A Year Gone By - Part B

Because I had already been living in Egypt for more than 6 months, I was allowed to file for a visa for Mohamed to move to the US from Cairo. I do believe that this method served our purposes greatly, and even though the US Embassy is a place of much needed help, it may have saved us months of waiting. The consulate predicted that if we filed all of our papers accurately, not forgetting or adding one thing, our process should be completed within three months.

Sure enough, after many visits back to the Embassy for each process, and numerous nighttime travels back and forth between Sharm el Sheikh and Cairo, the date for our final interview arrived in the mail. It was set for my day off from work, so we prepared our backpack full of snacks, bottled waters, and toilet paper, and headed to the Embassy with a change of clothes and perhaps the most anxious feelings imaginable.

Many hours later, after mix-ups with paperwork and with our energy slowly draining we met again with the consulate. He told us that we passed with flying colors and to expect the visa in the mail within 10 business days. Relief!

In the middle of May, Mohamed and I returned to the village to spend time with his family before our traveling to the US. Those days were both joyous and sad for both of us, and while it seemed that every minute that passed did so with such great struggle, it also felt as if the time quickly passed, and we were soon packing our bags for the 42 hour trip back to the US. A word of advice from a friend: planning a stop in Amsterdam with a 10 hour period between flights is not in your best interest, especially when you do not plan to tour Amsterdam during that time of waiting.

Having been in the US for nearly one year now, we still continue to learn more about each other’s cultures, and though I began this post by complaining about the lack of interest in the American culture that I face, I do believe that there is even still so much that I could, and should observe.