Me, on the other hand, I do not like Kafka. I never thought he was interesting and when I had to read his books and stories in school I was just reassured, that Kafka really isn't my thing. But you always meet twice in life, and Kafka came back at me. Not in a book this time, but with an adjective that was purely invented for him and the way his stories work. Kafkaesque.
Wikipedia says:
"Kafkaesque" is an eponym used to describe concepts, situations, and ideas which are reminiscent of the literary work of Prague writer Franz Kafka, particularly his novels The Trial and The Castle, and the novella The Metamorphosis.
The term, which is quite fluid in definition, has also been described as "marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity. [...]
Situations that are incomprehensibly complex, bizarre, or illogical.
If you have read my blog entry "What Pachaa is for Madrid..." then you have already gotten an idea of how bureaucratic things in Brasil are sometimes, even if it is just to get into a club. It led me to writing a series called "Kafka was brazilian..." of which you can read part one right here, right now.
Buying a TV.
Even though I am not a a big fan of TV, I sure am a big fan of movies and I do not like to watch them on the tiny screen of my tiny laptop. Thus, I needed a TV.
Well, I thought, that cannot be so hard. Its a TV. You go to the stores, look at the offers, pick one, take it home, plug it in. Done. Well, thats right, I THOUGHT.
Well, first of all, things tend to be sold out. I could pull out some comparisons to the former GDR now, but I won't ;) Afterall, I have just heard those stories from other people.
But it is true about Brazil. Stores do not like to keep a lot of anything in storage that is expensive, and while I can understand that, it bothered me while shopping for a TV.
Everytime I found one I liked it was sold out and the prices tend to jump up and down every day. But this cannot really be called kafkaesque, so here comes the real deal.
I finally had found a TV I want even though there was none left in storage (if there ever was one) but I could have the one standing in store. Quickly, I pulled out my debit/credit combi-card in order to pay my new TV and take it home.
First though, I needed to register in the store. Name, Adress, Phonenumber... ooops, system fail. Again, Name, Adress, Phonenumber... ooops, does not work, there is a, street number required for the adress and not just the buildings name. Mh, too bad, cause the city hasnt given out numbers yet (it is a new building in a new quarter). Okay, it will be 00.
I am registered. I get asked to please move over to the nice lady behind a bulletproof glas. The cashier.
When I try to pay though, it turns out that neither debit, nor credit, nor a combination work. My limit is too low. Limit?, I think, What limit? They never told me about any limit?! Its just a TV?!
The salesperson offered me I could go to the ATM and take out all money I can and see if it is enough. So I gave it a try, but my limit was 500R not enough for the TV... And keeping it and going again tomorrow for more and driving all across the city with so much money? No thank you.
I decided I would just go to the bank and pick up checks to pay the next day, and i was promised that they would keep the TV. Tomorrow at 10am, they said, we open and you can come and pay.
The next morning, it was 10:30, I was back at the store. Unfortunately, it was still closed. Due to rearrangement of the store, it would only open at 2pm it said on a big screen. Well, "re-arranging" the store?! The guy yesterday could have known that... oh well.
I came back at 16h and, oh, new sign: The store stays closed today. Thank you very much.
Well, there is still sunday. I went back to the store, and as it was closed the day before, they had kept there promise and noone has bought the TV. Actually, the price had even dropped. I pulled out my checkbook and was actually kinda happy to, for the first time in my life, pay with a check.
But oh. Registration. Registration? I just registered the last time?!
Well, for check payment one needs to register "completely". This includes, first of all, the CPF number. It is tax number and "Schufa" (for all you Germans) in one. Luckily I have a CPF number. Next would be my RG number. Unfortunately, I do not have an RG as foreigners do not get registered with an RG but with RNE (Registro Nacional para Estrangeiros - National Registry for Foreigners or something like it). The stores system luckily took RNEs and although I do not have my RNE card yet ( it takes half a year to be made) I was able to proof with many discussions, the protocol of the RNE application and the system print of the RNE Filing (with all its stamps and stickers) that I was really registered and thus allowed to buy things. But although I registered in the stores system with my RNE as a foreigner, when it asked for my birthdate, parents information and birthplace it unfortunately asked for a state and only had brazilian states in the dropdown menu. Berlin with its wonderful postalcode of 14057 was not found in any state, and there was no way to find the postal code to some, maybe existing, Berlin somewhere in Brasil. We left it all empty to see what else is coming up.
I was supposed to give them two telephone numbers in Goiânia as a reference for me being able to pay. Or, just in case I won't pay. Now, I did absolutely not feel comfortable with giving away two of the three phonenumbers I new so far in Goiânia.
Not being registered, would leave the option of writing a check to the store and to come back two days later to see if the check had worked out and if the TV was paid. If so, I could take it home then. But really, I felt even more uncomfortable with that option, thus check book was now officially ruled out.
As I nearly had expected something like this, I had brought my German credit card. The German system works with signatures, while the brazilian always works with 4-digit pins. My card ran through smoothly and though it hurt a bit knowing that the money would be taken off from a bankaccount in Germany that receives no more salary but gets deducted for a student loan every month (more about this in the next Kafka Story) at least the receipt popped out and I I finally owned my TV.
Wait, was that real? Can it really be paid without a pin? Another discussion and explanation later it was decided. Yes. It was real, and I could take the TV home.
They packed up the TV and loaded into the back of my car. It now stands here and is great. But these registry and system things can really drive you nuts. Wait until you hear more about them...
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