And Now, A [Holiday] Word From Our Sponsor

Another year's rolled by, and Ramadan is once again upon us - late nights and overeating for all!

Here to welcome the season - courtesy of Vodafone, which vies with rival firm Mobinil for Egypt's cell-phone loyalties - are a galaxy of familiar faces from Egyptian film and television, slotted into the kind of what-the-hell variety number not seen in the West since those annual specials each fall that introduced us in fanciful ways to the new season's TV lineup. Basically, everybody here (or at least everybody given either a line or a close-up) ranges from Gary Burghoff- to Cher-level fame. Notable among them is the stout gentleman you'll see at 1:08 and thereafter, in the tactfully flowing red shirt and remarkably cantilevered hairpiece; he is Samir Ghanem, a fixture of the firmament in Hollywood-on-Nile since the early '60s and, despite being the father of two well-known younger actresses, camp as a row of pink tents (not unlike the one he's wearing, if it comes to that).

So it's a month of cooking and eating ahead of us, of finding ingenious ways to keep the dogs occupied to allow Himself to sleep in in peace, of endless telephone calls Back Home, and not least of the annual Ramadan soap operas and TV spectaculars. Wish me luck...