So, having talked to a colleague and been reassured by her splutter of "...but, that's [Admin Guy]'s responsibility," and checking back over my emails to confirm that, yes, I did reply to the following November 13th email:

Dear all,

If you have a plan to leave Thailand for the Christmas holiday, you must have a re-entry permit. (especially new teachers this year) Please let me know then I can arrange for all of you. Thank you.

With kind regards,

Admin Guy

on the same day with

Yes please!

Thank you!

I think that it's reasonable of me to argue that it was indeed the school's job to ensure that my visa was sorted out, and that they should refund me at least some of the 300 dollars I need to pay out of my wages this afternoon.

If it were a small sum, I wouldn't be thinking about being arsey, because, yes, when I didn't hear anything else from Admin Guy I should have gone and followed up on it. Because clearly he did sort out everyone else's visas and mine got forgotten about - which is probably because he had already got everyone else's passports, whereas I'd been to Singapore and still had mine in my flat.

It would have behoved me to go and ask him about it, when he didn't ask for my passport - but to be honest I totally forgot about the whole thing and just concentrated on all the my-job stuff - reports-writing, assessment week, school production, blah blah blah. On previous occasions when he's needed my passport he's sent me a message and I've duly brought it in, but this time around no message ever came, and it was only when I was starting to think about the whole going-home thing this week that it struck me that I still didn't have a re-entry visa, so on Thursday I went into the office and asked about getting it sorted.

He's a very nice bloke, and generally very efficient and very very busy - I don't feel good about implying that he screwed up - particularly since I do feel culpable myself. But I also don't feel good about having to shell out thousands of baht in order to leave the country, and it would be very nice if my employers would reimburse me.

I may be biased, because I'm in a similar situation, but this "you should have kept on me if you expected me to do what I said I would do" thing is bs.

Well fuckity. GF may be losing her job. We'll be alright financially if so, but with her dad and all, it just sucks. Plus she went through this last year this time. Lay off, universe!!

I've just emailed him politely to confirm my current situation (using the 'reply' function from his email of November 13th, so that it's clear that I did tell him I was planning on leaving at Christmas and reminding him that he'd said he was going to sort out our re-entry visas, without me actually having to state it in the body of the email) thus:

K. Pee tells me that because my last re-entry permit expired on November 27th and a new one was never applied for, I will be charged around 9000 baht when I go to the airport today - 500 baht per day of overstay. Also she says that I will have to apply for a new visa over the Christmas holidays, the paperwork for which you will kindly forward to me in England.

Can you confirm that you're going to send me the paperwork for the visa to my parents' address in the UK? And is there anything else I need to do to make sure I can come back for the start of next term?

Thank you in advance for your help - I am sorry to make extra work for you over the holidays.

This may seem too nonconfrontational, but if you think I am overly polite/unwilling to cause offense, then the whole Thai thing about courtesy and loss of face would blow you away. I would gain nothing by being arsey to the bloke. He will already be mortified about the situation - he's generally very on the ball and invariably kind and helpful.

I cc'd it to my Headmistress. Now I'm drafting a letter to her which is a bit of a stickier business - saying that this has happened, and making it clear that I think that the school should cover the fine. Because after a night's sleep and further consideration, I do think the school should cover the fine. Ngah.

Thus far I've got:

I'm sorry to bother you straight after we've broken up, but I wanted to keep you in the loop.

It occurred to me earlier this week that nobody had yet asked for my passport to sort out my re-entry visa, so on Thursday I asked [Admin Guy] if he could arrange for me to go to Immigration after school on Friday to get it done.

Upon reflection, I think that perhaps he sorted everyone else's out back in November, and because my passport was in my possession (because of the trip to Singapore), rather than in his possession, I just got left out. Certainly I didn't hear anything from him after I confirmed by email on November 13th that I would be returning to the UK for Christmas and thus need a re-entry visa. As we've all been pretty busy with brilliant books and parents' meetings and Christmas productions and one thing and another, I didn't give it any consideration until this week.

It turns out that my last re-entry visa expired on November 27th. Because it hasn't been renewed, I'm going to be charged 500 baht for every day of overstay (ie around 9000 baht) when I get to the airport, and will have to apply for a new visa from scratch over the Christmas holiday.

Since I gather we've been paid for December I *will* be able to cover the fine when I get to the airport today - but I hope I'm right in assuming that the school will reimburse me in full.

Again, I'm sorry to have such an unfestive reason for writing, but I'm sure you can understand my concern. I do hope that the rest of your Christmas break will be stress-free and fun-filled.

What do we think?

eta

Crap, GC! Job-ma for your girl!

Fay, that sounds like you have done an admirable job of refraining from playing the blame game, so all the best in getting your school to take some responsibility for the mess.

Job~ma for GC's gf. Lots of it.

I think I am going to talk about this a lot. Just saw the cast and crew showing of a movie Weekend King. I've known about it for a year - because they have been filming it all over town. And it looks like it is going to some of the independent film festivals.

Basic story - a guy lives and works in Silicon Valley, where he doesn't have much of a life. But he does have money ( he sold stock at the right time) . so one day he buys an impoverished town in Utah.I

It is very funny. a little dark, a little bitter, a little sweet.

here's the YouTube promo

[link]

{{{{{{{{{Jessica}}}}}}}}}

Fay, I think the letters sound fine.

Job~ma for the GF, GC.

GC - passing your GF all the keep-your-job~ma.

Jessica, my sympathies to you and your family. I.m so sorry.

Job-ma for the GF, GC.

Hec will appreciate that I'm in a hotel in Cleveland with the Raspberries. I was three feet away from Eric Carmen last night.

I read that as being in a hotel with raspberries, which a lovely breakfast in bed notion, but was curious about Hec being a big berry lover. Have a big rockin' blast, Cashmere.

I'm avoiding starting my housework.