Applying for a Schengen visa (Part 4)

I frantically made my reservation using the app and tried to matched it with the itinerary that I have made. (Thank you T-Mobile, thank you family plan T-mobile, thank you Google, thank you playstore, thank you booking dot com). Of course I chose the free-cancellation ones. But you know, the free-cancellation ones are actually more expensive. I thought that was okay since I was gonna cancel them for free anyway. Then as I was booking, I realized that it used my old address, DAMN ME. I didn’t know how it happened. Maybe somehow that info was stored from back then when I made a reservation? But it was weird since I did update my info, address, card, etc. when I installed the app in my (new) phone. But I didn’t care anymore. I had no time to modify what’s already booked, and I checked that they didn’t actually include my address in the confirmation email/receipt. So I continued making the reservation in other countries after updating my address once again and telling the app to save it for future references.

Free cancellation. No prepayment needed.

And I realized, that, gosh, even for free cancellation, they might still charge for the fee and taxes. The fee varied. I freaked out; I remember when I cancelled my UK-France trip in Expedia, they still charged me USD $0.66. Well, it’s small, and it’s not booking dot com. But I got freaked out so easily, I panicked. So when I was making the hotel reservations and saw the fee and taxes on the price details, I was anxious. And let me tell you, I even ran into a hotel in which the fee and taxes were up to $100. I didn’t choose that one, but I just thought that if I were to cancel it, even if it’s free cancellation, should I still pay for the fee and taxes? I mean, it was free in that I didn’t have to pay as much as the price for the stay I booked, but I wasn’t sure for the booking fee and taxes. I was so down, because I’ve booked several hotels in different places and I had no idea how much the fee and charges were! If I were to cancel all these and still pay for the fee and taxes, I would be broke. It felt like the lowest point of my life. But I didn’t care anymore; I was playing rich; I continued making all the reservations in every country I mentioned in the application form and daily itinerary. Then I tried to find the officer in that office to told them I wanted to print out some documents. I thought I would be allowed to use a computer or such. (I even foolishly thought that it would be for free! LoL, so naïve of me).

See that taxes and charges? Now you know why I freak out.

Well, a lady gave me an email address where I could sent the documents I would love to print so she could email it for me. So I just forwarded all the confirmation receipts (probably 12 emails). I asked about the fee and she said it’s $1/page. Haha (It’s a sad laughter, btw. That’s what some people do when they don’t know what else to do with a series of unfortunate events that happened to them). Fortunately, I always keep cash with me, just in case. I still had some that I always kept with me, and I also brought the money that was returned by Japanese embassy. So, I could still call myself lucky, right? I thought if each email would be printed into at least two pages, then I would still be able to pay. I told the lady about that. And she was so kind because she said she would print it on both sides of the page so 1 email would only be 1page, so I didn’t have to worry. In total, it cost me only $12. I had $2 and $20 with me. I handed it to her. Apparently she didn’t have the change. She even tried to get the change from her colleagues. She couldn’t find it. She came back to me and returned my $20 saying it was fine. She was so kind I felt like crying. But I couldn’t do that. I came back to the visa section office for my application and to try to get some change.

There were 3 people now in the room. The lady was busy on the back of the office, and at the counter was a gorgeous guy. So very very handsome. (But I really hope he wouldn’t read this because the rest of my story would be kinda embarrassing). Like the previous lady did, he checked my documents, but more carefully and meticulously. He found that the dates of my two bookings were overlapped. LoL That’s to say, I checked in a hotel in a certain date when on that same date I hadn’t checked out from the previous hotel. LoL I begged him so I could modify and reprint them again. But he said it was fine. So nicely and calmly I really wished I disappeared from the world in that very moment. Well, when someone got angry when I made a mistake, I understood, but when he was so calm, I had no idea what that meant and it was terrifying. He even said that it was fine with a (cold) nice smile, yes it’s nice and gorgeous but because I made a blunder, it felt cold to me, I was dreading with fear, fear that my visa application would be denied or rejected. I was so hopeless. I modified the dates right there. I hoped he would allow me to reprint it again.

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