When you travel to India for a stay exceeding 180 days you will be required to register with the Foreigners Registration Office (FRO)  within two weeks of your arrival. This can be a bit tricky for us outsiders so I've put together a handy step-by-step guide to walk you through it.

The following took place over the course of two months.

How to Register with the FRO in India:

Step 1: Catch an auto rickshaw and ride the 45 minutes to the FRO the day after you arrive.

Step 2: Get stopped at the door and told to go online and download an application form and bring with it all the documents that you've already given them when you applied for your visa.

Step 3: Collect the documents and return. Wait for your number to be called. For 15 minutes no one will be called to the counter, despite all of them being manned by people starring at the wall.

Step 4: Wonder uselessly why this is.

Step 5: They will begin calling numbers and after 30 minutes it will be your turn. The man inspecting documents will find a typo in your rental contract and tell you to get it fixed and re-notarized. You will also be told to bring a copy of the landlords photo ID as well as a letter from your landlord stating that you will be staying there. It will seem to you that the signed rental contract would be sufficient. Ignore that thought.

Step 6: Wait a week and half for your landlord to come back from a business trip in Rome and give you a copy of his ID.

Bonus Traveler's Tip: It won't matter since before he gets back you'll realize you're being overcharged, find a better apartment for 8,000 rupees less and start the process over.

Step 7: Collect the new documents and take them to the FRO. Wait for your  number to be called. After 40 minutes it will be your turn, but the man at the counter will immediately direct you to another line where documents are being inspected by another man.

 Step 8: Wait in the second line for 30 minutes. The man at this counter will tell you that you're too far past the registration deadline so you will now need a police report from the city you currently live in stating that you have not been arrested for anything.

Step 9: He will give you a letter explaining what form is needed to give to the police.

Step 10: Take the request letter to the station. Once there they will tell you that you've only lived in this city for a few days so before they give you their report you'll need to present one from the city you first lived in.

Step 11: Ride to that city's police station. You will be informed that you need a request letter from the FRO listing their city's name. If you hear a soft chipping sound, don't worry. That's just the sound of your mind breaking in little, tiny pieces. Ignore it and ride the 45 minutes back to the FRO for the report request letter.

Bonus Traveler's Tip: When the FRO gives you the form with the wrong city on it, hand it back and tell them to reprint it. He'll try and convince you that this is unnecessary, but you'll know better because you’re a savvy traveler about to go completely insane.

Step 12: Return to the first police station with the proper letter. He'll ask you why it wasn't stamped by the FRO. Be bewildered. He'll shake his head and tell you that he needs copies of your visa and passport. Apparently the stamp was simply a matter of preference. When you give the copies to him, he will tell you the visa copy is on the wrong size paper.

Step 13: Take deep breathes and count to 10.

Step 14: Go across the street to a Xerox shop and get the copy on the correct sized paper.

Step 15: When you return he will then, and only then, inform that he also needs copies of your rental contract, your employment contract and a photograph of you.

Step 16: Look at your photo. Wonder who this person is. He looks strangely familiar, like someone you once new in a past life.

Step 17: Go back across the street to get these all copied.

Step 18: When you return three minutes later the police officer will be gone and you will be told that he has left to have breakfast.

Step 19: Burn the building down

Step 20: Burn the building down.

Step 21: Burn the building down

Step 22: Ignore the voices telling you to burn the building down as this will only further delay your registration.

Step 23: Wait the 20 minutes for him to return. He will take the copies and tell you to come back tomorrow.

Step 24: Go back the next day and wait at the station for half an hour. The police officer will show up and grab a Tupperware of food from his desk drawer. He'll tell you he's going to eat breakfast. Say something stupid like, "Wait! Is my report ready?"

Step 25: Watch him walk away, pretending he hasn't heard you.

Step 26: Wait another 20 minutes while you cling uselessly to your feeble grip on reality like an elderly widower clutching  a photograph of his long dead wife.

Step 27: When he returns he'll turn on his computer and print the report. Could he have done this before breakfast? No, you idiot. Why would you even think that?

 Loose five points.

Step 28: The police officer will then tell you to go across the street to make copies for him. Apparently you now work at the police station too. Congratulations on your new job, Senior Copier Guy Who Copies Stuff For People Who Love To Eat Breakfast!

Step 29: Return with the copies and leave with the original. Remember those voices telling you to burn the building down? Feel free to give now!

Step 30: Act casual as you walk out of the burning building.

Step 31: Get sent to Chennai for four days on business.

