If they think they're going to drive me crazy: they're a bit too late!

I'm writing this when I probably shouldn't be! "Why not?" I hear you ask, Dear Reader. Because I'm blinkin annoyed! That's why. Let me tell you the story.

Last year, we had a couple who wanted to come to Luxor and see the sights and experience the culture, so they had enquired at several hotels about prices and availability etc. They had a major problem, however. The gentleman suffers from malfunctioning kidneys, and needs dialysis every day. This meant that he needed to have his dialysis fluids delivered to his lodgings by the time he arrived. As you can imagine, this is pretty important to him, as he'd probably die without this treatment. None of the hotels he tried would entertain taking in his supplies!

This turned out to be good news, however, for yours truly! It was no problem for us to receive and store his fluids for his arrival. In doing so, we ended up having two lovely guests who became friends also.Now, they are both 'getting on' a bit, and thought that our stairs might be a touch too much for them this year. So I think it was with a bit of embarrassment that they contacted us again this year, with a request to again help out with the fluids, even though they were going to stay in an hotel! The daft hapeths!

Last year, the boxes were delivered by a firm called (I think) 'Middle East Courier Services'. They were no trouble. Three men turned up in a van and just humped the boxes up the stairs, they got a 20LE tip and a drink of tea for their troubles, and were very grateful. This year, it was an entirely different matter. It could even be termed a Saga!

The couriers were a crowd trading under the name of 'Rapido'. When they rang, the person on the phone could barely speak English (and I can hardly speak Arabic, so I cannot really grumble much about that!) but I thought he suggested that I might collect the boxes? No no, they had to be delivered! The delivery was eventually arranged for 10:30pm last night (Saturday). When the driver rang for directions; I went downstairs and gave the phone to our friend Abdullah, who soon put the man right. He landed within a few minutes.

Then the trouble started! The stupid man expected me to carry the boxes up the stairs!!!! You can see the picture, can't you? That's right: 21 boxes containing 240litres of liquid Glucose. It amounts to some weight, I can tell you. I tried to be calm and polite as I impressed upon Abdullah that I didn't really want to find (and pay) anyone else to carry it up the stairs, as it was the delivery man's job, for which he was already being paid!! I eventually told him that if he wouldn't deliver it to my apartment; he would have to take it away. He then wanted me to sign a form saying that I refused delivery, the cheek of the man! After calming down a bit, I sent off an email to our friend.

This morning, I decided to telephone the Egyptian company which supplies this fluid, and complain about their carrier's service, hoping that they would be able to bring some pressure to bear on the carrier to do his job properly. The lady on the other end of the phone was most helpful, and apologetic too.When she spoke to the carriers on the phone, they told her that the stuff had been delivered, and that they had carried it up the stairs! Of course, I told her differently, and she wasn't very pleased! She eventually rang back to tell me that they would deliver in 1 hour, and carry the boxes up the stairs. Hallelujah!

In the event, I carried up the first box; 10 litres, and that was enough for me! I left one of the delivery men bringing up the rest, the other one (who wouldn't have it last night) was just sitting in the van! I went to fetch a 20LE note to give him as a tip.When I got back, here were two young boys humping boxes up the stairs! I recognised them as friends of Adam's sons, so he had to be involved. When I found him, I didn't get a word out of my mouth before he had said that I should pay the two boys the 20LE between them."But I didn't want them!" I was rather annoyed by now, as you can imagine."No no" says he,"the man told me he needed two porters, because he couldn't carry all that himself." So I still ended up paying someone else to do the work which the carriers men were already being paid to do. I'm still hopping mad about it now, over 12 hours later!

Anyway, when I came to sign the delivery forms (obviously, in Arabic) the man asked me for 20LE, "What for?" It turned out that he had been instructed to collect the 20LE to cover the cost of the return jouney after they failed to deliver the first time, cheeky devils! I rang the lady in Cairo, while he was still there, and asked her to speak to him. In the meantime; he spoke to his boss, on his phone, who decided that they should waive the second delivery charge. So the lady wasn't required, thankfully.

The moral of the story is; don't EVER use this bunch of clowns for a delivery, impress the name upon your memory "RAPIDO". I would, however, fully endorse the "Middle East Courier Services", as they were great.

All I need to do now is to make arrangemnets to get this stuff along to the hotel on Wednesday afternoon. Wish me luck, won't you?