النهاردة كنت في مبني الأمم المتحدة في جنيف, في صالة كلها هدايا من الدول الأعضاء , لوح فنية, تماثيل وسجاجيد, كل قطعة فنية منهم بترمز للبلد اللي أهدتها ومكتوب عليها اسم البلد ووصف القطعة وسنة الاهداء.

الا القطعة المصرية بتاعتنا اللي عبارة عن تمثال للإله ماعت مكتوب عليه إنه متاخد من المتحف المصري وأهدى للأمم المتحدة سنة 2004 من “صاحبة الفخامة, السيدة سوزان مبارك” ده هم اللي كاتبين كده! مش مكتوب اسم مصر خالص!!!

إزاي يعني القطع الاثرية تبقى من حق مرات الرئيس إنها تهديها وتوزعها؟وإيه, بإسمها الشخصي مش بإسم مصر!!!!

القطعة دي لازم ترجع المتحف المصري أو على الأقل يتغير التعريف اللي مكتوب عليها ويتكتب إنها مهداه من مصر!!!

الصور أهه:

ابتسمت بمجرد رؤيتي للهرج والمرج من على سلم الطائرة, غمرني شعور بالراحة والسعادة بعد غياب حوالي السنة عن الوطن.

لم أشعر بالضيق أو المهانة على الاطلاق بسبب الخمسة عشر دقيقة التي انتظرتها لكي يزين الظابط جواز سفري بختم الوصول في حين ان جميع الركاب الاجانب على الطائرة انهوا اجراءات وصولهم في اقل من 3 دقائق, فانا أعلم واذكر تماما كيف أعامل في بلدي.

بما أنني كنت المصري الوحيد على الطائرة فكان من المحتم علي ان أطمئن باقي المسافرين ان عدم ظهور الشنط على السير يرجع لهبوط الطائرة في ميعاد مدفع رمضان وليس لأي سبب اخر قد يساورهم.

تسبب اكتشافي لخدعة عدم وجود مكتب تأجير للسيارة في المطار كما ادعى صاحب المكتب بمحو الإبتسامة من على وجهي.

بعد عناء لعدم وجود أي كابينة هاتف أو مكتب بيع خطوط تليفون في المطار اكتشفت ان مكتب التأجير سيرسل مندوبا لتسليمي السيارة, بعد الافطار.

هالني الكم اللانهائي من الفنادق المبنية على الطراز الأمريكي في تلك المدينة على البحر الأحمر, كل شيء تم سرقة فكرته وتنفيذه بكل فلح وجليطة ففقد جماله الأصلي وافقد المكان جماله الطبيعي.

تعبت من اختلاق أعذار تبرر هذا الكم الهائل من عناصر الشرطة على الطريق وسبب سؤالهم عن عملي ووجهتي ومن يرافقني.

لم أجد إجابة لهذا السؤال العصيب ولم يخطر على بالي ان أكون في يوما مضطرا أن أجيب عليه, ان تكون فقيرا لا يمنع ان تكون نظيفا, لماذا شوارع مصر تمتلئ باطنان القمامة؟

كانت الساعة قرب العاشرة مساءا, كان بيت السحيمي مغلق حسب المواعيد الرسمية المحددة من وزارة الثقافة ولكن ورقة من فئة العشرين جنيها كانت كفيلة بتغيير المواعيد الرسمية والسماح بجولة خاصة داخل البيت البديع.

سألتني لماذا لم تفلح العشرين جنيها هذه المرة في الدخول إلى الجامع الاثري, أجبت أن هذه المرة الأمر بيد وزارة الداخلية وليس وزارة الثقافة, حيث اليوم موعد احتفال فرقة الباهرا الهندية بصاحب المقام فـيمنع دخول المصريين, حتى أصحاب الورقة فئة العشرون جنيها.

لا أعلم تماما ماذا حدث, هل نسيت ضوضاء القاهرة أم هي زادت فوق احتمالي, كدت ان أصيب بجلطة أثناء محاولاتي في الحديث مع الأصدقاء في مقهى كوفي بينز على أنغام أحدث اغاني فريق ن سينك اتس جونا بيمي.

أصيب النادل في المطعم العائم ذو الخمس نجوم بالهلع حين طلبت خفض صوت السماعات المقابلة للمائدة, خاصة أن عويل المطرب كان فوق احتمال الأذن البشرية, سألني ماذا ستفعل عندما يحين موعد فقرة الراقصة؟ حينها اشتقت لسماع موسيقى هادئة من بيانو أو كمان وتأكدت من ضياع هويتي المصرية الاصيلة المحبة للضوضاء والعشوائية

شعرت بالحرج الشديد عندما التقطت صورة سيارة الشرطة بعد ان علقت تحت كوبري السيدة عائشة بسبب جهل السائق ومحاولته تفادي الزحام.

