KFC is a hot commodity between Gaza and Egypt as smugglers bring in the fast-food via underground tunnels and charge up to double the price.
According to the New York Times, Khalil Efrangi, 31, runs a small shop in Gaza called Yamama that will deliver a 12-piece bucket of KFC for $27, about twice what it costs across the border in Egypt, where the food is prepared.
It takes about three hours for the fried chicken to make the journey. Al-Yamama's financial manager, Mohammed al-Madani, told the Christian Science Monitor that the smuggling process is surprisingly simple. "After getting the orders, we call our partner in al-Arish and ask him to make the orders," he said. "After getting the meals, he goes to a specific tunnel and asks smugglers to transfer them into the other side of the tunnel; this may take a few minutes."
The transfer of fried chicken from Egypt to Gaza took three hours, not exactly fast food, but good enough for a territory where there are no Western fast-food franchises, according to the Monitor report.
Apart from satisfying the cravings for chicken, the underground not-so-fast food service proves a point, Khalil Efrangi, an entrepreneur who started al-Yamama, told The New York Times.
"I accepted this challenge to prove that Gazans can be resilient despite the restrictions," the Times quoted him as saying.
Formerly called Kentucky Fried Chicken, a KFC franchise opened in El Arish, just over Gaza's southern border, in 2011, and in the West Bank city of Ramallah last year.
