I finally made it to India! But before I forget, let me elaborate on what happened yesterday since my last post was quick.
'After finishing work, I rushed to meet some friends to go go-KARTING in Villagio. It was amazing. Omer, florent, noor, taina, and luma ( a new friend ) were all there and it was amazing. Pictures will be coming up soon'.
Actually what happened was that I left
work early and went for a quick
meeting regarding the International orientation ( will elaborate on that some other time). After the meeting, I went to Villagio with
Benazir to meet up the
rest of the group. Go-Karting was amazing. If you are in Doha and bored, its the best thing to do. Its true that its a bit expensive ( 60 QAR for 10 mins), but its really worth it.
Than was a crazy drive back home since I was really late and had literally 20 minutes to pack and be ready to leave to the airport. Thankfully, everything went as planned and I was at the airport on time to leave to India. Basel, thanks once again for the ride.
Now for the story you all have been waiting for, how I got my visa! I know most of you reading this actually know the story but here it goes.
So I go to the Indian Embassy last Monday to apply for my visa and I have all my papers ready. Benazir, a friend of mine who is interning at the same company I am interning at, was with me since I give her a ride everyday. So I enter the embassy and see the longest queue of Indian men I have ever seen.
Remembering what Corinne told me about her experience with the Embassy, I tell Benazir to submit my papers since she was a girl and she could cut through the line without anyone questioning.
After cutting through the photocopying machine queue, and the general inquiry queue, I realized there was a problem. The Officer told me that the visa will need between one to two weeks to be issued and I was travelling in 3 days. At that point, I was really going to go crazy at the officer because when I called two days ago, the lady on the phone said that I will get the visa within one day. Anyways, moving on, I called my dad and told him the bad news. However, my dad with his smart thinking, gave me an idea (even though it sounded crazy to me).
He told me to go to the airport and give my passport to any trustworthy looking person who was travelling to Oman. My dad would then get the passport from him and get me the visa from the Indian Embassy in Oman. It does take a day in Oman to get it. And to get my passport back, my dad would send the passport with someone who was travelling to Doha! Genius
That is exactly what happened. My passport went to Oman with a group of three Qatari men and came back the next day in the evening with a Omani family.
Now I know that some of you might think its crazy to give your passport to a random person, but when you think about it, I had no other option.
Right now, I am at the hotel with my dad and its 7:30am. I think I will take a nap until our business meeting with some companies at 10.
In tonight's blog, I will try to give you my first impressions of India and my little list of things I am planning to do while in Delhi.
Ah, I already knew the story behind your Indian visa. But I still think it was too risky a thing to do. But then again, you're Abdalla Ezadin Abdalla and you can manage, yeah? :P Whatever I'm happy you got things done on time. Acha, in your next post please don't tell us that India is dirty, everyone already made a huge deal after Slumdog Millionaire. Let's focus on the goodies, shall we? Lots of pictures when you go sight-seeing, IF you go sigh-seeing :P
ReplyDeleteP.S. Make sure the pictures aren't as blurry as the ones in this post :P
P.P.S Miss thee!