We spent several weeks jogging
backwards and forwards to the IKA office in Rethymno to get Kimon's
IKA Health Insurance book renewed and changed. Previously it had
been issued resting on the premise that his wife was a pensioner and
pensioners' husbands or wives can also get medical health insurance
equivalent to pensioners' entitlements in Greece. This is until and
unless the dreaded Brexit changes everything … but enough of
Brexit. The madness is out of our hands now and anyway, we have
enough comic daftness of our own to contend with. Each visit to the
IKA office is initiated by a depressingly long queue in a boiling hot
office. Kimon had duly presented all his ID documents to the lady in
the office who said that he needed a form from the Accountant to say
that he had paid all his taxes and a form from the UK. K phoned up
the UK and they sent him the appropriate form in duplicate. K made
another journey to Rethymnon to present the forms as well as
everything else but they said this was the wrong form and he needed
an E108. K returned home and telephoned England again. Form 108
does not exist any more and form S1 replaces it. They refused to
accept it a second time of asking. Time was running out and the book
was becoming invalid and the man in England did not dare to send
whatever other form it was, for reasons best known to the mysteries
of all these agencies even though there was no doubt that K was
entitled to medical care either in the UK or in Crete but the two
bureaucracies were in complete deadlock . We were flummoxed.
At this point I contacted the British
Embassy to ask for help. I tried to work out the different processes
required by the British office and the Greek office. Typed them all
out, google translated it all and Emailed it to DWP in England asking
them to fax it to the office in Rethymno. Then we collapsed in a
heap for a week or two trying not to worry about cancer care without
health cover - scary stuff! After a couple of weeks we had a gentle
voiced telephone call from the lady who had kept sending us away
saying that if we came to the office again at 8 o'clock in the
morning, she would sort out the book and we wouldn't have to queue.
K and I couldn't believe we were dealing with the same lady, but we
smiled, spoke Greek and K charmed her as much as possible while I
chased up and down the stairs with pieces of paper from one office
with a man inscribing a huge record book and another office where
another man with a biro and a rubber stamp squiggled something. I finally chased downstairs with my prize sheet for the completion
process. DONE! It had taken about five weeks of travelling, queuing
and worrying but such a relief even if you have to do everybody
else's work for them. Everyone celebrates with such a feeling of achievement.
Then we needed to make sure that our
tax return had been completed by the Accountant. We paid a visit and
handed over some money. Several days later, we had a phone call
requiring our marriage certificate. K dropped it in. Then the
Accountant wanted a translation of the marriage certificate – so
google translate came to the rescue again. Then they decided that
the marriage certificate was not sufficient and that I should have
had another document from the Church with a signature and a rubber
stamp on it. K and I were beginning to lose the plot at this point
and wondered why on earth they needed our marriage certificate? The
Accountant thought she would reassure us by saying that she would
send it somewhere to some other office so that they could put a
rubber stamp on it and the technical language was a bit beyond our powers of translation..
They were surprised at my strong negative reaction to putting any marks on our document!
The accountant wondered could we get a
certified copy from the Central Register every year? Of course not,
there is only one, we got married once and this is it! I jokingly asked whether we should
get married again in Crete, so that the documentation lined up? The
argument continues and I have made contact with my parish church in
Farnham and the Surrey Records Office because life just isn't busy
enough.
It has given me lots of time to
meditate upon the intrinsic value of a rubber stamp! What is it
about a print impression made out of rubber that gives a document
such power and authenticity? Suddenly, I realised that seals and
stamps have been used in Cretan prehistory since Minoan times and
obviously have much greater significance within the Greek official
hierarchies than we are used to. A maker's mark or stamp must lurk
within the psyche of all our Greek and Cretan officer folk as a
symbol of supreme authority and reverence!
Anyway, enough of all this stuff.
Crete is in the middle of a heatwave. Scorching days and nights with
the air conditioning keeping us from sizzling up. The plants need
lots of tender loving care, a nest of swallows have hatched and flown
the nest in the porch leaving a great deal of unwanted guano behind
and we are keeping under cover as much as we can during peak holiday
season with loads of tourist traffic. The car is baking hot and we
need oven mitts to use the steering wheel. It seems much nicer and
cooler at home than venturing out too much.
Wish us luck with officialdom, it is
keeping us very busy indeed!
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