Comments for Caliban - Opinion and Righteous Anger

Comment on Aswan by ianmacd

ianmacd — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 05:04:30 +0000

Well, it's nice to have someone looking out for us, anyway. Given that we have no family in the Netherlands, it's not as if our absence back home would really be noticed for quite some time.

And our silence was most unusual, given that we've always blogged quite comprehensively in the past.

In a pinch, you can always call my mobile phone, although the tariff to even receive a call here is horrendous.

Comment on Aswan by Mike

Mike — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 03:17:50 +0000

Guilty. It was I who EMailed the Beit Sabee Guesthouse and who received confirmation from Miguel that the family (hale and hearty) had survived the desert trek. He assured me that all was well and that you guys had embarked in your dahabiyah. Sending the EMail was somewhat kin to dropping a rock into a black hole: The website for the guesthouse is under construction, so I wasn't convinced the message would get through. An automated response said only that someone would get back to me "soon," but it was with some relief that I saw the EMail reply a couple of days later.

Stay cool. 107º F ain't so hot...

-- Mike

Comment on Networked Plug Socket by ianmacd

ianmacd — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 23:01:01 +0000

The entry actually mentions the supplier, a German company, called Leunig.

Comment on Networked Plug Socket by Alec

Alec — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 09:11:52 +0000

I don’t suppose you could say who the supplier was? I am looking for one of these too.

Comment on Cairo by Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:51:03 +0000

sugar cane, it is. Sorry for the spelling…. it’s getting late.

Comment on Cairo by Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:42:53 +0000

Hi there! To tell the truth, I haven’t been in Egypt for ages, but when little (back in early 90’s) I was staying in Cairo with my parents for long – well, long enough to learn this and that about the habits of its inhabitants and so forth – and remember the first cultural teaching, I received from my mom, was that Arabs won’t respect you if you don’t haggle with them, but you shan’t do that if you aren’t genuinely interested in the product offered and never do that for fun or just for a tryout.

See, the prices they ask you to pay them for goods will be most of the time far too exaggerated compared to the regular fair value of the product or service in question, so if you care for acquiring the particular thing (be it meal, cab fare, or anything you’re not given a real receipt for), know that it has its negotiable price that you can always discuss with them, provided that you have a fixed price in your mind and that you know the equivalent rates the other sellers would charge.

I’ve also heard that they make fun (between themselves and in Arabic of course) of tourists who never haggle, but instead just humbly pay the price they offer – no matter how high and unreasonable it is – and they simply consider them naïve.

The inquiry you’ve heard after asking about the cost of your meal today was not exactly what you thought was just making up the price on the spot (well, in a way it might be), but it seemed clear enough to me that they were expecting your bid in return, so that you could negotiate the fair price. Not sure, though, how those rules changed over the past twenty years, but the great chances are that not much – seeing (from what you post here) that the city still looks the way it was when I was 8. Sigh… Don’t know – perhaps it might be worth a try to google the haggling thing in the web and see how things look these days.

Ah, and would forget: don’t miss the opportunity to try the über-delicious freshly pressed mango juice and suger cain juice served cold with ice cubes! They were my all-time favorites when I was little. Look for them at the street stalls or other random places found on the street.

Comment on Good Evening, Cairo by ianmacd

ianmacd — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 15:11:16 +0000

Yes, we made it here in good time.

We certainly did get rain all morning and it was chilly, too. The streets turned to mud and Eloïse in particular got plastered in the stuff. Both children are in the bath as I write this.

Comment on Good Evening, Cairo by Mike

Mike — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 23:18:05 +0000

Just sent you an EMail after ascertaining from the EgyptAir website that your flight departed and arrived on-time. I note from Yahoo Weather you can expect "Partly cloudy skies early. A few showers developing later in the day. High near 70F. Winds W at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 30%." Not so shabby, but I thought the chance of rain this time of year in Cairo was about nil. Get out there and explore the Great Pyramid and tell us all about it!

-- Mike and Florence

Comment on More Face-lifting by Bas Scheffers

Bas Scheffers — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 08:20:10 +0000

Ah yes, lots of plugins, none I could find that did what I wanted, with is kick in when you use the [gallery] short code. That's so I didn't have to edit dozens of posts and change tags.

Jules, how ya been? Thanks for the tip. I've done precious little WP development; nothing beyond a few tweaks to templates and existing plugins, so I had not looked into all the options for it.

I am still debating whether to go on with WP for this site, or move it to something like Drupal or Joomla.

Comment on More Face-lifting by ianmacd

ianmacd — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 11:48:03 +0000

After reporting the issue in the Lightbox plug-in to the author, I’m happy to report that he has already released a new version that takes WP_PLUGIN_URL into account when the version of WordPress being used is >= 2.6.