Time for Work Permits

Ahhh today heralded another trip up to the glorious El Tor, the next town up from Sharm el Sheikh. There is basically one main road that leads in, goes through the town and and then out of Sharm. If you head along it towards the North East you will come across Dahab after about an hour's drive through the desert, and if you head along it to the North West for an hour, you will hit El Tor. It is here that all the legal stuff takes place, such as visa renewals, driving license applications, court hearings and other fun activities that no sane soul would want to do whilst here on holiday.

Today, we have finally had our work permit renewals approved, so had a fairly lengthy process to go through. There is a file for each of us, full of our application forms in Arabic... five copies of this for each of us, multiple photocopies of our passports, a ton of our photos and a few other forms, all of which needed to be meticulously checked whilst we waited. As we sat in the office, admiring the peeling paint on the ceiling, we noticed that one of the office girls (yes... refreshingly, they do have women working in Government offices here) actually had her new born baby asleep in a pram next to her... creche facilities at work eh, very up to date. And what a chilled out baby he was. We were in there for well over an hour, and there was barely a snuffle or whimper from him... hmmm industrial strength Kalpol may have been at work there it was suggested... hehe. He even slept through the rather heated argument going on between our Human Resources chap and the work permit guy... I was impressed. Thankfully, the argument was resolved, and we headed off to our next port of call... the hospital.

Here we had to have our blood tests done (every foreigner working here has to have an HIV test each year), which for the most part, went well, apart from poor Eloise whose veins seemed to have done a runner. We were all intentionally a little dehydrated, trying to avoid having to use the dreaded loo from hell that is found in the El Tor passport office, but maybe she had gone a little too far. Note to ourselves for future visits... "yes, dehydration means no cringeworthy pee breaks, but go too far and the doctor can't find your veins!" Ouch!

Next stop was finally the passport office, which usually takes another hour or so. By now we were all a little peckish... so once the passports and yet more application forms were dropped off, we headed for a nearby falafel bar.

Back to basics, this is a traditional Egyptian breakfast, and supremely tasty. Freshly fried, delicious falafel (still warm from the vat of bubbling oil) were popped into pockets of local bread, with a handful of fried potatoes, finished off with a bunch of salad and tahina... hmmmm and all for the equivalent of thirty pence. We then, in true local style, sat by the road and watched the world go past, properly sticking out like sore thumbs, as this is most definitely the real Egypt, not a tourist in sight.

Finally, our passports were ready... all stamped and signed, and we were ready to head back home to Sharm. Woo Hoo.. after all the unease hanging over our heads for the last few months, wondering whether we would even be allowed to continue working in the country, it has all been sorted and we are good for another year.

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