Step 32: When you return take the report to the station of city you currently live in. Die a little inside when he tells you that the report was only valid for three days. Did anyone bother to mention this to you? Nope! Is it printed on the form anywhere? Nope! Did Officer Breakfast try to tell you this telepathically? Maybe!

Step 33: Since you're already there, the officer wants to see your apartment to make sure this isn't some elaborate ruse to drive yourself insane. Oh, but he doesn't have a car so you have to find a rickshaw and you have to pay for it.

Step 34: Show him the apartment and drop him back off at his station.

Step 35: Go back to the charred remains of the other station and explain to Officer Breakfast that you need another report.

He'll tell you that he can't give you another report without another request letter from the FRO. You'll ask why a second, nearly identical letter is necessary. He'll just shrug and walk out of his office, leaving you to clutch your knees to you chest and rock back forth mumbling incoherently.

Step 36: Keep in mind that punching an officer of the law right in his breakfast-eating face is frowned upon in India and exit the station peacefully.

Step 37: Ride the 45 minutes back to the FRO and wonder how it's possible to hate a building so much.

Step 38: Ask for another request letter and show the man working the desk the other city's request letter so he knows what you're asking for. He'll ask you why it's not stamped.

Bonus Traveler's Tip: Apparently there is  a magical man who runs around stamping important documents which is obviously why no one bothered to tell you that a stamp for them existed let alone was necessary.

Step 39: Get the request letter and...

Step 40: Get it stamped.

Step 41: Take the stamped request letter to the police station of the first city you lived in. Wait 30 minutes for the officer to come to his office.

Bonus Traveler's Pop Quiz!

What was Officer Breakfast doing for those 30 minutes:

A Eating dinner

B His job

C Eating breakfast heyguysthisistherightanswer.

Step 42: He will take the form and ask for scanned copies of your passport and visa. You'll remind him that you gave those to him last week. He will tell you that those are now in storage. Of course they are.

Step 43: Go across the street and make copies. When you hand them in the officer will tell you to come back later that evening. 

Step 44: Return and collect the report.

Step 45: Muster up the strength to do a victory dance.

Step 46: Take this report and head to the station of the city you currently live in. There's a new officer in charge and he heard you have a pretty sweet pad and now he wants to see it. Find a rickshaw and pay for it to take the two of you to your apartment. Show it to him and drop him back off at the station.

He'll tell you to return for their report later that night.

Step 47: Return to the police station. He'll tell you to return at 11 the following morning. At this point your exhaustion is outpacing your anger. Crawl away.

Step 48: Return to the police station again. Wait with the police officer for the police chief to show up to sign your report. After about 20 minutes the officer will get annoyed of your constant sighing and the two of you will go to find the chief.

The police chief will be the man with two stars on his shoulder watching TV. Some show about Indian people. He'll look away from the screen long enough to sign your form.

Step 49: With both reports and all necessary documents in hand, march proudly into the FRO. Nothing can stop you. You're on top of the world.

Step 50: You suck and you're stupid. One of your letters from your company isn't written right. Has it been look at and approved by several FRO employees? Yep! It even has check mark seal of approval on it. Doesn't matter!

Step 51: Oh and also now you need a scanned ID of your boss.

Bonus Traveler's Tip: On the FRO website is a list of documents necessary for your registration. A copy of your boss's ID isn't on there. No one is going to mention it until now. But still, you should have known…somehow.

Step 52: Take a rickshaw 45 minutes back to the office. Write and print a new letter and copy your boss's ID.

Step 53: Take a rickshaw back to the FRO and hand in the papers. He will stamp your passport letting everyone know from here on out that you registered late. But who cares because...

Step 54 : Congratulations! You are now a registered foreigner as well as a danger to yourself and others. What is the meaning of this vulgar reality? All is an illusion.

Step 55: Check yourself into a nearby mental institution and enjoy the rest of your life in a bathrobe.

Without stopping to look down I jump off the Satabdi Express with a hundred other passengers before and behind me. We are like water from a spout, poured too quickly into the grimy train station. We trip over each other and each other's children before sloshing against the grey walls opposite and pillars in between.

The train, now far behind me, was air conditioned, and now outside I'm having trouble breathing. The April air in Chennai is so thick you could gargle it and spit it out. The humidity immediately wraps itself around me. It's like wearing a wetsuit underneath a sweater in the middle of July.

When I talked to my friends about the trip in the days leading up to it their eyes would go wide as they tried to convince me to reschedule.

"No, no too hot now. Go a different time."

