I am getting so frustrated with the connections in Egypt. Our Interview is only two days away and we have barely been able to talk.

I am sure my Habibi will do fine...but I would feel so much better if we could have talked and reviewed all the info he knows about me and my family and whatever else we think they might ask. I just want this to go well so he will get approved and hopefully get his visa in hand soon. Not being able to talk to him has really been depressing. When we do get to talk we usually get cut off in the middle of our conversation. I know I should not worry....he is so confident that all will go well. And until today I have had a pretty good feeling about our interview. But I guess time is just running out.

I want to talk to my Habibi and see his face. But most of all I want the Interview to be over and him receive approval. I am ready for my husband to be to be my husband.

Anyway, back to the point has anyone heard any more news about when the cables will be fixed and Internet restored?





TimeLine:
===============================================

Became couple after few months of friendship in January 2007
First trip to Egypt June 21 2007 He is so wonderful!!!!
Engaged June 21 2007
Filed I-129F July 21st 2007
USCIS receives packet July 25th 2007
receive NOA1 August 14th 2007
Waiting
Waiting
Waiting
Leaving for Egypt again to see my love 10-20-2007
Back from Egypt 11-10-2007
I-129F Approved December 2nd 2007
NOA2 received in Mail December 7th 2007
Waiting working on our Packet 3 stuff
NVC Received Papers 12-06-2007
NVC Mailed Papers To Embassy 12-07-2007
Got Hard copy from NVC today 12-13-2007
Embassy received Papers 12-17-07
Packet 3 mailed by Embassy 12-17-2007
waiting
waiting
waiting
Packet 3 received 12-22-2007
Checked Fed Ex site again my package to Ahmed is on delivery truck on way to his home!!!!!!
Ahmed received the packet 3 I sent 12-22-2007
Birth Certificate, Police History and Military Certificate completed 12-23-2007
Medical Exam 12-24-2007
Today we got results of Medical exam and all translations back from translator
Packet 3 mailed to Embassy via DHL 12-26-2007
Embassy receives Packet 3 12-27-2007
waiting Packet 4
Called NVC Interview is Feb 11th 2008 at 0730 Packet 4 mailed by embassy today 1-22-2008
Just 2 days left before Interview......so nervous

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=109097

My husband and I have had no trouble communicating with Egypt by phone or internet. And we're talking boonies Egypt, too.

We have had the same problems with the phone connections this past week. We are cut off midconversation every time. We are able to text each other and get almost all of those. Haven't even tried internet lately with the reported problems.

If he is confident and has all information already then he should do fine. I remember the nervousness and fear at the time of my husband's interview. His interview really went well though and I am sure yours will too. Good luck!!!

We haven't tried yet. I hate chatting with him via the net. We always end up in a tiff. lol. We'll start out fine, then our cams freeze up, then the whole thing will freeze within 5 minutes and he'll have to reboot. I"ll wait 10 minutes and then call him. He'll be mad that i called 'cause he doesn't want me to spend the money for the call when we're chatting anyhow. Then we'll talk and his mic will go out usually at a pivotal point in the conversation. Then he'll complain that my cam froze and ask me to fix it. He insists that I need to turn this and switch off that and I have no farkin' idea what he means and he'll get frustrated and I'll get frustrated. Then he'll say something that I misunderstand because the reception sucks and I"ll get mad at what I THINK he said and it will take until later on that night when we text each other to fix the misunderstanding.



Bottom line I'd rather not use the internet to talk to him but he misses seeing me so we're going to try today and I'll let ya know how it is.

When we are on internet we have all these same issues happening with cam freezing, etc. It is so frustrating when you are in the middle of a conversation and just have it all freeze or DC.

hi Chery
how are ya ? i hope everything is OK with you
well the Internet connection is so pretty good now in Egypt since Monday and they keep fixing it
they are playing kinda bad games with the Internet connection DNS and with some connections IP
and its about 80% now of the normal speed or maybe a little bit more than that
i know you worried so much about the interview but he will pass it inshallah i heard they approve everyone now in Egypt hopefully
my best wishes for you

where did you hear that?

They've always "approved" everyone. It's getting the visa in a timely fashion that's the problem.

My husband and I talked to his sisters and cousins for a long time yesterday with no problems at all

My SO has Vonage and the last two days he has been calling me and everything has been just fine.

We often had similar problems with the internet in the West Bank. A lot of it is caused by overloaded servers (running wayyyyyy too many computers off the same line in the net cafe, etc.)

Thanks for all your replys. My SO lives in Damanhour Egypt. He had connection one day at his home all day while I was at work and lost it again as soon as I got off.

He has tried so hard to go to net cafes so we can talk but we have not had much luck there either. Once or twice we were able to talk for a couple of hours.

But the Interview is Monday and he needs to print our Skype Log for phone calls, Our emails, and our msn conversations from December until now for the Interview. Lucky we had printed all up to December 29th because we sent it with our Packet 4.

They returned it to us and told us bring to Interview....so we still have it. But we have nothing from December 29th until now. So I am getting nervous about it. Think they may tell him he does not have enough proof of relationship....and may deny him or put us into AP.

Maybe I am worrying over nothing.....But sometimes Cairo is quick and sometimes it seems as if they search for anything to hold you in AP.

Just pray he will get connection or find internet cafe with connection and printer so he can print our records before Monday.

Thanks for all your support.

Cheryl

Cheryl: Are you able to print those logs? because if you are, just print them, scan them and email them to him so he'll print them. I see he has no way to get them. Do you have them saved???

Good luck!!

or just fax them to him!!!!!! he'll be able to explain the Consular Officer that due to internet problems in Egypt you had to fax the logs for him to take them to interview.
I don't know, I'm sorry if I am saying dumb things, I just want to help....

