1500 USD, contrary to what you may think this is not the price of an NBA finals ticket, it's the registration fees for ACPC (Arab Collegiate Programming Contest), no flight tickets included with mediocre accommodation.

These fees, However, included long opening and closing ceremonies in both of which we had to endure Mohammad Fouad's very dull and lame jokes (one of his childish doings: he stopped the opening ceremony, made us all stand then laughed and told us to sit down...).

Being funny was definitely not their strongest suit. Nor was organization for that matter, atrocious organization with hours spent exposed to extreme Egypt weather.

In addition to all of this, we had to starve our way through the competition with the very cheap and inedible food they provided.

The most suspicious part was that they only accepted cash payments in dollars (they refused bank transfers or any other traceable payment methods) only dollars and only in CASH !!!!!!!

You are probably wondering why I'm posting this with a fake account and to answer this question we'll have to backtrack and see the ACPC behavior patterns:

Last time someone complained about the awful circumstances, their team was immediately DISQUALIFIED and only authorized to participate after a great deal of pressure on the ACPC committee see first comment here for more details

Someone also thought about sending the complaint to the ICPC committee, well they ended up forwarding it to the ACPC committee which, unsurprisingly, disqualified the team.

Last time the competition was held outside of egypt was in JORDAN 2012 (with a reasonable 200 usd participation fee + THEY ACCEPTED BANK TRANSFERS)

I don't know if the ICPC committee knows about this ongoing robbery happening every year but this has got to stop, this is painting a very bad image for the contest as well as ICPC.

It appears that no one is prepared to take the blow and expose Mohammad Fouad and his mob of thieves.

ONCE MORE if you didn't pay attention : The fees are 1500 USD for official teams and 3000 USD for unofficial teams (without flight tickets)

The official excuse for this ongoing robbery is that the hotel is top notch with world class features and accommodation. First of all, the hotel we stayed at this year is nowhere near what's described. In fact it was very mediocre.

Second, no one asked for luxury. We are all competitive programming enthusiasts and participate for the mere experience of the contest itself. No one here is expecting a 5 stars accommodation which may I add lot of us can not afford in the first place.

The ball now is in the ICPC committee's court, they have to act immediately to stop this nonsense otherwise they as as much to blame as ACPC for this FRAUD.