Unfortunately Chris is only in town for a week and we have meetings already lined up.

We hurry through the crowded, dimly lit train station, stepping over sleeping travelers and weaving around toppling piles of luggage. After six hours on the train it feels good to test my legs.

We finally emerge from the sweltering maze into the sweltering city and begin searching for a rickshaw.  There should be 40 of them swarming tourists lost in a new land, but we see only five or six. We would later learn that everyone is at home watching the Cricket World Cup which happens once every four years. The final match is pitting India against their neighbor, Sri Lanka.

Eventually we do find a driver. He charges us 175 rupees for a ten minute ride that should only cost 25, but it's a seller's market so we reluctantly accept. We arrive at the hotel and walk into the lobby just in time to see India loose the World Cup. As I fall asleep the trains gentle rocking continues somewhere deep in my inner ear.

The following day is filled with meetings and planning, but as it winds down Ravi, our sports director, offers to take me to a state football match where one of our former players is competing. Oasis runs multiple football leagues throughout South India for boys and young men growing up in the slums. We use these leagues to give them a reason to not join a gang or follow their fathers into alcoholism. Role models like Ravi are able to show them that there are new and better ways to live, if they only decide to work and work hard for it.

We jump on Ravi's motorcycle and head out to the stadium.

The blazing sun is setting, kept at bay behind tall buildings as a cool wind finds its way to us from the nearby ocean. People escape their various places of work and flood the sidewalks to chat, sip chai and eat deep-fried street food. As our motorcycle cuts left down a narrow street, the sunlight begins breaking free, flashing rhythmically though each gap in the passing buildings. It feels as though it's chasing us, desperately trying to keep up. All of this is seen through half-shut eyes. I made the mistake once of fully opening them while on the back of a motorcycle. The stinging is instantaneous, as small particles of dust hit your eyeballs at 30 miles an hour.

As we find a seat in the stadium, Ravi points our player out to me. From the distance it's hard to make out any distinguishing features except for the big number 10 printed on the back of his jersey.

Ravi offers a few details about Number 10's life before Oasis. He grew up with a dad who was perpetually drunk and a mother who was gone all day cleaning houses just so they could survive. He and his younger brother stayed in school and at night would sleep beneath a roof made of dried palm leaves. For a long time, this was their future. Then several years ago they began playing with Oasis and have since become quite skilled at the sport. They've made good friends and found mentors in their coaches, especially Ravi.

Now Number 10 is paid a decent salary to play football with the state's equivalent to our minor leagues  and, according to Ravi, he has a real chance at playing professionally within the next few years. His younger brother plays for the division below him but is getting better every season.

Even with the 200 or so other spectators (all male), the massive stadium is practically empty. The men behind us yell down to the players with every steal and missed shot. "They're shouting swear words," is the closest to a translation I can get out of Ravi. A old man is sprawled out on the concrete floor below us, sleeping off his afternoon beers. Children jump over him to get back to their seats.

Number 10's team is losing, 2-1, with one minute left in the game. Suddenly his teammate breaks free with the ball and dashes towards the painted goal posts. A stampede of stained yellow jerseys close the gap and quickly surround him, but it's too late, he's already in shooting range.  With a swift kick the ball rockets out from the cluster of players, cuts left and just barely misses the goal. As the ball rolls away from the field the referee blows the whistle. The game is over.

We pack up and Ravi drops me back at my hotel. 

I’ve been keeping a record of these random scenes from day to day life in my shiny new Moleskin notebook, a gift from the supercool Brandon and Mel. I’ll be posting them from time to time:

A family of three speeds by on a motorcycle, barely an inch away from our auto-rickshaw. The woman sits towards the back holding an infant and I laugh thinking about the outbreak of justifiable panic that would erupt if this were to happen back home.

A Muslim girl walks towards me, her face covered with only sharp, stoic eyes peering out. Suddenly they contort, she stops walking and her hand rushes to cover her mouth.
With a shake of her head and a sonic boom a sneeze breaks free.

I step onto my patio Sunday morning and pull an undershirt off the clothes line. I put it on and the thin cotton is warm from the still rising sun.

I walk into a restaurant during what happens to be one of the biggest cricket games of the year.  India versus their former countrymen of Pakistan. The game is projected on the wall and to me it's chaos but all eyes are aimed at the screen.  I assume India has won when the room explodes into hugging and cheering.

A coworker kindly offers to buy me breakfast.
With my last bite an insect surfaces
in the small bowl of cilantro chutney
I've been dipping rice flower cakes into.