Bureaucracy with a Smile

Over the past few months I have been developing a theory about bureaucracy. In the UK, at least compared to other countries I've lived in, paperwork is kept to a minimum and is generally relatively easy to complete. As a result, people who administer it are generally pleasant and efficient, but rarely anything more than that. In Italy, on the other hand, bureaucracy is a crazy, incomprehensible mess that can only be confronted three days a week between the hours of 10.30 and 11.15 in an office on the other side of town from where you thought you had to be. As a result, the people who administer it feel the need, every so often, to be incredibly helpful, just to remind themselves that they are still human beings and that all this paper has nothing to do with the real world.

Because I work with children, I needed to get a certificate from the police before I left the country stating that I had no criminal record in Italy. The first part of this process is astonishingly simple. You fill out an online form and send it off, and a few days later you get an email telling you that you can collect the certificate, in my case from the Casellario Giudiziale di Milano.

This was where the fun started. At 11.30, after doing another little job in town, Mr A. and I set out to look for this building. Our search was somewhat hindered by the fact that my map of Milan, published by the ATM (which runs all the public transport) has an index that doesn't correspond to where the streets actually are on the map. As Mr A. kindly pointed out, if I had acquired a little less Italian inefficiency, or was less Scottish and less mean, I would have bought a new map by now, but seeing as I am clearly one or both of the above, we ended up wandering around for half an hour before sneaking a look at a street plan in the Mondadori bookshop. We found correct entrance to the Casellario Giudiziale, walked through the metal detector, surrendered our cameras to security and asked for directions for where to go.

And let me tell you, that place is massive. As well as what looked like court rooms and hundreds of offices, it also had its own bank and post office. The man who gave us the directions waved vaguely to the right, muttered something about “on the left” and sent us off on our way. It took us a good ten minutes to find the office number 500, which was not particularly near 500 bis, or where it appeared to be on the maps of the building. By this time, it was about 12.40 and the office workers were getting hungry and disinclined to work. I handed my piece of paper to the man behind the desk, along with my passport, and hoped for the best.

Only one problem. I needed a “bollo”. After ten months in Italy, I still don't really know what a “bollo” is for, but it's a little sticker that you can buy that appears on most official paperwork. I knew that I would need one before I went, but I didn't know where to buy it. I asked the man behind the desk and he gave me some more unclear directions. I asked him to clarify. If it was far away or there was a queue, I would never make it back before the office closed at one and would have to come back the next day. The guy said something else, which I didn't understand. I was obviously still looking confused, and he obviously wanted his lunch, because he asked if I had the 3.52 euros and, when I said that I did, reached into his bag, pulled out a stamp, stuck it on the piece of paper and handed me the certificate.

Italian bureaucracy at its best!

Down Off My High Horse

I went to the comune today to apply for residency and they allowed me to be britannica and from the Regno Unito. The whole process took about 15 minutes and the lady was very nice.

Despite having eaten a delicious dinner of fresh bread and a selection of cheeses followed by some pre-Easter chocolate, I may have to eat my words.

Italian Paperwork and Scottish Nationalism

Next week, I have to go to some official place in Milan with some official pieces of paper to get another official piece of paper from an official person which will prove that I live here. Before I can hold the piece of paper in my sticky hand, some policemen will knock on my door to prove that I actually live where I said I did.

As an EU citizen, I have the right to live and work in Italy for as long as I like. Nevertheless, the Italian government apparently feels that it is worth spending its taxpayers money on paying the aforementioned bureaucrats and policement so that it knows exactly where I live.

Apart from the fact that it's a bit of a waste of time and other people's money, I don't mind too much. What I do mind is this:

When I first got here, I filled out the application form. The questions on the form are written in Italian, French. German and English, so I wrote my answers in English. Apparently, though, they have to be in Italian, so my work very kindly wrote some corrections on the original form, which I then have to copy on to a new form. And under the “nationality” section, where I had written “British”, they wrote “inglese”, which means “English”. One of my Scottish friends in Italy confirmed that this is what the Italian officials make you write. So I am going to have to write it, and then sign the piece of paper to say that what I've written is true.

This doesn't annoy me because I'm a raging Scottish Nationalist. It bothers me because it's wrong. Saying that a Scottish person is English is like saying that Austrians are German because both countries are in the EU and they speak the same language. I am from the UK and my nationality is British. That's what it says on my passport and that's what I write on forms. (I do feel Scottish too, but that has nothing to do with politics. And if English nationality could be officially recognised, I could have that too, but it doesn't.) If the man in the street called me English, I'd either explain politely why I'm not or smile and shrug my shoulders. But if the Italian paper-pushers want me to sign endless unnecessary documents, they should at least give me the opportunity to put the right facts on them.