"Msssrrr Frumphdylllllmmn?"....."Are you talking to me?"

Yesterday we bought a printer from 'The Good Guys.'Previously, when I have needed anything copied to support the endless form filling that I seem to have done since arriving here, I have emailed stuff to Will at work and he has copied it for me there....but yesterday, we bit the bullet and got a printer of our own.It is all singing and dancing.....How they have changed!It is wireless, a scanner and is a photocopier too. It will even print on cd's. Stick your foot in and it paints your nails and cuts them too  if too long. Lift the lid and it becomes an exercise treadmill for a small dog. Shout "what's for tea?" and it says "bangers and mash!" Ok, I might be joking about some of those but it is good.We spent a good deal of last night printing off all the evidence they asked for to support the Carer allowance claim and this morning I was getting it all together and sorting it out when I came across the original letter, that came with the forms they had sent,and noticed that it said they had to be returned by the 30th April!We were two days late!Heaven knows what they would do to us but I have seen what they do to people who arrive by boat seeking asylum and whatever it was it would not be pretty.'If you are unable to complete these documents and return them by the appointed date you MUST contact us IMMEDIATELY!' said the letter.Look, I know I should have read it properly but when they arrived I thought 'Forms? Water off a duck's back!' I'm a professional form filler. Heck! I filled in all the visa forms myself. Lots of people get an agent to do it....I did it myself!....and it was fine.I hate forms but I'm used to them.The contact number they gave was the same as the one I rang last week where I was told:"The current waiting time for calls is over 90 minutes."Sod that! We'll go to them.Our nearest Centrelink office was Inala and not the one at Mt Gravatt that we had been too previously.....So, there would be no Bojan, but this was an emergency.Will was calm, I rushed around like a headless chicken grabbing papers and stuffing them into envelopes and putting on shoes.I got to the top of the steps and noticed the letter had a P.T.O.......I did......OH NO!I needed '100 points' of indentification.....just printing off my visa grant only gave me 70.....I had to rush down under the house to get my passport.We needed '100 points' for Dulcie too..we had a copy of her birth certificate but that was not enough. Will grabbed her pension and medicare cards and a few bills with the address on and we headed to Inala.Inala....it sounds African to me. I said so to Will."Impala" he said.........but that's an animal!I was thinking 'Kampala'....at least that is a city.It was not that far away but as we parked Will commented that Inala is probably as low a socio-economic area as you can get around Brisbane....great!It was very like the Centrelink office at Mt Gravatt except busier."Staff are wearing casual clothes today to raise money for charity."'Are they really?' I thought or perhaps they just can't afford posh clothes and the sign is there permanently.We joined the queue to speak to the 'Bojan' of Inala.....a woman with a 'Madonna' mic and Ipad.I explained that we had missed the deadline for returning the forms and expected her to press some lever whereby the floor would open up and we would be sent by sewerage chute to Christmas Island.....but she just smiled, tapped her Ipad and said,"Take a seat."There were not many left to be taken. All life was here.We chose the seats badly. Firstly we were sat right behind some fellow in flourescent work clothes who was regaling his trapped neighbours with tales of his trips to Malaysia. Secondly we were under a TV screen that kept on telling us how we could contact Centrelink online rather than in-line. Now they tell us!Mobile phones were going off with ringtones related to their owners cultural background and all the while the 'casually dressed' Centerlink employees wandered up, sporadically and called out names.'Ching Wa Kok!".......... "Mustapha Houboudoubou!"......... "Maverick Clutterbuck!"........... "Mr Aziz!"I could hardly hear, so we moved away from the TV and the flourescent fellow to quieter seats.We guessed which one of the 'casually dressed' employees would call us forward. Will chose the big woman in the brightly coloured smock and two tone hair. I chose the woman in black nearby who was stamping peoples documents wildly. She would have been welcomed by the Gestapo.....It would be just my luck to get her."You've only applied for five jobs this week!?" She said, incredulously to one sheepish looking lad. He mumbled something...."Well, tell them you live nearby....make it up!" She snapped.Finally, the people in the queue before us, when we first came in, were called up and so we knew we would be soon.An Indian man came forward from his desk and said;"Msssrrr Frumphdylllllmmn.""What language was that?" Asked Will.I was too busy trying to decide whether it was me or not.....could "Msssrrr Frumphdylllllmmn" be me? I was desperately trying to hear my name in it somewhere.It wasn't......Msssrrr Frumphdylllllmmn got up and followed the Indian man back to his desk."Nicholas Allen!" Said another voice.We were both wrong.....it was a Middle Eastern man.We followed him to his desk and I promptly bumped into it, violently, as I sat down."Are you alright?" he asked concerned." I am" I said, rubbing my knee."How can I help you?"I explained and waited for our punishment to be given out.He did not seem bothered that we were late.Firstly he flicked through all the documents and removed all the evidence I had carefully placed in the pages of the forms where it had been asked for. Then he checked the identification.I told him my visa was 70 points and handed him my passport which I knew to be 40 points from the letter I had only just read."The visa does not count," he said. " Do you have a Driver's License?""Yes, but it is British," I said.  He frowned and spurned it as if it was the British Eurovision entry.I handed him my Medicare card..."Do you have a bank card?" He asked.I did."That's enough," he said.Now to Dulcie's identification. He tossed the copy of her birth certificate back at us."We need originals,"  he said."Originals?!" I thought.....Heck! Her original birth certificate must surely be carved in wood!We had the bill.......20 points.......her Medicare card........30 points. Her pension card did not count!We were short!"Would her Bank Pass Book count?" Asked Will."That would be enough," he said. We had to drop it in some time in the near future." So you are going to be the Carer? " He asked."Yes""And are you related to the person you are caring for?""She is my Partner's mother," I said, putting my hand on Will's shoulder."And have you been in Australia for more than two years?""No...but...""Then this claim will be rejected!" He interrupted, thumping the pile of forms in front of us loudly.I jumped. Will was calm...."But there are exceptions," he said."Are you an Australian Citizen?" asked the man."I am," said Will."Oh, I see," he said. "I will just go and photocopy these documents."When he came back to hand back my passport and cards he almost smiled....."Thank you, leave this with me Gentlemen."We left.I somehow feel we have not heard the last of this....There is bound to be something else that we need to provide.Next time we will got to Bojan.....or do it online!