crocsbeach

Egypt's Revolution Disrupts Daily Life, Economy

A driver stops to gawk at protesters crowding the sidewalks along the bridge. Traffic is snarled. Tempers flare and car horns blare. A well-dressed man jumps out of his car to berate the driver.The driver gets out of his car and yells back some choice insults, repeatedly jabbing the first man in the chest. As a crowd forms and voices rise higher, the men are pulled apart. Shirts are straightened, shoulders patted in an attempt to soothe.

"If you want to watch, why don't you just park somewhere and join them," the first man yells. Then, as he hops back into his car, he barks ¡ª as much to the protesters as the other motorist ¡ª "Some of us are trying to work.The U.S. government has sued a former NASA astronaut to recover a mini dv video camera used to explore the moon's surface during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission after seeing it slated for sale in a New York auction. We can't keep living like this."Abdel-Meguid Omar, who helped break up the fight, looks around him, shrugs and sums up the scene with the sarcasm and humor for which Egyptians have long been famous: "So, this is democracy..How did we live without them? Take a step back in time to August 1984, when we lived in a world where only the wealthiest among us could afford a Video Door Phones -- and even then they were usually tethered to their automobiles.."

The man's complaint over the continuing disruption of daily life reflects a growing frustration amid the optimism that was the soundtrack for Egypt's revolution since the ouster of former President Hosni Mubarak in February.Egyptians are now looking to a future in which they hope, for the first time in decades, to chart their own course. With the floodgates open, Egyptians are taking to the streets to press for long-pent-up demands ¡ª more housing, better pay, lower prices. Expectations are soaring,Microsoft announced Monday that it has begun offering a full-cost rebate for a dual screen car dvd player kit purchased in conjunction with the company's Xbox video game console.Telstra has revealed plans to shut down its long-running online DVD rental service, with customers to be referred instead to rival service Quickflix. even as they tell themselves not everything can be solved at once.

But the turmoil, fueled in part by the continuing protests, is making it harder to address the demands. Revenue from tourism, worker remittances and foreign investment plunged sharply after the revolution, while manufacturing and productivity were hard hit. Many complain that their lives are worse off economically than under Mubarak, increasing the pressure for immediate change.In a make-or-break year, Egypt's transitional government is trying to show it can make at least some tangible improvements. Officials have approved the new budget for fiscal 2011-2012, a populist behemoth of welfare and development programs.