scott,its totally illegal to drink alcohol in saudi arabia i wouldnt want to get cought doing so!, yes "uzo" is greek and can be very nasty, they have another drink there called "sediki" not sure of the spelling. but it means "friend" in thier lingo, i had a friend stationed there for one reason or another i wont get into that here, but for a year or so hed asked me to sent him a number of copper and brass toilet fittings,tubing,valves etc,i didnt understand why untill i was assigned to spend a week at his residence there, turns out since he couldnt buy booze hed made his own still,producing "sediki" it could be mixed with anything and could be made to taste like, scotch, gin, burbon,rum,or any other hard booze,well i just had to try it for scientific reasons ya know, it had a bit of an "edge" to it but not bad all in all,i mixed my 6 oz. dose with coke, first sip rendered a nice body warming sensation,second sip challenged my verbal skills,third sip was immobilizing, forth sip i dont remember at all,woke up the next morning in the same chair feeling refreshed and relaxed not a sign of a hang over, i was told the absence of such was attributed to the clarity of and lack of impuritys in the brew, had i but known of my friends new self tought skills i wouldnt have taken the great change of being arrested by customs upon entering the country by my smuggling in two bottles of mouth wash filled with "johnny walker black" that was a very dangerous chance indeed, the only long lasting ill effect of drinking "sediki" was the degeneration of my word spelling ability. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/yesnod.gif