Passport woes

So, the rumours you've been hearing about long wait times at Canadian passport offices? Yep, they're all true.


Stood in line 4 1/2 hours yesterday to try to get new passports for myself and two kids since they expire in a couple of months and we'll be travelling within that time. It's supposed to be easier to get it if you fill out the application form online first, but you can't do that for a children's application, which I had of course. Also, the lineup for the south office is supposed to be shorter, but because the building is smaller, it snakes outside for most of the time, so I went to the downtown office, where although I waited a bit longer, I was inside the whole time. Which was nice because there was a wicked wind blowing that day that would've felt really chilly.

The thing that surprised me the most about the line was not so much it's length (though that was a bit shocking) as the people in it. There were a few expressions of the wow-this-line-is-really-long kind, mostly at the beginning when we first started lining up, but other than that, everyone waited pretty patiently. Sure, the kids were running around, bored out of their minds (and I forgot my mp3 player, so had to listen to ALL of it), but aside from a few conversations here and there, people mostly waited patiently for the line to move forward.

It got me thinking about the last time I was in a government office waiting for a long time. I'm not sure if it was the Social Security office, or the DMV, but either way, the waiting people there were certainly much more boisterous about the whole affair. I know the last time I was at the DMV, there was one gentleman who kept following us around, talking to us, and another who was demanding rather loudly to be served (and who was promptly escorted out by security).

Although there was a sign at the passport office telling people that if they were harassing they wouldn't be served (much like the signs at the DMV) the mood of the crowd was such that I would've been surprised to hear anyone complain. Mostly, people stood quietly, or talked amongst themselves.

Now maybe the comparison of the group at a Social Security office and a passport office isn't fair - there isn't probably much of an overlap between the two groups. But at the same time it makes me wonder if in addition to spelling and pronunciation, we also inherited the British facility for queuing.