Egypt''s EFG Hermes says Q1 net profit jumps 27 pct    Politicians call for securing and developing Sinai    Microsoft kicks off online privacy campaign    Al-Azhar to send convoys to combat extremism    Rights groups address plight of Egyptian women    Rafah border crossing reopens    Google to hold a forum for agencies to join “Engage for Agencies"    The IMF conundrum: austerity and unrest    VIDEO: Rocketing strike give Gouna win over Hodoud    Rafah crossing re-opens after Egypt soldiers released    Arabian racing takes centre stage in Toulouse    Iran, Hezbollah increasing support for Assad: Britain    ‘I don't like cricket... I love it!'    Coin smugglers foiled at Cairo Airport    PROGRAMME: Four Countries – Four Movies, screening in Cairo    UK Opposition Party Leader Says Google Tax Behavior 'Wrong'    Sources: Algeria's Talks With VimpelCom Over Djezzy Stopped    Egypt: Echoes Of Revolution Far From Cairo    Brotherhood guide congratulates Egyptians for release of soldiers    Syria opposition urges rebels to join Qusayr battle    Rare "Harry Potter" first edition fetches record auction price    Morsi thanks military and police for successful rescue operation    Hamas Felicitates Egyptians On Releasing The Abducted Soldiers    IMF Says Egypt Budget Gap Worrying, Urges Yemen To Finalize Economic Program    Egypt's Central Bank Offers US$ 800 Mln At Exceptional FX Auction    Consumer Reports Calls Samsung Galaxy S4 ‘Top-Rated' Smartphone    Vieira leaving in July    Power outage at Cairo airport    Malaga have European ban lifted by UEFA    Bayern defender Badstuber out for 10 months after surgery    Britain asks EU to put Hezbollah armed wing on terror list    Egypt's Army Says Seven Hostages Taken In Sinai Are Free    Carroll out of England friendlies with Ireland and Brazil    Search for US tornado survivors nearly complete    BREAKING: Kidnapped Egyptian soldiers released, says military spokesperson    Poverty on the rise amid increasing unemployment and inflation: ECESR    Upbeat    A Spanish touch of Paradise    Beautiful aquatic ‘soft killer'    Beyond marriage of disparity    Investigations into food poisoning scare at Al-Azhar Univ.    Vodafone keeps Verizon payout after European weakness    Israel Fires Back At Syria After Gunshots At Its Troops    Annotated 'Harry Potter' 1st edition on auction    New Ahli deal for Abdul-Fadil    Morsi: NGOs Law To Be Discussed With Different Parties Before Its Approval    Eurovision Song Contest Won By Denmark    David Beckham is to retire from football    

Articles of the author Simon Willis
Being kind to cats
The last seven days have not been kind to cats. Between Saint Fatima Square and Hegaz Square there are two feline corpses, which are not fresh. As to whether the puss remains on the tramlines are bloated, decomposing or dry. Meanwhile, the dead dog that was unceremoniously removed from the grounds (...)

25 - 04 - 2013
Three cheers for shouting
This week's drama lesson was about developing a voice. No, not the silly voices on cartoons summoned of by 8-year-olds when they want to wind up their parents. Nor the sentimental words uttered in squeaky voices by ventriloquists intended to raise an ‘aaah' and a smile. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, (...)

18 - 04 - 2013
‘Fools, clowns and hooligans'
Within three months of starting secondary school, five of us boys in a first year class could do passable imitations of some of our teachers. Every verbal quirk, every facial expression, every gesture and every word was fed into our mental recording faculty, analysed, held up for ridicule, derided, (...)

11 - 04 - 2013
Charming cash out of pockets
On the railway viaduct across the road that passes through the campus of Ain Shams University was a large green rectangular panel with the name of an insurance company in white letters of a distinctive Arabic font. Underneath in Roman letters was the el-Shark for Insurance – a rather unfortunate (...)

04 - 04 - 2013
Loose change and a floppy lettuce
In what Charles V of Spain (1500-1558) termed “los buenos dias viejos" and Taha Hussein in 1948 – “fii-l-ayyaam al-2adiima-TTayyiba" (the good old days), a man could leave home with LE20 on a trip to the supermarket for a bar of soap, and, three hours later, return empty-handed except for bits of (...)

28 - 03 - 2013
Green Hotels
The United Nations and the World at large, today celebrate World Water Day. The event aims to raise activities at both local and international levels to increase awareness as to water consumption and to work on finding new sources of drinking water, especially as it has been estimated that one (...)

21 - 03 - 2013
Former glory around the corner
The exhortation ‘Remember, you found it on ‘Yellowpages.com.eg' sounds almost like a reproach, especially with regard to the Automobile and Touring Club of Egypt (ATCE), which is located at number 10. Not the famous namesake in London, the official residence of the British Prime Minister, but Kasr (...)

21 - 03 - 2013
From mothering to Mother's Day
The occasion of Mother's Day could rank among those issues that open the sluice gates of indignant letters to the broadsheets about the use and abuse of the humble apostrophe. By the way, authors of such letters rarely notice mixed metaphors. Such people clearly lack a sense of humour. Nothing so (...)

