1. In April 7th 2009, I mailed a letter to the Egyptian Embassy in Washington, DC to inform them of my visit to the Gaza Strip—my home. In the letter I included copies of the passport, permanent residency card, as well as other documents.2. In mid May, I still have not heard back from the Egyptian embassy about issuing me a visa, I should have followed with them much sooner, but I did not.
3. Upon learning my brother in law a resident in Norway attempted to get access to Gaza Strip via the Cairo Airport, only to be detained for 36 hours and sent back to Oslo, denied entry to Cairo—he wanted to meet up with his mother and his wife who were waiting for him in Egypt, they have not seen each other for 4 years. Granted he wasn’t able to see his family and was deported.
4. I called the Egyptian Embassy on May 20th to follow up on my visa application, the lady took my name and pretended to look for my file for a while, she returned and told me that they still have not heard from Egypt.
5. I call the following day, and she gives me her boss extension to ask him about my visa status. He wasn’t available, I left him a message and he never called back. I called him back the following day May 23, he took my info again and said they will call me back once they have something to tell me.
6. Now, I start to worry and ask my previous boss—a former Congresswoman to call the embassy to see what they deal was. She calls and she get somebody on the line, only to find out that somehow they embassy does not have my papers. Not sure, what went wrong there, so the lady at the Egyptian embassy advies me to file again, and wait 8 weeks.
7. My trip to Gaza is only 6 days away, and now I seriously consider changing my plans to make sure everything goes well and I get the green light from the Egyptians at the embassy.
8. My brother in laws finds out about my trouble and asks me to send him some information, what I initially sent to the embassy. He has contact with a distant family member who has good contact with the Palestinians Embassy in Egypt. The Palestinian embassy can actually put my name on the list within 48 hours and the Egyptians will grant me a visa—I had to do that in 2005 too.
9. A good friend of mine had good contact with an old guard of the PLO who also claimed to be able to put me on the list to get into Egypt. Now it was a time issue because now I am 3 days away from my planned trip.
10. I finally heard from one of my contacts to go, not sure about the other person though. I decided to take the trip knowing that one of three things could happen. The best case scenario, I will be allowed into Egypt and head to Gaza on my own terms. The second best scenario is to be granted entrance the airport and deported along with other stranded Palestinians at the government convenience and pays all those random fees they charge. That’s what I had to do in 2005. The hellish scenario is to de deported back to the country I came from which is what had happened to my brother in law a week before.
11. My trip was Washington DC, Cairo via Madrid on Iberia airline. It started like a good trip where the Iberia crew was both courteous and helpful. I wait in Madrid for six hours and then we take off to Cairo
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