The Efficiency of French "Bureaucrazy" ughhg

Ok, I’ll try to keep this just a minor rant about all of the paperwork that I have been going through, but it has gotten slightly frustrating! First I need to get a residence permit that will validate my visa for a year; in order to get the residence permit, I need several letters from my school attesting to the fact that I work here, live here, have opened a French bank account, have an official French translation of my birth certificate, etc etc. So once I gathered all of this info, I went to the government office an hour before it opened to join the line of people already there … and it still took about an hour and a half to get it all done. However, this was just the first step in the process … next I have to send a letter requesting a medical visit; I will supposedly receive a date for this, and then will take my medical letter back to get one step further in the process. I think it will probably take about a month or so to get it all done. I also had to apply for a French social security number, in order to actually get paid for teaching; however, this is just a temporary number until I actually receive the residence permit. Basically, it is frustrating because to get one thing, you need several documents, which may or may not be available until you have finished applying for something else. And I just found out that to get my cell phone & plan, I have to have my permanent residence card, which based on all of the above info, probably won’t be ready for another month. But I will find a loophole for the cell phone and get it taken care of!