Immigration laws are no joke

The idea to write this came to me after a beer yesterday, but the phenomenon is so common that I hope the guy I was having beer yesterday won't take it personally. This attitude is quite widespread among people from Western countries living in other Western countries.

In order to live in a country you are not a citizen of you usually need a residence permit or some other papers. There are exceptions to that, but usually this is the case. The people who give the residence permits out don't make it easy. Getting a residence permit somewhere is a game where you are playing against an adversary who is vastly superior to you in power and resources, who has made all the rules and who gets to change all the rules in the middle of the game. You cannot afford not to pay attention.

The rules are often stupid. I also think it's silly to make a lot of trouble for a person who applied for a permit extension one day late, but I don't make the rules; they do. I've met a few people who have done so; you really don't want all this trouble.

Don't believe anything the officials tell you, get everything in writing.

Don't assume that they will bend rules for you just because you are a fully employed Western person and not a Somalian refugee. They might, but they probably won't.

The system is staked against you, but the person behind the counter is rarely a personal enemy of yours. Don't take it out on them.

Your consulate is unlikely to help you. This is not because they are assholes, there is probably nothing they can do. Other people's consulates don't help them much, either. But if they really are assholes, contact your State Department or equivalent.

Sometimes various officials ask too many questions or look at your passport for too long. Take a deep breath. This is usually not a major problem, but you can make it one if you make a scene.

Don't try to renounce your citizenship without a good reason, especially if it's your only one. I can tell you from bitter experience that being stateless in not an improvement in comparison with being a citizen of an industrialized country as far a getting visas and crossing borders go. There are some countries whose citizenship is so shitty that being stateless is preferable; yours, however, is probably not one of them. My ex-country was.

There are rules that you can break and probably not get caught. Before you do so, think of the consequences if you are caught. Sometimes it's worth it, but usually it isn't.

If the country you are traveling or living in is a third-world shithole, all of the above applies even more. Don't overstay. Don't live there without a residence permit. Just don't. If you do it just might be that getting kicked out will be the least of your problems.

Have all your papers in order, smile nicely, expect all kinds of dirty tricks and be glad when and if they don't come. Read the laws. Find things out in advance.

If all of the above sounds patronizing you are probably not the intended audience. Having lately run into a person who tried to live and work in Russia without a residence permit, a person who moved permanently to a country and then started trying to find out whether the country in question has a permanent residence permit, and a person who tried to renounce his only citizenship over a rather trivial matter, I just felt I had to write this.