Deise Ponce, a UC Santa Barbara student, showed up shortly
before 4 a.m., a full four hours before the Spanish Consulate on
Wilshire Boulevard opened its doors.
Ponce, like many UC students hoping to study abroad in Spain
this fall, was forced to make the early-morning trek to Los Angeles
after hearing word that the consulate ““ flooded with
last-minute visa requests ““ had begun turning people
away.
The Los Angeles consulate ““ the only one serving Southern
California and adjacent regions ““ now accepts only the first
25 applicants each day, forcing students to line up outside the
consulate doors hours before its 8 a.m. opening.
“It’s just a hassle because I had to wake up
early,” Ponce said, who lives in the San Fernando Valley and
recently graduated with a degree in sociology. She is hoping to
live in Alcala for four months this fall, finishing up coursework
for her Spanish minor.
She had come to the consulate the Friday before, but was turned
away at the door because of the institution’s new daily
applicant cap.
“Summer is a really busy time for the consulates,”
said Bruce Hanna, spokesman for the UC Education Abroad Program.
“There are probably some cases in which students will not be
able to go because they were not able to get their visas in
time.”
Hanna attributes the system backup to a bout of one-upmanship
among consulates that was triggered after the United States
implemented stricter visa regulations following the attacks of
Sept. 11, 2001. “Both consulates are very much aware of what
the other ones require, so there’s a natural tendency that if
one country says “˜you’re going to need more
documentation’ for the other country to respond in
kind.”
An early-morning assortment of students, tourists and
businessmen gathered outside the consulate has not been an uncommon
sight the last few weeks.
Early one Monday morning in front of the mid-Wilshire site, some
visa hopefuls drank coffee and others drank tea. Most sat on the
pavement, though a few reclined on folding chairs.
By 6 a.m., the line had already stretched to a dozen people.
Many rifled through documents, including four Visa application
forms with passport photographs stapled to each, parents’
bank statements and tax forms and medical clearance letters printed
on doctors’ stationery.
Some newly added documents required by the Spanish consulate
include guarantees of financial support, housing, insurance, health
and a drug-free lifestyle, Hanna said.
Erica Schim, a fourth-year biochemistry student at UCLA, drove
up from San Diego on Friday morning only to find she was the 26th
applicant.
“I waited until 8:30, and then finally gave up,” she
said, sitting outside waiting with her boyfriend close to the front
of the crowd.
“It’s not as cold as I thought it would be,”
she added, smiling.
Several students in positions similar to Schim’s have
called EAP, worried they won’t get their visas in time.
Some of the 50 UCLA students who planned on studying in Spain
will likely be stranded in Westwood this fall, Hanna said, adding
that he expects EAP to refund any students left behind.
“There’s essentially nothing we can do to speed up
the process,” he said.
Though the consulates of other countries popular with EAP
students ““ such as Brazil, Italy and Germany ““ have
experienced summertime booms in visa requests, the system backup at
the Spanish consulate has been the most extreme, Hanna said.
Further down the Monday morning line outside the Spanish
consulate, Brett Applegate sat with a friend who had accompanied
her on a seven-hour road trip from Tuscon, where she lives and
studies English and creative writing at the University of
Arizona.
“It could be like Tuscon ““ 100 degrees, 110,”
Applegate said, finding the cool morning air a relief from desert
weather. She and her friend had spent the night at a motel on
Olympic and La Brea.
Applegate joked with her friend that she was afraid she would be
mugged while walking to the consulate. Her biggest fear was that
someone would steal her paperwork, she said.
“Take anything but my passport,” she said.
Applegate said she had heard through a friend of a friend that
the Los Angeles consulate had implemented the new procedure.
Students said the policy was not posted on the consulate’s
web site, though it is mentioned on an answering machine there. EAP
counselors recently informed UC applicants to arrive early to the
consulate.
“I’m just glad I heard,” Applegate said,
staring out across the street at a used car lot and Bob’s
restaurant, whose sign boasts that the joint is Home of the BIG BOY
Hamburger. “I think I would have come at 8. I’m really
just kind of grateful that I knew.”
As Applegate spoke, she turned briefly to look at a commotion at
the front of the line.
Several students and parents had wandered out to the middle of
the sidewalk, their heads tilted upwards, eyeing the top of the
gray building. At the front of the queue, Ponce stood wiping bird
droppings off a textbook.
A doorman let everyone into the lobby at 7 a.m. About three
dozen people shared the room with one bench, sitting on the floor
and leaning against the walls, drinking lattes and eating breakfast
purchased from a nearby Burger King.
Just before 8 a.m., a representative of the consulate began
handing out numbers to applicants, in the order in which they had
signed in.
Upstairs on the eighth floor, Ponce was first to the window.
She flashed a small grin to weary onlookers as she turned to
head out after submitting her paperwork, and the room broke out in
a light applause.