, that while nice and warm, scare off the few costumers you’ve had tonight (they fought over the tables inside), so you just sit there at work for 3 more hours doing nothing but shiver, trying to keep that spicy food in while humming Johnny Cash’s “Ring Of Fire”, obviously a song about the aftermath of spicy food, and wonder whether it’s ethical and more important legal, to send one of your employees to warm up the toilet seat for you…

In the end, you give up, go out early in the morning and buy yourself a retarded looking Andean wool cap with little strings that hang on the sides of your face like some goddamn orthodox Jew or Andean Chola, but it defrosts your brain to sit down and write this…

Well, cats stole all the covers, and my toes are numb, bye now

P.S.

When pigs learn to fly I’ll add pictures too.