The Case of the Missing iPhones…

My friend David Sasaki (the venerable Outreach Director of GVO) has not only documented my shmoozing of the Santa Monica Apple Store staff, but has also brought up something I'm trying desperately to forget.

Mohamed was in the process of buying about four or five iPhones for his buddies back in Qatar. At the time, however, the limit was 2 iPhones per customer so Mohamed had to resort to his charming wink and million-dollar smile in order to walk out with more.

Oh the irony! David using my purchases as an example of making a quick $2000.

It all started when I was invited to speak at the Meridian Centre in Washington DC. As soon as friends heard I was going to the US, I started getting requests to get them iPhones. Being an Apple fanboy and having had to do all sorts of crazy things to get Apple to ship me an iPhone, I was deeply sympathetic and agreed.

In Qatar they go for at least QR2800. I've seen them in Dubai Airport Duty Free for AED3500. So the $400 plus tax I would get them for was a bargain. So I found a sympathetic salesmen and he agreed to let me help me around the 2 iPhone per customer rule Apple had imposed. That evening I sent word people back to Qatar and South Africa saying that I'd got the phones and received replies of joy.

And then I landed at Doha International Airport and my bag came off the carousel - as soon as I spotted it my heart sank. The lock from my bag was gone. I opened the bag in the airport in a panic and all 5 iPhones were gone. Obviously a couple of family members of the Newark Airport staff were going to be getting some great Christmas gifts. I on the other hand was now down by over $2000 and had to find a way to break the news to a Syrian, Qatari, Algerian and 2 South Africans...

I still haven't had the heart to tell them that Qatar Airways showed me the small print on the ticket that said that the $2500 max claim on stolen property does not apply to "valuable items" (right, so who the heck has $2500 worth of non-valuable items in a bag?).

Maybe I'm going to have to turn on that charm David talked about and break the news...