Awesome, but god so much work to get a damn phone.

It would be worth it for some people to just pay the premium.

epic journey nonetheless

That's great news! Would you mind sharing how you handled shipping? (Which courier, whether you bought insurance, customs etc). I'm trying to get one shipped from Dubai as well.

ohhh do let us know if this one does come available and for what price

expansys has the cyan:

http://www.expansys-usa.com/nokia-n9...n-16gb-220312/

Well, we went three different routes on this one from Dubai - we had 4 different phones coming in from there.

One was sent from there, via FedEx. I have an account for FedEx, so I gave him my account number and it was sent that way. No matter what though, I believe that FedEx only pays like $100 on this kind of stuff unless you state the proper price and pay the extra.

DHL is a no-go. You can't do it. No matter what. They will not ship out electronics from Dubai.

One went to London, was sent from there. That was the fastest route. But it was because that person was on travel to London, so the coincidence was in our favor.

And one is in New York now... like right now. That contact was in Dubai, now is in New York, but got delayed on their trip by a couple of days... but will be sending it via my FedEx account again to me directly.

I know you can drop ship or use air mail, but no tracking number scares the hell out of me.

Oh man... I remember when the PC Engine Super Grafx wasn't coming to the States and I couldn't locate a importer and I had JUST left Japan a few weeks prior. I had to locate a store that had one in stock - calling around Akihibara and speaking horrific Japanese, then give my card number to a friend that was still there, they then took their sweet time to send it to me, then finally I got the damn thing only to notice that I also needed games too... the "bundle" I paid for was an extra controller and a carry bag for the system.

It's quite unusual for me to be totally "screw you, I'll get it by hook or by crook" type of mode, but when I do get there, I get it.

BTW Negri electronics have confirmed having 16gb in stock and ready to ship if anyone wants to bite. $689.50

I'm willing to bite. Anyone have any reviews of Negri electronics? A cursory Google seems to show mostly positive reviews as well as decent customer support. Their purchases seem to happen using my Amazon account, which probably indicates that they're legit.

Thoughts?

I've booked a black 16GB n9 from Negri electronics. Total cost is $689.50 including shipping. Lets see how this goes.

@gerbick: I might not require the 64GB one that I requested.

Guys, check this place out. They're about 10 mins drive away from me and I've bought number of phones from them in the past. I called them yesterday and the guy I spoke with confirmed that they have them in stock and ready for pick up...not sure which ones they have as I didn't bother asking.

A few days before knowing that they would have the N9 in stock this week, I had bought a black one, 16Gb through my cousin in New Zealand. He's got it in his hands and to my dismay, he's taking his sweet time sending it to me. Cost was secondary to me as I want this phone so badly.....my debit card was charged $723.84 for it plus I sent him $172(fees included) for shipping via Western Union....totaling $895.84....ouch....but it's still cheaper that the one available locally.

I have yet to get a confirmation from my cousin that he's shipped my N9...that is very unlikely as it is the weekend there and I'm sure no shipping place is open. But i'm keeping myself optimistic that I will have it in my hands by next week at this time...we shall see.....

If any of you guys interested on knowing what they have, call them up and let me know what I can do to help.

http://www.welectronics.com/gsm/Noki...6GB-Black.HTML