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Originally posted by sonomod:
I am wondering, do foreigners need to carry passports everywhere they go? Or do you get a ID if you have permenment residency?

It scares me to carry my passport everywhere, is there a different option?

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It's preferable to carry it with u, it help if there is any problem..
and u can have an ID, when u get the nationality !! dunno if u can get one if u have permenment residency

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Originally posted by ExptinCAI:
only time you need it is if you're traveling to sinai. otherwise, it's just like carrying any form of ID in any country. some people always carry a driver licence/id - others don't. it's up to you.

why would it scare you? if you lose it, it's easy to get another one.

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Because after dealing with the bureaucratic mumbo jumbo to get my recent passport. I don't want to have to file for a new one in a foreign country.

I had to send the USA government over 60 forms of identification since I applied for a passport after marrying my husband and taking his name. I had to send affidavits from third parties proving who I am. And it took longer than usual. Let alone the costs incurred from having to get a passport issuing agency to help expedite the process.

Imagine having to do that in Egypt?

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Originally posted by Penny:
I also don't trust myself to carry my passport everywhere. I once left my bag in the back of the taxi just after arriving from the airport it had every important document and quite a lot of money in it. Fortunately I had for once turned my mobile phone on and my husband had the forethought to phone it while running full pelt after the taxi. Thank goodness for honest taxi drivers. I now only carry it going in and out of Sinai as ExptinCAI says and have not needed it, except for hotels of course.

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I probably will try to see Sinai for hiking.

But during my trips in Egypt, I can't tell you how many tourist officers had stopped my brother in law to see my passport and basically piss him off.

Having a secondary form of ID in Arabic showing that I am married to an Egyptian would help. This is something a passport can't explain.

I'll have to email the embassy again. But it takes 4 emails reworded to say the same thing in order for them to understand. Like its some sort of game. Kinda like the tourist officers.

In all my time in Egypt I have never been asked for my passport once except at official checkpoints. Fot the first time ever just recently I was asked if my husband was my husband but that was at a very busy Cairo tourist place.

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Originally posted by sonomod:

Because after dealing with the bureaucratic mumbo jumbo to get my recent passport. I don't want to have to file for a new one in a foreign country.

I had to send the USA government over 60 forms of identification since I applied for a passport after marrying my husband and taking his name. I had to send affidavits from third parties proving who I am. And it took longer than usual. Let alone the costs incurred from having to get a passport issuing agency to help expedite the process.

Imagine having to do that in Egypt?

I'll think I'll bring a small safe with and keep the passport in there. And just carry ID.

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Well, I don't have to imagine it as I renewed my passport in Cairo. It was so effortless in the embassy and took 24 hrs. If you're that anxious, bring copies of your birth certificates, make copies of your passport and register with your embassy upon arrival. That way if you should even lose your passport, it'll be easy to get a replacement.

Really, there's nothing to be freaked out about. You can buy a safe* here and usually people do keep emergency cash on hand in the house (everybody, usually) so it's common to have a safe.

*just not so small someone can walk away with it hiding it under his coat, lol

A few of my husband's acquaintances have lost their Egyptian passports in the USA and have to leave the country because of it. With no return visa I might add.

And I have had at least 15 debts recorded in my name that I had to fight tooth and nail to scrub out.

I'll leave it in a safe at home or deposit box at a bank.

Yeah, and I keep every paper with my name on it, only shred them. So I will keep lots of identification under safekeeping.

Yet it will be a hard time for an Egyptian woman to use my ID, 130 of my first, middle and surname female babies were born in the same hospital the same month I was born. Can you say the baby boom generation doesn't have any creativity?