Iqarma quest and the jawizaat

When I received my shiny new six month visa through the post before I left I assumed, immigration wise, that would be the end of the matter. How wrong I was.

As I slumped in the back seat of the taxi after a 6 hour flight on my first visit to Syria, trying not to think too hard about where it was actually taking me, I flicked through my passport to examine my new entry stamp, upon which was printed the following:

WHEN HE WANTS TO STAY MORE THAN 15 DAYS HE MUST REFER TO THE BRANCH OF IMMIGRATION

At this point I was too tired to contemplate the consequences of this statement and promptly drifted back to sleep.

Fourteen days later I overheard some friends discussing what they were going to do about residency. I had read somewhere that there was a residents’ permit available which meant that you wouldn’t have to renew your visa in London after the six months was up, but I had decided that after six months I would probably be in need of a holiday. It was only after I expressed these sentiments to my friends that the huge error in my logic was revealed to me.

In Syria, so it seems, bureaucracy is so substantial for two reasons:
1- That the officials enjoy the power-rush when they instil foreigners with a sense of hopelessness.
2- There is no interdepartmental cooperation.

So I came to learn, the department for immigration, which let me into the country and issued my six month visa, has absolutely nothing to do with the department for residency, which lets you stay in the country for anything longer than a quick holiday. So, according to the stamp in my passport, in just over a day's time I would be an illegal immigrant.

Seeing my look of panic, my friends came to the rescue. Apparently, even though the stamp says ‘go to the immigration department in 15 days or else’ they’ll turn you back if it has been anything less than a month since your arrival.

Finally, an additional two weeks later I decided that it was time for me to pay a visit to the Department for Immigration (a.k.a. jawizaat). Four of us (two guys and two girls) were in need of a visa extension and we were fortunate enough to have some vague instructions as to what needed doing. At 9am our taxi came to a halt in a pretty nondescript area of town, and were it not for the swarms of people jostling outside one particular grey tower block we would have been at even more of a loss as to what we actually needed to do.

So we paid for the taxi and marched with an air of false confidence to the entrance, pushed past some people and went in.

Then we quickly came out again. After less than a minute inside the building we were thoroughly flustered and, standing in the cool morning breeze, decided to call someone on the phone for help. “Go upstairs and over to the window in the corner” were the instructions we clung to on our second attempt, as we pushed through the masses of people waiving green Iraqi passports about their heads. We eventually made it to the window, putting years of school rubgy tactics to good use, and conveyed that we wanted a visa extension. After parting with 25SL each we were presented with a form and headed back outside to surface for air. To cut a very long story short, the next hour and half went something like this (although not accounting for all the people hindering every stage of the quest)

Fill in form. Apply postage stamps to it. Take to window. Get another form. Get four copies of different form made. Fill in each one (it was made explicitly clear that you couldn’t just photocopy a form which was already filled in). Staple one passport photo to the top of each. Get multiple copies of passport and visa. Take all forms and copies to top floor to be signed by the General of Administration. Take forms to office on third floor to get a number. Return to window. Hand in forms and passport. Take a deep breath. Leave.

(I apologise if the order is not quite rightm it was a very stressful day - but I hope you get the gist!)

Having achieved nothing except the loss of my passport (with no receipt to claim it back) I went home and got back into bed.

Fortunately I did get my passport back the following day, only after returning to the window and enduring some sort of identity parade where they looked through all the passports for one with a picture that matched, pointing and laughing all the while.

I’m not going to even bother to explain what residency permit entails. Maybe when I’ve recovered from the memory...