[jaramba]

Three chaps each contribute 10 dollars towards a hotel room charge. Thus in total they give 30 dollars for the room. However the Manager decides to refund them 5 dollars as discount. But the hotel receptionist takes ( actually hides) 2 dollars from these 5 dollars and gives the three guests the remaining 3 dollars refund. So each will get a dollar apiece.

Therefor we can say each contributed 9 dollars (10-1=9 isnt?). So it follows then that if each contributed 9 dollars they logically contributed 27 dollars (9 by 3).

Now what confounds me is that you add these 27 dollars + 2 dollars (stolen by the Receptionist) we have 29 dollars!! Where does the other dollar disappear to?