Ali-baba

Well, it's been a wild and crazy few days... First off the last weekend of Ramadan where we had from Friday to Monday off was a bit of a runaway, as per usual I s'pose. For those of us expats who hung around the resort we planned a tournament each day. Friday was golf, Saturday was Poker and college football (via slingbox), and Sunday was pool. I was relatively well behaved Friday and Saturday nights even though I had dressed up in my galabeya (spelling?!) to play golf... But Sunday was a little different. After he pool tournament it turned into crazy expat karaoke, followed by drunkin' room rally in my room, followed by even more drunkin' beach crashing... I only remember about a 2/3 of the evening, and I'm not proud of that either. Needless to say the sun was well up when we finally crashed and I didn't wake up until 3:30pm Monday afternoon. I'll try and post some pictures as there was a guy taking some until the wee hours... You could safely compare him to "that guy" that takes a camera to a bachelor party, I thought what happens in Egypt stays in Egypt.

So then I had a squash game lined up for Tuesday evening. So I get back to my room after work around 6pm, realise I'm running low on Egytian money so I take $400 US out of my safe and put it with my wallet so I remember to take it to work the next day to change. I leave my room at 6:25pm to play squash and return at 7:40pm to find the US cash, my Egyptian cash, and both my mobile phones gone. No signs of forced entry, but also not all "valuables" are gone, only the cash and phones. So the rest of the evening is spent convincing hotel security that I didn't just misplace it all and it didn't fall behind the desk. It all seems a little sketchy for my liking, even by Egyptian standards. I'm hoping the perp is a hotel guest who's gone now, but if it was staff then we're all f'd.

Bottom line, I'm out about $600 in mobile phone technology and $500 US equivalent in cash and an uneasy feeling leaving anything of value in my room. But where do I hide a laptop and related electronics, sunglasses, watches, personal documents, pictures, etc in a 250 square foot hotel room with a .5 cubic foot safe? Son of a... So I had to call Rogers and deactivate my YYC SIM card/number so don't bother calling that one. Mind you I've been here 8 months and the only calls I field are Scotiabank trying to sign me up for credit card insurance. I'll replace the SIM and reactivate the # at Christmas when I'm back on the continent.

I grew a goatee over the weekend (ok ok, last 2 weeks)... I don't think I like it and haven't decided if I'll share it with anyone. blah!