Funnily enough, I was the only male prize winner. The four ladies who also won comprised three Americans and a Lebanese - the later, Kathy Shalhoub, taking away first prize (an I-Pad) for a pretty stunning short story about the end of the world. If I weren't such a strapping macho man, I might well have had a tear in my eye.
Apart from winning a 500 dirham (100 quid) book token, I also got to meet Egyptian writer Sahar El-Mougy who picked the five winning stories from a shortlist of ten. It was interesting to swap information with her about Cairo. I worked there in 1988, had Naguib Mahfouz as a near neighbour and felt like I was describing a place from the history books - a feeling which Ms El-Mougy reinforced by telling me how much Cairo had changed since then.
You can read my story here:
http://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/books/the-others-by-paul-a-freeman
I'm already looking forward to next year's short story competition. I just hope I can move up the field a bit.
Below are links to my two Global Short Story Competition winners, my short-listed story for the National newspaper, Abu Dhabi, and my Canterbury Tale published by Coscom Entertainment:
http://coscomentertainment.com/?p=159
http://www.globalshortstories.net/winningstoriesjuly09.pdf
http://www.globalshortstories.net/winningstoriesdec09.pdf
http://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/short-story-a-day-for-decisiveness
Happy writing!