How do you spell buracracy

I have been told several times to expect bad service, long line ups and general disdain for my angliky-ness when ever you are dealing with the Czech government.  This past week was a total test of that theory and I was not disappointed.

First stop health care.

You need to first understand the sluzby (service) culture here.  Do you remember the lady who growled at me in the Kika when I was trying to get the Kika bus instead of walking home with unfinished furniture in my knapsack?  NO BUS FOR YOU!  Ya well, she turned out to be nice in comparison to many of the clerks, cashiers and other workers that we've had the pleasure of meeting.  I suppose if I were making the equivalent of $15 a day, I'd be grumpy too.  But these people take it to a whole new level.  Its funny how people adjust cause now we just expect it.  In fact if we don't get yelled at or ignored, we think we've done something wrong.

Just in case you thought getting OHIP ( ontario health insurance) was onerous, try getting public health care in CZ.  

Before you can get health care, you need to have a visa and an employment contract.  Imagine you are out for a country drive and you end up in a town that has a friend that you haven't seen in ages.  You arrive totally unexpected; you, the kids, the dog.  No car.  A bank account, but no paycheque.  A nice school for your kids, but no way of paying the tuition. You also have no furniture, but that is totally your problem.  Your friend, not knowing what else to do, ignores you for say, 2 weeks, despite your pleas.   And then after figuring out that you are not going away, scrambles into action.  For us, that friend was IBM Czech Republic.  

Despite the countless emails and meetings, IBM CZ seemed to be totally unaware that we were coming.  And what does this have to do with health care you are asking?  Well when you move to a foreign country and you trying to figure out who pays when you have your stress induced heart attack, health care becomes a concern.  It would appear that sluzby, or lack of it, begins at home.

Fast forward a few weeks and we have all the paperwork (as well as temporary health insurance) and I am now ready to bravely face the people at the VZP (which is the national health care program) in order to get full coverage.  On this particular morning, I take the kids to school with Stu and he then drives me to the address written on the piece of paper I've been given.  I'm not sure why I was expecting there to be a sign on the outside of the building but I was.  Clearly I was setting myself up for disappointment.  We are now somewhere in Prague where the only word I recognize is 'porn'.  No one speaks English and everyone is in a hurry.  I go into a lekarna, which is a drug store, figuring that they might know.  I politely point to the VZP words I have written.  I politely get ignored - that is until I step in front of clerk and shove my paper in front of her and dance the 'where the f*** is this place' dance.  Good news....she knows!

Turns out that the VZP office is a tiny hole in the wall on the first floor of a hospital complex.  As far as I can tell I am the only one who thinks that labeling or numbering the doors would be a good idea.  Actually, Stu thinks so too since he has been trying to find me since parking the car.  At any rate we are together now and we enter the waiting area.  There is a numbering system in the waiting room and this particular machine has 8 options to take a number, each labeled with the particular service you need.  None of them are labeled as 'porn' and as a result we have no idea about the services so we take one of each.   Funny enough, everyone in the waiting area is surprised when one of our numbers comes up first before all the others.  We totally march in ahead of everyone else having skipped the entire queue.  I am expecting to be tackled at any moment so as we walk in, I don't breathe a word of angliky and position myself strategically in front of Stu so that if something happens, he'll take brunt of it and not me.   Me so clever.

The lady expecting us is sitting behind a desk in a small open concept area.  Maybe 5 desks in total.  There will be no secret conversations in this room.  Every one will know who you are and why you are there.  We approach the desk, each with our great big Canadian grins on, and say 'dobre den' just like any average czech.  That, however, is the end of the civilities because the next words I use happen to be in English and that apparently is enough to send her into a not so happy place.  She looks at us with the same stare i've seen before - the kind that comes with an out of body experience that says this cannot be happening to me.  Usually though, they are reserved for things like car accidents and heart attacks and not because someone speaks English.  Fortunately, it only lasts a second before it turns into a rather large and somewhat exaggerated shrug of the shoulders accompanied by the word 'angliky' uttered in a 'you gotta be kidding me ' tone.  This is enough for the others in the office to peak out from behind their computer monitors and giggle in that 'ha ha, you lose' kinda manner.  

Going well so far I think.

I am now emptying my knapsack and producing every piece of paper I have ever received or signed with regard to our move.  This includes my employment contract, lease agreement and passport.  I even produce the last grocery receipt for recently purchased toilet paper.  My thinking here is that if I am buying toilet paper I must be serious about being part of the Czech society.

I am now expecting hands to be thrown up in the air and another shrug.  Instead another lady comes over and in very halting English asks for my name.  I show it to her on one of the papers (and no it wasn't the toilet paper receipt as it has been several years since you've had to provide ID to purchase toilet paper).  She types my name into the computer and prints a 1 page document, applies an official red stamp of some kind and that's it, I've got health care.  At least I think so as there is nothing in my language to indicate that this is really what I've accomplished.  She, however, is convinced that her job is done and we are expected to leave.  I spend 10 minutes gathering up my papers and she watches every move ensuring that we are actually going to walk out.  As if we were gonna hang.