Malaysian Passport Renewal In London During COVID-19 in 2021

I normally fly home to renew my passport but Covid-19 as usual, ruined everything therefore I needed to renew my passport in London. My passport is expiring in July 2021. When I checked in January 2021, I was under the impression that it could wait but in mid April 2021, there was a notice on Jimlondon.net that apppointment is required for the passport renewal so off I went to the STO website and to my horror, the next available appointment was in mid August.

Anyway, I managed to get an earlier slot after multiple phone calls and email *special shout out to Jesmin who kindly squeezed me in to an earlier appointment* as I need a valid passport for work and Uni application.

It was a very stressful situation and I couldn't find much information on how to proceed so I hope that this post will help anyone who are in my situation in UK/ Europe.

1- Get the passport appointment made when your passport is expiring in 6 months time at STO.

2- Don't worry about online application. I wasted 6 hours of my life trying to upload the passport photo online. Multiple specification failure without any help in succeeding.

3- Gather your IC, expiring passport and UK visa with 1 photocopy of each document. Don't need any passport photo as they will snap it in the High Comm (advisable to wear black or dark coloured blouse/ shirt, I wore my black hoodie).

4- Head to High Comm on your appointment date, go to the basement and get a ticket number. They start the passport renewal process at 10am. *remember your facemask and the receptionist will check your temperature before allowing you in*.

5- After they call your ticket number (identical announcer as back home lol!), head to one of the 3 allocated counters. Submit your documents and photocopies, get your photo snapped, thumbprint obtained and signatures on paper then pay the passport renewal fee by cash. Mine was 41pounds. No card machine available.

6- The passport will be ready to be collected in 1-1.5 hours so after submitting, head out for a walk/ coffee and return in 1 hour time. Canteen that serves local food was sadly closed due to Covid lockdown restrictions. Try to spot the person who has the ticket number before you and stay near to the counter when you return because the counter officer will announce your name verbally according to the arrangement of being served without relying on your previous ticket number. The officer was obviously fasting as it is ramadhan time so the voice was not very loud.

My experience:

I arrived to High Comm at 0945, got served by 1030, spent 5-10min at the counter submitting documents etc, left for coffee, returned to High Comm by 1125 and collected my new passport by 1132am. Quick and slick. Quite pleased and proud with how efficient things went. Seriously grateful to Jesmin who kindly allowed me an earlier appointment. You are the best!

Take care and stay safe!!

COVID 19 in 2021

Hello!! I just noticed that my last blog post was exactly 1 year ago today. How funny is this. My last post was during Covid's 1st wave. Since then, 2nd wave happened and predicting 3rd wave if this vaccine programme fails. I have now moved back to the main city and things are different. People are just tired and fed up with all these lockdown. I have been dealing with a few adulting things such as mortgage, grant searching for research etc Am I still angry? Sometimes I think mostly because I feel like I am stuck/ stagnant at where I am. No obvious visible progression. Work has not been as satisfying and with all the restrictions from indoor dining, mixing with friends from other household etc, it feels like another year wasted. I should feel more motivated in pursuing academic world but when work is not going as smoothly as it should, it affected my motivation and drive. I still like research etc but the essential autodrive to achieve quick result is failing. It took me a few months to realise that I am not enjoying work, I am frustrated with my lack of efficiency and initiative and I am going through a vicious cycle. So I took annual leave proper (took some over pre-Xmas period but end up still going into work) and 1st week was basically dealing with adult life stress and second week was basically catching up with friends locally and internationally. Longest conversation that week was 8 hours. Restrictions are easing but traveling overseas is still not allowed. Vaccine programme is going as plan here in this country but when I see messages circulating on the internet or shared by my family, it drives me up the wall. All the non- evidence based speculations are trusted more than what study results showed. I like how a researcher explained the situation we are currently in and the choices we should make. ' Imagine you are in a building that is on fire and there is a car that can save your life. Would you question if the car is ferarri or porche or BMW? No, you take the car and drive out of the building!' Stop spreading that pfizer or Astrazeneca or China's Sinovac is better. Just get the vaccine! One of my friend was refusing to take the Covid vaccine because he was worried that he will be infertile. What?! How?! *facepalm* And the media reporting about the rare cerebral venous thrombosis complications and the speculations surround it, fearmongering the already doubful vaccine population. Look at the other side of the coin, at least there is an adverse reaction reporting system. How sure are the other vaccine from other countries are accurately reporting their complications? Politics are too complex for my simpleton brain so I shall refrain from going into that rabbit hole. Recently (actually yesterday) just came back from an essential travel to renew my Passport and had a very pleasant nice surprise to meet a few juniors at the Embassy and end up hanging out together going food hunting. The renewal process was so smooth and I was stress over lack of information so my next post will be on that, hopefully help a few people who were in my situation. With what's been going on in other countries, I should be grateful for still being alive, healthy as well as having my family and friends still staying safe and healthy. When I hear news about the situation in India, I tear up. The Indian doctors in this country must have feel strongly about going home to be with family or help out but with travel ban and the risk of not coming back to this current work place, it's such a difficult choice. I feel for them =( Let's all hang in there and stay safe everyone!