Orange Tape

There is a little more to becoming Dutch than bikes and hotdogs. Puh.

As with any fine, upstanding nation in the world today, there's red tape. Only in Holland, Orange is the new Red.

So it goes something like this:
* From Expatica.com: "Anyone who intends to stay in the Netherlands for more than three months... must register at the GBA within five days of arrival." GBA = Gemeentelike basisadministratie... something like the state-level State Department; they keep track of where people are in order to make sure that each city/state has sufficient resources to provide for its residents.
* From the site rijksoverheid.nl... The GBA retains the following information on residents: "Name, birthplace.... burgerservicenummer (BSN)." The BSN functions the same way the social security number operates in the US. As far as the government is concerned, the number is who you are. Oh wait, I don't have one of those.
* From the site overheid.nl:  "Iedereen krijgt bie de eerste inschriving in het GBA een burgerservicenummer (BSN)." [Everyone gets with their first registration with GBA a BSN.] Great. So what do I need to take to the GBA?
* From the same site: In order to register with GBA, you must show the following: [as applies to me] " U bent vreemdeling en verblijft rechtmatig in Nederland." [You're a foreigner residing legally in Netherlands.]

There's more but that right there is where it starts getting wonky. What it all boils down to is this:
* You must register with the GBA within 5 days.
* In order to register with the GBA, you must show that you're here legally.
* In order to be here legally, you must have a residency permit.
* In order to get a residency permit, you must show [in my case] that your business is registered with the Chamber of Commerce and that you have health insurance.
* In order to register with the Chamber of Commerce, you must provide a BSN.
* In order to get health insurance, you must provide a BSN.
* In order to get a BSN, you must register with the GBA.

And round and round and round it went in my head until my brains almost melted. My very special person and a 900 number to the rescue.

This bit actually made me laugh a lot. The Dutch government, rather than providing 800 numbers, uses 900 numbers. Who knew there were 900 numbers that aren't sex lines??? They typically charge 0.10 a minute. (The government lines, not the sex lines.) Apparently it both offsets the cost of providing the service and cuts down on people phoning up the government to complain about random things.

Long story short, 2 euros worth of government chat time between my very special person and people I can only assume were talking about immigration and not sex yielded an appointment with the Immigratie en Naturalisatie Dienst (IND), on 7 December. The lovely IND person was reportedly not at all concerned with the apparent circular logic of the system, waving it off with a dismissive, "We'll give you a form to take to GBA."

Fingers and toes and everything else you can cross without doing permanent damage to yourself will be appreciated. Thank you!