Reply to post: Had a similar experience

From Maidenhead to Morocco: In a change to the scheduled programming, we bring you The On Call of Dreams

Sparkus

Had a similar experience

hand-carrying a huge load of specialized electronics to the Philippines for the benefit of the US Military. The local 'fixer' never showed up at the airport so import duties/bribes were payable, immediately, and in cash (no receipt offered).

I was so royally pissed-off that I expensed the lot on a paper expense form. Postal services being what they were in the 80s, it took a while for the form and claim to make it to my boss and then his boss.

Understand, this was immediately after the Lockheed international bribery scandal and at the beginning of the Marcos' rise to power in the PI.

Was politely asked by my then third-level boss to resubmit my expenses to him directly and "not be a smart ass about it" (direct quote). He promised to personally reimburse me for the loss of cash (which he did) and to look into the missing local fixer who was apparently paid a large retainer to prevent this sort of thing.

After that, I got my self a fixed-base assignment in Hong Kong where, at the time, local officials were almost pathologically honest.

I'm saving the story about importing a Xerox 9700 laser printer beast to South Africa for use at a remote astronomical observatory. The local trucking firm managed to roll off the mountain access road and dumped the million dollar asset down about 700 meters of rock.

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