لم استطع ان أكتم غيظي عندما سألني  هو الباشا مش صايم؟ بعد ان طلبت لها زجاجة مياه في حديقة الأزهر في نهار رمضان

أصبت بالذعر عندما قفز رَجل في الثلاثينيات من عمره وتعلق في زجاج السيارة محاولا بيعي تذاكر دخول الأهرامات من السوق السوداء, مرت العشر ثواني التي قمت بجره فيها كأنها سنين, قفز امام السيارة العديد من اصدقاؤه لا أعلم من أين جائوا محاولين ايقافي.

اشفقت على الجندي وهو يتلعثم بالانجلزية الصعيدية المصرية محاولا اقناع اثنان من السائحين بأخذ صور لهم امام الهرم الأكبر, اشفقت أكثر عندما طلبوا منه اعادة البقشيش عندما اكتشفوا انه لم يضغط على زر التصوير.

عندما أصر موظف المطار أن اضع الكيس البلاستيكي الصغير داخل الشنطة حتى بعد شرحي له ان الكيس يحتوي على حذاء سأقوم بلبسه بعد انهاء الاجراءات, أجابني ان التعليمات كده.

قالت لي ما كل هذا الخراء يا أشرف؟

The master piece of the legendary artist Vincent Van Gogh, “Poppy Flowers” has been stolen from the museum of Mahmoud Khalil in Cairo.

FOR THE SECOND TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Those fuckers at the ministry of culture should go hang themselves and that *@$#! who thinks himself an artist and has been a minister of culture for more than 20 years should be thrown in prison for all the crimes committed against art and culture in his era.

We don’t deserve to have such master pieces in Egypt, really, i demand that we move the pyramids and all our national treasures to a country that respects them where we can actually be sure it wont be disregarded and thrown in the dust.

If we cant protect a 50 millions USD painting from being stolen, not once, but TWICE! am 100% sure that the only reason the sphinx has not been stolen yet is that it’s difficult to move it due to it’s size but i wont be surprised when they do it!

There’s no hope, we’ll always remain as a failure as long as all our officials are either corrupt or stupid and mostly both.

link to reuters

Moftasa posted this article on how he wrote a linux script that downloads all the obituaries published in Al Ahram newspaper between 2002 and 2008, finds all the names of people with Police titles then finds the family relations between them!

The script does the following:

The first step is to convert the HTML files downloaded by curl into one giant text file.

Then to move each separate obituary into a line of it’s own.

Extract officer names sandwiched between rank and place of work into a separate text file.

Search for the names of each officer through each obituary, family links between different officers can be discovered.

The output is in GraphViz .dot format.

This is as cool as the Oracle Of Bacon

Chapeau to Moftasa, it’s a brialliant idea to dig this kind of information using the modern technology

Readers Discretion is Strongly Advised

The following story, explains the Murphey’s Laws and show how they work in real life.

So, i went to After8 (it’s a pub in Tahreer التحرير in Kasr El Nil Street شارع قصر النيل), well, the place is very nice, it’s very small and crowded, but the atmosphere is very nice, playing Live Music from a nice band (i don’t know the name), and from time to time the DJ takes over, it is a bit expensive (17.5LE for a small mineral water bottle, thats a ripoff) but i don’t really mind, the place is really good.

Anyway, am not doing a review here.

At around midnight, my phone battery started to die and kept saying low battery.
My friends left at around 3:00am, and i had to stay waiting for a foreign friend of mine whom i will meet in a place nearby. He was so late and didn’t call, so i left, and on my way out i tried to call him, offcourse, the phone died on battery.

I couldn’t call him, and i can’t get the number, i went back again into the pub, to ask if anyone has a charger, but luckily, no one owns a stupid samsung phone like i do.

So i headed for my car, which was parked far away (near Omar Makram mosque), i remember that i had a car charger somewhere in the trunk.
After a long while  looking through the mess, i found the charger, plug it in the car, only to find it’s not working.

I started to get worried, that my friend will come and will try to call me, to find my phone switched off, and he will probably get lost and will not know what to do.

Now the problem is that even i can find another phone and put my SIM in it, it will not work, because i use the phone memory to store all the numbers.

Luckily, i remembered that i have my old SIM card in my wallet (i just changed my phone line a few weeks ago) and it have the number of a friend who knows the other friend number

The thing is that i don’t have a working phone aslan phone   i wandered around, trying to find an open koshk at 3:45am in down town!!!

 

 

Luckily, i found one that is still open, in a street nearby After8, but the guy is sleeping, i wake him up, ask him to do me the favor of putting my SIM in his phone and make the call.

The guy was nice, and he accepted, i plug in the old SIM, got the number, now i had to put back my original SIM to call the guys (because the old line is not working anymore), i preferred to do this, because my friend will probably not answer a weird number waking him up at 4:00am.

 

Just when it starts ringing, the old nokia phone died….i asked him what’s wrong, he told me the battery is shaky, try again and try not to move.