Hey Cheryl,

Good luck with the interview to you both. Try not to worry. He knows you..he loves you.... THAT is what will come out in the interview. So dont worry. I did some number crunching and took the K1's from over the last 2 years from VJ. And this is what I found......

Almost 70% of the k1 interviews have their visas. Out of 24 interviews only 8 still wait. The longest wait I found was 15 months, but there are reasons for that. 2-3 have waited 10 months...the rest have waited only 5 months for visa. The AVERAGE time to visa in hand for those that did get I found to be 3 months. The longest wait to GET a visa for those that have was 7 months. In a nut shell...The odds favor a visa to be issued in a timely manner for a K1 visa. Yes there are those few that have waited...but on the whole for K1 the numbers speak for themselves. Bearing in mind this is coming from the VJ REPORTED timelines. So dont worry...relax....

For the internet connections...my SO has his own line and we have had no issues over the last 2-3 days now. If your guy shares a line...that will weaken his connection right up front. My SO ssays that they finished repairing the actual lines...however through today they are rerouting the services back through the newly repaired lines..and that may cause issues still for some. Hang in there...I'd say in the next day he should have better luck with net.

As far as recent call activity...i wouldn't worry...they rarely ask or WANT to see any documentation from what i've been reading...he just needs to show what he can..as he answers questions...relax...its in Gods hands now. Your relationship is real...they will see that. Calm...breath...do something for yourself in the next day or so...get out a bit...the work is done...now its time to reap the benefits...

Good luck...may God guide your SO"s words...give you comfort, peace and strength... Rise like the Eagle and soar. You are in my prayers....

I agree...they didn't look at the BOOK full of chat logs and phone records we had and they only looked at the photo album for all of two seconds after he pushed it in his face.

As for the number crunching.....if Cairo didn't change their methods then that would be valuable but they have changed their procedures at least twice over the past two years so I wouldn't put much stock into those figures at all. If I had my interview a year prior my husband would be here by now. The only bright side that I can see though is that many of the K-1's and K-3's that we have seen here come out of their interview saying they are approved. Not something that used to happen that often. Interviews are not always approved on the spot which is what makes the ap hang so long. I was told this both by DOS and by Cairo. On Cairo's website now they state the following:



bolded emphasis mine

http://cairo.usembassy.gov/consular/when.htm


So bottom line, if the interviewer outright says yes you are approved then no sweat, you'll have the visa within a month I would think. If he doesn't and just gives you the thing saying you are in administrative processing then you won't know that you are approved or not until that visa is in hand. That is what makes this time more stressful then all of the other steps in this process....knowing you could be an entire year in AP only to then be denied. INshallah that won't happen to you...or anyone else in AP hell.

Good luck.

Oh and my husband was able to chat with me yesterday at a cafe but there was a huge line to get a computer since everyone is trying to catch up on the time they lost.

Have a peek here, for what it's worth :

http://cairo.usembassy.gov/webchat/wc103107.htm

Scroll down to this post :

31/10/2007 03:05:29 م
Yehia Hussein : Can you please give us some examples of the administrative processing that is required to issue a visa and takes many weeks? Could it be just a simple similarity of names that triggers such administrative processing.
Conn Schrader: When a consular officers approves a visa, it may require additional administrative processing. This means that the officer is inclined to issue a visa and does not infer that he or she believes there is any problem with an individual applicant. Again, the overwhelming majority of approved cases are ready within a few days of the interview.

That makes no sense whatsoever. If it does not infer that he or she believes there is any problem with an individual applicant why interrogate the no-problem applicant's neighbors, why ask him demeaning questions at the interview? Is this just their way of saying you're awesome!

whoops.....nagishkaw...that is for non-immigrant visas. The ones we are going for I believe are immigrant visas. The procedures are very different.

Since there must be only a small percentage of applicants going through Cairo that are on this site, I'm curious what the actual statistics are for Cairo. I'm guessing most people probably do get their visas pretty quickly.

As to the internet connection, ours is fine now, has been for a few days with no problems. And hubby just got his own dsl instead of having to share, so it's even better alhamdulillah.


Bridget, aren't all visas except CR1 non-immigrant visas?

I thought they were all immigrant visas. Maybe someone else can chime in but regardless this is the start of the chat:



bolded emphasis mine. The K-1 and the K-3 are not temporary visas to the best of my knowledge.

That's too funny! I think it was a way to tell that person and others that , "we wanna be nice cos this will be posted online so people should keep their hopes up while we keep spewing the superficial BS. "

Egypt says Internet back to normal by Monday
Fri 8 Feb 2008, 17:25 GMT
[-] Text [+]

CAIRO, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Internet service in Egypt should be restored to normal by Monday after repairs to undersea cables are completed, an official at Egypt's state-controlled telecoms firm said on Friday.

Repairs on one of the two cables cut last month had been completed and repairs on a second cable were almost done, said Mohamed Nawawy, an official at Telecom Egypt, in remarks carried on state news agency MENA.

Breaks in the cables off Egypt's northern coast and another cut cable between Dubai and Oman had caused Internet disruptions in parts of the Middle East and Asia, with Egypt losing most of its capacity.

Repair work on part of the intercontinental cable known as SEA-ME-WE 4, co-owned by India's Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd , was finished, Nawawy said.

Repairs to a section of the FLAG Europe-Asia cable between Egypt and Italy would finish soon, he said, without giving further details.

Egypt has said it did not know if the cables were cut by bad weather. Storms forced the country to close the northern entrance of the Suez Canal around the time the cables were cut.

Egypt's Telecommunications Minister Tarek Kamel had ordered Telecom Egypt to compensate all users with a month's subscription free of charge. Egypt has also said it wants compensation from the undersea cable operators. (Writing by Will Rasmussen; Editing by David Holmes)