Alright, I'm a little behind on my blog. If I could change the date on Blogspot, this entry would show November 25 or so...around the time I was returning home from this massive trip that included visits to England, South Africa, Namibia, Oman, Dubai, and Egypt. As it is, today is Christmas Eve and I'm back home aboard Candide editing my videos, updating my blog, and stuffing myself with all sorts of Christmas treats.

The last time I was in Egypt was in early 1998. I went there with Bill Hoffman, a childhood friend, on vacation. We arrived right after 62 tourists were murdered by terrorists in Luxor. Our friends, family, and coworkers thought we were crazy for going at that time, but we already had our flights booked! Plus, I figured that the safest time to avoid a terrorist attack was right after one happened. I was right! The entire country welcomed us with open arms. Our flight to Egypt from London was nearly empty. We didn't have to stand in line at the airport. They waived our visa fees. People stopped us on the street and thanked us for visiting the country and told us to please tell our friends to come. Because we were the only two tourist in Egypt at the time, we were treated like celebrities!

This trip brought back a lot of memories for me. My boss and I stayed at the Cairo Marriott Hotel, which was originally built as a palace to house the European dignitaries who came when the Suez canal was opened in 1869. This is the same hotel that my friend and I stayed in in 1998! At the time, our room cost about $40 per night (there were few guests because of the terrorist attacks, so the hotel offered rock-bottom prices), and a beer at the hotel bar cost $1 (I remember specifically because beer was 5 Egyptian pounds at the bar...and 1 pound across the street at the convenience store...and 5 pounds is equal to 1 dollar U.S.). Things have gotten a little more expensive since then. The rooms are now $250 per night, and a beer costs almost $6 at the bar!!! I'm glad Scantron is paying for it this time!

The main event for this trip was a 3-hour presentation that I delivered to about 50 professional educators. We rented a large conference room at the Intercontinental hotel and I put on a show about bubble forms, scanners, subjective item processing...y0u know, the exciting stuff! What was different about this presentation is that my every move was recorded by two professional camera crews. Each crew consisted of two guys; one holding the camera and the other controlling the coaxial cable that connected the camera to the video control room. It was so weird having these cameras constantly following me...and their bright lights made it nearly impossible to see the audience! You can see a bit of this presentation with the camera crews on the video below. If you want the entire presentation, as recorded and edited by the professional video company, it's available for $29.95 plus shipping and handling.

As usual, we managed to have a bit of fun. I bought some bread from a street vendor, which may not sound like much. But I was getting tired of sitting in our distributor's office all afternoon and had to get out and stretch my legs. I had seen a guy selling loaves of bread on the street, and I wanted some! Sammy, our young partner, took me to get a couple of loafs. I imagine that this is the same bread that Joseph, Mary, Moses, and Pharaoh enjoyed so many years ago!

That evening, we wound up at Khan el Khalili which is a huge bazaar that's been there since the 1400's. You can buy anything there that a tourist could desire...brass lanterns, woven carpets, sheep heads (see video). This is very much a tourist hot-spot; I don't think that any real Egyptians actually go there to buy anything. But, I was there in 1998 and wanted to revisit it for the memories. I'm glad I did! It was a lot of fun, and I was able to buy the three things I was after; post cards for family and friends, a gift for David Coats (our corporate travel planner who spent DAYS arranging this trip for my boss and me), and pumpkin seeds (I'm an addict). When I bought David's gift, I haggled like a pro! I told the shop owner that I had 7 children to support and that he was taking food out of their mouths! I might even have to sell one of them for medical experiments to pay for this gift! The haggling worked...I got a carving of a scarab (beetle) for 40 pounds...down from the original asking price of 120!

Later, we took a midnight cruise on the Nile River. This worked out because our flight left at 4:20 a.m. and we had already checked out of our hotel. After the cruise we went straight to the airport for our flights home.

As you may recall from an earlier entry, I had to get a temporary passport in London because I didn't have enough blank visa pages to get into South Africa. No other country had any problems at all with this passport. But when I got home, oh boy! I was pulled aside at customs / integration at Dulles International in Washington, D.C. They didn't ask too many questions; they just looked at my passport and asked me to step into a private area. At first, I thought this was going to be a random bag check (at this point, I had my bags with me). Indeed, they physically checked the bags of the guy in front of me...old school...pulling out the guy's underwear and socks and looking for contraband.

When my turn came, they didn't even look at my bags. Instead, I was asked to sit in a waiting area for "immigration processing." I sat there for over two hours. I was the ONLY American in the room of about 50 people...I believe I was the only English-speaking person in the room besides the immigration officials.

Eventually, my name was called and the game of 20 questions began. Why did I travel to the Middle East? (business) Why did I lose my passport? (I didn't) What type of business am I in? (data collection) What is the height of the Washington Monument? (555 feet) Who did the Green Bay Packers defeat in Super Bowl I? (Kansas City)

Once the officials were positive that I was a red-blooded American citizen, and were absolutely sure that I had missed the last connecting flight to Jacksonville, they let me in to the U.S. I had Thanksgiving dinner at the Dulles Hilton. It's good to be back home!