14 - 03 - 2013
The Khan can, given half a chance
Pet hate number 43: The look of utter puzzlement on the face of a shop assistant on being asked if an article is available. This person should know, for goodness' sake. He works in this flaming shop, doesn't he? Whether this person is ‘new' or not is a matter of sheer indifference to me. Such a (...)

07 - 03 - 2013
Of sledge hammers and two-wheelers
A sledge hammer is never near to hand when you want one, is it? By the way, ‘sledge hammer' in Arabic is ‘shakuush kibiir 2awi', in case you need to rush to Gomhuria Street and buy one, return to the scene of a near accident and apply this tool to the offending vehicle. By the way, ‘offending (...)

28 - 02 - 2013
The lists go on and on
On November 1, 1965, an electric bus that was travelling along one of the streets along the Nile, veered out of control and plunged down a 6.5 metre embankment into the river. Seventy-four passengers were drowned in the waters. Another 19 survived. This tragic incident is one of ten of the world's (...)

21 - 02 - 2013
Iron nature of the mother
“The time for sleep and rest has finished." This sentence is not only for students who are starting the second term, but also for mothers. The beginning of second term means the start of a long, fatiguing journey that ends on the last day of exams. Mothers' hard work throughout the academic year is (...)

21 - 02 - 2013
Chocs and teds
The problem with the Internet is that writers misspell words that they should have been taught in first year at school. If today's trendy parents who might send toddlers to piano lessons had their way, their offspring should know the alphabet by the fifth week inside the womb. Perhaps this writer (...)

14 - 02 - 2013
Ray of normality
The Armenian-English dictionary screamed ‘Buy me! Buy me!' No sooner had I picked it up off the top of a little pile, I found its companion, an English-Armenian dictionary, also clamouring to become one of my purchases. And the Spanish dictionary, too, was another candidate. A third reading of (...)

31 - 01 - 2013
Lighten the darkness
Finally, the standard lamp in the corner of the lounge goes out. You do not notice until the patch of darkness where an amateur oil painting (30 centimetres x 20 centimetres) of an unknown seascape is left in unflattering darkness. Yet, the imitation brass standard lamp stands as uselessly as a (...)

17 - 01 - 2013
Illeism for good or ill
This week, one is going to explore the subject of persons. No, not ‘people', but grammatical persons. This writer admires the equivalents of first, second and third persons in Arabic grammar. Looking after number one as ever is the first person (I/we), known in Arabic as ‘mutakallim' – the speaker, (...)

10 - 01 - 2013
Real-life drama
This time twenty years ago, this writer was the proud owner of a Chinese-made bicycle and he was a bachelor for the second time in his life. Now that he is married, he is now bike-less. Perhaps there is much to be said in favour of the institution of marriage, especially when one's partner is (...)

03 - 01 - 2013
View from above
For the software that you feel you cannot do without, the Internet is not always the most co-operative of channels. For example, you want that programme to read PDF documents, because some individuals insist on sending you material in that format. Without going into too much tear-your-hair-out (...)

27 - 12 - 2012
Whittling away absolutism
His authority, allegedly conferred by the Spirit in the Sky, was absolute. He had to say only ‘wine' and his advisors, drawn from the ranks of the aristocracy, i.e. his relatives, would be at the Great Rectangular Table in two shakes of a flunkey's bell rope. ‘Indeed, wine shall be banished from (...)

20 - 12 - 2012
When patience wears thin
December 3 must have been a special day, but there was no announcement in the press or on television to this effect. Blissful in my ignorance, I sauntered down to a branch of a well-known money transfer agency in the hope of enlightenment regarding the nature of transatlantic transactions. As I (...)

13 - 12 - 2012
Covering a thankless task
Still holding a hammer, Number One rested one hand on his hip and smiled at his handiwork. Although he had had the help of six other men to accomplish the task, he thought of the idea first. And now it began to rain. Number One felt he had done his fellows a great service. That no one from (...)

16 - 11 - 2012
The ‘Pound Coin' case study
Have you heard the one about the Saidi who swallowed a pound coin and was rushed to hospital? You know what is coming, don't you? Nevertheless, one shall continue to the corny end, shan't one? On the morning after the patient's overnight stay, the Saidi's relatives waylaid the doctor and pressed (...)

09 - 11 - 2012
Don't panic! It's only a test
You must have wondered how happy your child is these days. Do you call her over, have her stand on a small box and put the question to her? ‘Darling, tell me, how happy are you?' She might look blankly at you and ask who you are. ‘I'm your hard-working, long-suffering parent, dearie. Did you not (...)

02 - 11 - 2012
Don't panic! It's only a test
You must have wondered how happy your child is these days. Do you call her over, have her stand on a small box and put the question to her? ‘Darling, tell me, how happy are you?' She might look blankly at you and ask who you are. ‘I'm your hard-working, long-suffering parent, dearie. Did you not (...)

02 - 11 - 2012
Tough, soft, and tough again
She surveyed the heads that looked up at the whiteboard for a few seconds to absorb the next three words of the seemingly endless paragraph of gobbledygook in the short term memory and reproduce it imperfectly in devil-may-care handwriting in their copybooks. ‘C'mon! You should have finished this (...)

28 - 10 - 2012
Advertisement

Report inappropriate advertisement
Please help us to block an inappropriate advertisement by telleing what was the website it links to :





Thank you for reporting!
We will review the advertisement in order to ban it.