1. Read through the description of everything you need for your visa application, including the description of the photos you need which sound an awful lot like passport photos.
2. Go to Walgreens and get passport photos.
3. Return home, reread the description of the photo which specifies you need a 3cm x 3cm photo. Measure your passport photos that are not 3cm x 3cm.
4. Draw a 3cm square around your head thinking you can just trim them down. Your head is too big. Dang!
5. Return to Walgreens to ask them to reprint them for you at the correct size. Their computer doesn't allow them to resize photos to non-standard sizes. They kindly give you your money back.
6. Return home again. Call Kinkos to ask if they will print a passport photo and then resize it for you. They tell you that they can print a passport photo but they don't have the capability to resize it. Sit in speechless bewilderment for a moment. But....that is the purpose of your business, right...to print things?
7. Call another Kinkos. Listen as the lady explains that they do indeed have the capability to do that but can not actually do it because that would be tampering with a government document and that is against the law. ......*sigh*......
8. Stack up a bunch of crap on your kitchen table, set your camera on top of it, set the self timer, and take a picture of yourself.
9. Use Picasa to crop the picture into a square.
10. Find a friend that has Photoshop. Email her the picture to turn it into a 3cm square.
11. Go to bed thinking you have been successful and that all that is left to do is put the picture on your flash drive and bring it to Kinkos to print the next day. And seriously, this has been enough of a hassle for one day anyway!
12. Two days later, at 2:00, on your way to Kinkos, stop at Target to pick up some photo paper. Kinkos should have photo paper but they've been less than helpful so far so better to just be prepared.
13. At Kinkos, tell them you have a photo on a flash drive that you would like to print on photo paper.
14. Their photo printing kiosk will not let you print non-standard size photos and no, you can not print on photo paper from their computer work stations even if you brought your own photo paper. You can, however, stick your flash drive into their massive printer/copy machine and print from there. No they do not have photo paper. Good thing you brought your own!
15. Go out to your car to get your photo paper. Return to the printer. A different sales person approaches to tell you that that type of photo paper only works with ink jet printers. Theirs is a laser printer. Of course it is!
16. Stare at each other for a few seconds. Finally ask, "Sooooooo.....what are my options for getting this printed?" They do have some shiny card stock card similar to photo paper. Great! Try that because you just opened your matte photo paper from Target and realized that it looks almost exactly the same as regular printer paper anyway.
17. Print your picture. It turns out grainy. Who knew a 3cm photo from an 8 megapixel camera could come out grainy?
18. Go back out to your car and cry because that's what happens when you get frustrated and this is only one of about 5 other frustrating situations occurring on that particular day. Suffice it to say you are NOT having a great day!
19. Find another friend with Photoshop who kindly offers to let you use his computer and printer at work.
20. Drive to his office. Successfully recrop and size your photo so that it is no longer grainy.
21. Print. You are orange.
22. Change some settings. You are still orange. *SIGH* At least you have an appropriately sized photo with good resolution. All that's left is to find a printer.
23. Return to Kinkos. The printer/copier crashes while you are trying to print.
24. Switch to a new printer/copier. For some reason, this time it is blowing your photo up to full page size despite the fact that you are doing the EXACT same thing as when you previously printed your blurry 3cm photo.
25. Leave because Krav Maga class is about to start and by this time, spending an hour punching and kicking people is sounding really REALLY good and you are not about to pass that up.
26. Aforementioned Photoshop friend texts to ask if you would like try printing from his printer at home. You would.
27. Go to friend's house after class. Stick the crappy "photo" paper in the printer and print...and IT WORKS! Except it still looks like crap because it's basically on normal printer paper.
30. Drive back to Target to buy glossy photo paper.
31. Wonder if requiring abnormally sized photos is Colombia's way of controlling the number of immigrants that enter their country. If so, it's rather effective. You've almost given up. Ponder in amazement that anyone ever tries to enter another country.
32. Return to friend's house and successfully print the three required 3cm x 3cm photos! TRIUMPH!!!!!
33. It is now 11:00. That's right. It only took you 9 hours plus the several hours you spent two days prior to get a 3cm photo printed.
34. You should probably be given a gold medal along with your visa. Consider writing the consulate to request this. Or at least a gold star sticker...
***Many, many thanks to Stacy and Julio for the use of Photoshop and your assistance!***
UPDATE: When you get to the Colombian Consulate they will tell you your photos suck and that you need to go down four floor to take passport photos. It would have been helpful a week earlier if you had been able to get past their automated phone system to talk to a real person or if they had answered the email you sent asking if a passport photo would suffice. But now what fun would that have been?
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