CAIRO — Everyone’s heard the expression about cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face – but how about the one about cutting off one’s penis to spite one’s parents?That’s what one broken-hearted fiancé did after his parents put the kibosh on his plans to marry out of his social caste.

In Egypt, decent people apparently don’t marry below their class. Alas for one 25-year-old man, he is from a prominent family living in an unspeakably poor part of the Egyptian province of Qena, while the woman he fell in love with is positioned socially far below him.

Given that most Egyptian marriages are between social peers and not for love, this unfortunate personal shortcoming is something that his parents simply can not overlook.

Instead of wishing the happy couple well and buying them a crystal fruit bowl, the young man’s parents have instead spent two years refusing to grant permission for the marriage.

Instead of ignoring them and marrying the girl of his heart anyway, the young man chose a more drastic route.

Perhaps two years of pleading for a parental blessing was too much for the hopeful swain, but whatever the cause, the ultimate result was that the broken-hearted man heated a knife and sliced it through his non-marital manhood.

According to a report filed later, although rushed to a local hospital, the offended appendage was in no condition to be reattached to its original location. Word has it that the unwed and unmanned lover is still recovering in the hospital.