B56

I finally sucked it up and faced the lines of Australian Immigration to get my visa stamped into my new passport (old one expired last year). I suppose an immigration office can tell you quite a bit about a nation. This one told me that a vast chuck of would be foreign migrants/students to Australia are coming from Asia. It also told me that Australia doesn't go out of its way to accommodate said foreigners, as I'm pretty sure the gentlemen behind the counter, nice though they were, didn't speak anything other than English.

The entire experience was remarkably like trying to get a drivers license at the Arlington County DMV in Virginia, only the Arlington DMV is much larger, one has to wait much longer, and the dominant demographic is Hispanic rather than Asian. Other than that, it's the same old sitting around staring at the little slip of paper with your number on it (mine, in case you haven't guessed by now, was B56), sympathizing with those who for one reason or another are having a tough time navigating the bureaucracy.

While waiting, I did come up with an idea for "Waiting-Room Battleship". I'm sure watching the numbers tick by on the "Now Serving #_" screen would be far more exciting if one knew the next number could spell the end of his destroyer.