Departure Looms Ever Closer

Check out my sensationalist title.

There you were thinking all the hard parts were finished, HA! the god's of international travel laugh at your pitiful stamina.

We still had to apply for the visa! No essay here, just $700 US!

Subsequently, I had to get another passport because mine had expired from when I was 13/14. That only cost about $100 in all though, so it wasn't too bad.

And maybe 40-60 dollars on visa pictures. Listen carefully, this will save you a couple trips and dollars:

1. Walgreens can't do european style passport photos.
   
2. You are not allowed to smile in European passport photos.
   
3. European passport photos are extremely specific in size, lighting, angle, mouth openness, head ratio, etc.

After our application for a residence permit was denied several times due to failure to adhere to Dutch photo specifications, we went to a professional photographer who got them right kind of accidentally on the first try. It was kind of funny.
It was crunch time, I had to make as much money as possible to offset all these unusual attacks on my budget- so began my working every day and for anyone who needed me at anytime. During one of these shift coverings, I managed to slice off the tip of my ring finger- so ended my working as much as possible. Very fortunately for me, my mom had just gotten a new insurance plan that paid out for accidents, so from all the days I missed, I got paid a relatively equal amount. The doctor said my finger would grow back perfectly and I was lucky to not hit anything important on the giant meat slicer.
The winter break for us was particularly long because the Dutch semester would start in February and end in July.
We fly out January 31st and it's already the 29th!