Monday, 11th of March, 2019.
This post is not yet about my Cairo, Egypt, experience but I think it is pretty important to tell all of you, right now, all about the request for Tourist Visa Extension. It is pretty simple: do not do it. OK, maybe now, because all of I will tell you, it sound not so bad as it was for me (even that I had read all about and was “supposedly” prepared). Still, I seriously doubt that worth all the trouble.
Lets start with the most important information: the price. Until last year (2018) it was 570 Egyptian Pounds, and it was with this number in mind that I walk through those doors. Not anymore, silly Billy! They simply doubled it the price. Doubled it! From on year to another. The reason? Well, according to the not very well understood explanation from the Bank guy, it was because of the Dollar. I just did not know that the Dollar had double it! Anyway, now you will pay 1100 EGP, something about 65 USD.
The process itself is a nightmare. Everything about is a nightmare. The building you need to go is called Magama and is located at Tahrir Square. It is the chaos itself. You get inside the building after passing your first metal detector. Now, take the stairs ahead in your right to the first floor. After the second metal detector, go right. You will pass a Bank and something like a circle empty space, keep going. When you see a police officer in a very busy counter with a huge queue, stop it. You need to take the form for your request here. That huge queue is the one you will need to take if you are a man. If you are a woman, you can wait on the left side of the corner, where usually there is a small line of women. Unlucky me, they told me that just after I was already waiting for almost two hours in the men line. Well, I always fought for equality, right? Anyway, be aware because there will be lots of people trying to cut the queue. As I said before, is totally chaotic. Unfortunately, people in Egypt do not look so kind as in other African countries I visited.
Now the documents you need to bring. First of all, if you are planing to visit lots of countries that you need a Visa before Egypt, trying to change your schedule. Why? They asked me for two copies of all the Visas I had stamped on my passport. Luckily I had just one Visa for Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda, what made me take “just” eight photocopies, two to each one of the four Visas I had. Plus, two photocopies of your currently Egyptian Visa, plus two photocopies of your front Passport page, plus one photo 3×4. You can get all of those going back downstairs and turning right at the corner. There is a small door with lots of people in a disorganized queue (the young lady who was in there is probably the only nice person in the whole building). With all of this and your form full filled, get on the queue. A tip that I got for another blog is about your address. Put an address of any Hotel at Tahrir Square and they will keep your process in this building. Apparently, if you put a New Cairo address, they send you to a different area of town.
The police officer who was there in the day I went to, looked like an jerk. He had no patience at all with people. He was smoking, he was slow, and at some point, he simply disappear for about twenty minutes, when the queue was almost getting out of the building. Anyway, with me he was nice, and just wrote a bunch of things in Arabic in my paper. Apparently about the two photocopies of all Visas. So he sent me to the next window at my right, the number 30. Most of the ladies working in there are very rude and ignorant.. The one sitting in the middle is the worse. The fact that they do not speak English is an absurd! How the government allow that in first place? They will give you the first paper you need to pay, about 15 EGP. After the payment, you come back to that same number 30 and they will take all you papers. When I though everything would be fine and she would give me the last paper to pay, she just said: “Two weeks, In shaa Allah!” What? Are you fucking kidding me? Two weeks for what? What a huge joke! As this whole process, this whole building, this whole country.
All about this process just reflects, in my opinion, the country itself. Everything in Cairo is chaos. The traffic, the way people drive, the places, the streets, the important buildings, like this one, which should be an example of organization, is a huge joke, full of incompetent, ignorant and rude employees, who probably hate their lives and jobs so they pass that through the people to whom they are there to serve, being paid for. Every moment while I was in there, I was asking myself why I was doing that. If I did not need to stay longer, I would never put myself in that situation and instantly would have made a better plan for staying just one month.
When I came back after two weeks I went to the window number 30 and the rudest lady sent me to the bank to pay the final fee. I came back to her with the receive and she sent me to another window. There a nice man (finally!) took a look on my papers and ask me to come back after 1 o’clock (the final process it happens between 1 and 3 o’clock). I had planned going to the Pyramids after that so I said I couldn’t come back that same day. He was very nice and talked with his boss who let me come back next morning after 9 o’clock. In the next day everything was very simple. I went to the Photography room, took a picture and that was it. They gave me back my passport with the new Visa expiring after 90 days,even that I had asked just for 45 days.