El Andalous - The Incident

Egyptian Film Crew Shooting a Fictional Drama at El Andalous

A huge thanks to Sheila for the last three blogs. It’s given me a bit of a holiday and it gives everyone reading this blog a change of voice, which is always good!

What Sheila didn’t mention – and I’m glad she didn’t as I’ve been wondering whether to say anything and, if so, how – is that she arrived at El Andalous at a period of high drama.

Two of the Russian owners exited their flat one day, leaving behind their governess alone in the flat. The governess was in the bathroom, heard a noise, went to investigate, and found one of the cleaning staff rifling through items in the lounge. The male cleaner, realising he’d been caught, hit the governess on the head. She fell to the ground, and he fled the flat. Blood was on the wall and the floor. The police were called, the man identified and arrested, and the governess taken to hospital.

Hordes of angry Russians and worried Brits gathered in the reception area demanding to see the head of the management company. He eventually arrived, explaining that he’d just been visiting the injured woman in hospital and that he had arranged to pay all the hospital fees. There was a huge discussion on how security could be improved and crowds of people rushed to reception demanding the return of their spare keys (normally, you have to keep a spare at reception).

We were promised that harsh measures would be taken and the culprit would get ten years in jail. The police system works a bit differently over here and often the police will ask you what punishment you want to give an offender (I’m not too sure how this all works, but it’s possible it might be a bit like “do you want to press charges?”, to which you could reply that you don’t want someone to go to prison, but you do want them to give you your money back, for example. However, don’t quote me on this!).

It was agreed that security cameras would be installed and that the system for keeping spare keys – no longer obligatory since this incident – would be tightened up.

These events have a habit of taking a life of their own, so by the time Sheila arrived two days later, rumours ranged from an internet posting that the governess had been murdered to the accusation that the governess had invited the cleaner in and they’d had a lovers’ tiff. Neither of these are true!

Nevertheless, the main point was that what happened was a wrongdoing and this is indisputable. Our hearts go out to the governess, who is out of hospital, and we wish her a speedy recovery. Although the owners had lost their keys, a number of people had suspected staff of entering their flats without permission, and the incident only increased suspicions and made people feel very insecure.

It must now be at least a month since it happened and life here has settled back to normal. The cameras were installed, as promised (unusual for Egypt!), and the new system for keeping the keys safe appears to be working. We now have a security gate at the bottom of our gardens.

For those now worrying about my safety – please don’t! This was an unusual incident and was the first such case in six or seven years. Security is now better than ever and there’s already a lot of security in Sahl Hasheesh and in El Andalous. Wrongdoings happen everywhere and I’m probably safer here than in many other places (let’s hope I don’t live to regret saying that!).