Three Reasons to Love Consular

My friend S. has been on the consular line for about 6 or 8 months now. I asked her if she had heard anything unusual, if she had any good stories. She agreed as how you get into the strangest conversations, like...

1) The time when she heard one of her fellow consular officers shouting "Stop staring at me like a monkey! You're staring at me with those monkey eyes. Stop it!"

2) The time when an applicant kept telling her that he needed to go to the US to rescue his ex-girlfriend from her parents. He kept saying that he knew if he could just see her one more time, she would follow him back to India. He knew she was being trapped by her parents' mind control. S. was a little disturbed by his voice, the way he was so insistent. She told him that she couldn't issue him a visa unless he had something else to show her. At this, he said that yes, he did have something else. She asked 'what?', and he slid a piece of paper through the window opening. Then she saw it was a letter professing his absolute sincerity and his love for his girlfriend - written in his own blood. (Needless to say, she dropped it immediately, reached for the hand sanitizer, and denied his visa.)

3) The time when an applicant said he needed to go to the US for an operation. S. asked why, as India has many excellent hospitals, all much less expensive than those in the US. He said, well, it just isn't working. What isn't working, she asked? This isn't working, he said, and he popped his eyeball out of his socket. It bounced once and rolled right under the window. As she jumped back, she said, Sir - it's never going to work if you keep doing that. (Then she grabbed the hand sanitizer, and you know the rest...)