Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Instructions to get a UAE visa

1) You have a passport from a Gulf country, or some developed nation that is friendly with the sheiks. If you have an Argentinean passport, go to #2

2) You apply for a visa at the UAE embassy in your own country. If you are travelling around the world and are nowhere near Argentina, go to #3

3) You go to a UAE embassy in whichever country you are at the moment. If you are in Jordan, this is not going to be of much help, go to #4

4) You go to Emirates Airlines' office, because you've heard that they would process a visa for you, if you "FlyEmirates". However, they require a sponsor. If you don't have one, go to #5

5) You need a sponsor. You email all your friends in the UAE and grudgingly ask for the big favor. Being a sponsor involves filling forms and making all sorts of financial disclosure. If your friends in the UAE are MIA and don't reply to your emails anymore, go to #6

6) You try to contact a hotel in Dubai. They want your business, so if you stay with them, they'll be your sponsor. If you are not willing to make a $5000 deposit, pay $400 a night for accommodation, and a non-refundable visa sponsoring fee of $200 (and btw, after all this, there's no guarantee that they can get a visa for a non-married woman), go to #7

7) By now, you have basically run out of options. But somebody tells you to go check with Royal Jordanian airline. You go to the first office in Amman, they send you to another one. Finally you meet with their UAE visa representative that has a secret direct line to the UAE immigration office. You book your flights with Royal Jordanian, leave a $600 deposit, pay a non-refundable processing fee of $40, and wait for their reply. After a few days of silence, you insist. The representative that helped you originally is not there anymore, but you find somebody else that sends you an email with a one-page attachment that says "visa" and has your personal details on it. Print that page, fly to Dubai, and go to #8

8) You land in Dubai airport and approach immigration with your printout. While waiting in line, you feel uneasy, not sure of what will happen. You go through not one, but two queues where officers review your documents, and use modern equipment to take pictures and scannings. Thank God (or Allah, probably), there are faster lines for women only. Finally, you are in! They stamped your passport, and you walk into the UAE. Easy.

Mercedes

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