 

Finally i managed to get the number, and i called my friend, to find out that he is waiting for me right next to After 8.

I thanked the guy, i tried to give him money but he refused, thanked him again and left.

 

Off course, you all know that i get lost quite easily in down town.

And i had no clue how to get back to After 8, so, since it was 4:00am, and there is no cars in the streets, i decided to go back in the wrong way of the street so i know where am going.(yes, its wrong, my bad, i know )

 

For my luck, just when am about to get into the correct way of the street, a police officer saw me, he told me to stop, so i stopped at the right.

 

He came to me with another guy in normal cloths, and he asked for my license and registration. (el ro7′as)

I told him am sorry, am a bit lost, it’s 4:00am  BLAH BLAH BLAH

He asked me where am going, what am doing now etc….

Then he said, you seem to be a nice guy, (ebn nas w keda), and he held the license right next to my face.

 

So i say: “Thanks, can i leave now?”, he says: “Yes, sure…..it’s just that am out of credit, and you know scratch cards to recharge  the phone are expensive and such” “انت عارف بقى الدنيا ليل وأنا معيش رصيد, عيزين نجيب كارت شحن كدة ولا حاجة”

So i understood he will not let me go unless i pay him, i took out 20LE and gave it to him, he handed me back the license.

 

I go and meet my friend, just to find out that he lost his wallet, which had all his credit cards, important docs and 1300LE…

We head to each and every place we went to, and as expected, we didn’t find anything.

 

We went home….

 

Summary:

• If you think things cannot go worse….THEY CAN AND THEY WILL!!!!
• If there is a chance of several things going wrong at the same time, the one that will cost most damage will occur first.
• But still that doesn’t mean i didn’t have fun before that in After 8
• All police officers must be shot in the head, or somewhere else

Another thing we face daily, in our “evil streets of Cairo” is parking… there is no place to park your car ANYWHERE in Cairo, you have to suffer everyday for 15-30 mins everytime you try to park at work\home\friends\shopping or whatever you’re going to do.

You will also notice, the “menady” (this guy who is basically a begger,  but tries to give you help parking your car), are spread  in the whole capital. Ripping you off with 1LE each time you park and they happen to pop next to you from the sky.
If you try and give one of them 0.5LE you will win a “look of disgust” for yourself, like: “keep the change for yourself, if you cant afford 1LE then don’t use a car, cheap bastard”

You could be lucky(like me) and have a personal garage for your building at home, well, am not so lucky because i still have to pay 50LE\month + tips for cleaning the car, but at least i can guarantee a place for my car when i go home.

Going to my new work in Maadi, there is a car parking too, which costs 50LE\month (is that standard or what?) i said to myself, nope, am not paying it enough parking money, its going to end up paying half my salary on gas and parking!!! (not mentioning repairing the car from the random hits i receive on my car)

So, i ended up looping around the office building EVERYDAY for 15 mins to find a parking spot, i guess it would have been easier to park at home and come walking, since i end up walking LOOOOONG distances anyway.

A good thing is, there is ALOT of empty spaces, but they are blocked with جرادل or cones

If you try to move them, you will get attacked by the security guard or the door man and they won’t allow you to park, off course, not wanting to have a fight first thing in the morning (you will have plenty at work) you have to find another spot.

So, the public streets are now a private property? anyone who wants can reserve a certain space for himself? just block with a chain or put a cone around it and not let anyone park? is that’s how it works now?بالدراع – bel dera3?

So, today i was coming to work, later than usual, and i couldn’t find a single place in all the spots i used to park in, so i suddenly spot an empty space, it’s relatively big, it could fit my car and an smaller one too, and luckily it’s not blocked by anything, so i head and park there.

Just while am switching off the engine, an old “bawab – door man” came out, and started yelling and shouting in the rudest way possible, saying that am blocking the “entrance to the building, i explained to him that am parking “IN THE FU**** STREET!!!! AND there is space for other car to park and people pass and everything!!!” so when he found out that’s not really working, he started the other tactic, he said that this place is reserved for a high ranking officer who lives in that building. (DOHHH!!!!! wasn’t it blocking the entrance a few seconds ago?)

Anyway, if i wasn’t late for work, and if i was in a good mood (i had an accident this morning, i’ll blog about it later) and if he wasn’t a very old dude i would have had a different reaction, but sadly, i just left and tried to find another place to park.

It also happens that my previous work, was located in Abbas El Akkad one of the most crowded streets in the capital.
And i faced this problem daily, and i had to make friends with those parking assistance (menady) to help me park everyday.

I HAD ENOUGH!!!! NO ONE OWNS THE F**** STREETS!!! I HAVE THE RIGHT TO PARK ANYWHERE!!! YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHARGE ME FOR PARKING!!!! AND THE NEXT TIME YOU SPEAK TO ME RUDELY, AM GOING TO BEAT THE CRAP OUT OF YOU!!!!