Not too sure about this one
Used to work with a bloke called Luigi, who claimed -

1. He was born and raised in Alexandria, Egypt.

2. He had gone to art school there and learned to paint in oils and watercolours, portraits, landscapes, still life, murals, you name it.

3. He fought in the Six Day War against the Israelis. They marched out into the Sinai Peninsula, sat there ten days, saw nothing then were recalled to find that they had lost. He said it was very hot there.

4. On moving to Australia he had lived in northern New South Wales and he had taken up clay pigeon shooting. He claimed to have a lot of trophies for this.

Yes, Luigi, we believe you. Thousands wouldn't, but we do.

One day he asked me to give him a ride home as his car was being fixed. It was one street out of my way so of course I did. he said "Come in for a cold beer". So of course I did. There was a case in the living room filled with trophies for clay pigeon shooting, competitions in northern New South Wales towns. Engraved in his name.

There were artists materials in one room and picture framing equipment in a shed. Later I found he was teaching colour theory at a local college and is now known as a muralist. I have bought two landscape oils of his.

Was he Alexandrian? Did he fight in the Six Day War? We'll never know.
(Redemption blamed it on the Bossa Nova since, Sat 1 Dec 2007, 8:58, 1 reply)

To be honest
his story sounds semi-plausible, in that one of the "features" of army life in wartime is sitting around a lot, and Australia does have a bit of an Egyptian community. Luigi's not an Egyptian name, of course, but have you ever tried pronouncing Arabic correctly?
(Emily Bruce-Dickinson http://jovialfellow.blogspot.com/, Sat 1 Dec 2007, 12:18, closed)