I’ve often wondered why the Kleenex pushers work in groups. They all descend on you at once, like vultures or piranhas or something, forcing packets of tissue into your hand, insisting that you are a good person, and asking you for money. What could I possibly need all that Kleenex for? Am I supposed to choose one lucky Kleenex pusher and give them my money? It isn’t as if one packet of Kleenex is far superior to the next, is it? As you can see the whole scenario is rather overwhelming.
The trickier ones place packets of Kleenex to Rachel’s ever-extended hand and then expect me to pay for them. I usually just end up giving the Kleenex back and not paying them because I find it horrible that they take advantage of my child to get a few LE.
The more determined ones will follow me for several streets whining about this and that. I don’t buy their Kleenex, either, because they’re just annoying.
I usually ignore them all, truthfully, and I feel rather callus about that. But how many little packets of tissue could I ever possibly need?
Yesterday Rachel and I went out walking and I kept a pound in my pocket to give to a beggar. Oddly enough we didn’t see a single beggar the whole time we were out, so it was still in my pocket when we went out with Andrew this evening.
Keeping with the ordinary, I saw a lady peddling her Kleenex. She looked truly poor and her baby honestly sad, unlike the other lady who’s been pestering me (she refused the food I offered her and laughed when I offered her some change. And her baby is super chubby. She keeps telling me he’s hungry and I’m like, “Are you kidding me? His rolls have rolls!”).
Like most other Kleenex pushers tonight’s shoved her wares up in my face, like perhaps I didn’t see her or hear her. Or maybe waving Kleenex directly under someone’s nose makes the Kleenex more attractive, or at least reminds the person that they might just need it someday.
I don’t know if it was her Kleenex-waving skills, or the way her face was so pleading, but I decided she was the one to get my pound. She took the money and told me I was a good lady and then, get this, she wouldn’t give me the Kleenex.
One pound is a bit much to pay for 5 sheets of lousy tissue, in my opinion. Much more overpriced than buying a box of Kleenex in the store. But to pay a pound for a packet of Kleenex and then to have that Kleenex taken from your hand…
I suppose she really needed the money. But why did she even offer the Kleenex to me in the first place? Why didn’t she just flat out ask me for money?
At least the Kleenex pusher/Indian giver and I are friends now. She smiled and waved at us on our way home and called me a good lady again. Not that I gave money away to be called “good lady.” I actually gave my money away for a packet of Kleenex.
I will admit I was a little miffed about the whole situation. I’m not sure why because it was only a pound, which is like 18 cents. It’s not like that broke the bank, but Andrew has a cold and really could have used a tissue just then.
I’m not sure when I’ll be buy Kleenex off the street again. I feel like I kind of got the bad end of the deal this time around.
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
Power Outages
We had a branch party on Saturday and, after a wonderful mix up on Andrew’s part, ended up at the correct swimming pool, which was lovely.
Andrew had led us all the way to Maadi Club (or Clup, depending on which sign you’re reading) and we stood at the gate for a while not knowing what to do. He didn’t have any money on his phone so he told me to call someone but I hate making phone calls so I handed him my phone and told him to call someone.
He called Kevan who told us just to look at the guestbook, choose someone in the branch as a sponsor, write our names down as their guests, and go on in.
We tried explaining this to the guards. Andrew took the book and opened it. The guard slapped it shut. Andrew explained again that we had friends inside and tried to open the book. The guard slapped it shut again and told us that this was a private club and, essentially, to get lost.
We resumed our previous position outside the gate looking stupidly lost and out of place.
Andrew handed me back the phone.
“You call someone,”
Fair is fair. I looked through the numbers in my phone. I need to program more numbers in there. Phyllis was the first on my list. She wasn’t going swimming. Then the Masons. Finn had a doctor’s appointment so they weren’t swimming either. Then Sara.
I need to add more numbers in my phone. I know more people than that. I called Sara who told us that Kevan had just gotten home and would be over shortly to let us in.
A while later Kevan called back. Andrew answered.
“Where are you guys?” Kevan asked.
“At gate #1, right by the circle,” Andrew answered.
“There’s no circle…”
Ah, we were supposed to be at Maadi House not Maadi Club (or Clup). Things were beginning to be clearer already. We wandered our way over there, crossing Boor Said twice, much to my dismay. I hate that street with a burning, fiery passion.
At any rate we found our way and had a wonderful swim, even if Rachel wasn’t in to the whole thing. When she’d completely come undone, we decided to call it a day, but not before stopping by the Lewis’s to use the internet.
Once home, Andrew showered while I put Rachel down for a nap, and then it was my turn in the shower. As luck would have it, the power went out the minute I was in. Again, very reminiscent of Jordan (I don’t know why it took us so long to replace that burned out light bulb—was it just a hard light bulb to find or our laziness that allowed the bathroom to remain dark for so long? Perhaps the bathroom was simply more welcoming in the dark. It was a scary bathroom, eh, Crystal?), showering in the dark while praying that the hot water didn’t run out before I finished rinsing my hair out.
The power goes out here all the time, but just in little spurts. It rarely stays out for longer than 30 minutes. Andrew and I did a little sleuthing around our apartment to see if we could figure out why the power goes out so often. It really wasn’t hard to find dozens of reasons why, especially when you consider that every apartment here has similar “features.” Is it any wonder we get a few blackouts now and again?
Amateur electricians are everywhere, including Andrew who daringly spliced our phone line together and then, in a death defying feat, chipped away the paint in the phone jack so that we could plug in our phone. (Amateur painters are everywhere, too. They seriously painted over our phone jack, completely filled the little hole with paint). I don’t think they have to train at any special trade school or do apprentice work or anything here. It’s all learn-as-you-go, as evidenced by every single cord in our house. Each one has been cut in half, mangled, and then taped back together. The bigger question is how we get away with so few blackouts. From the looks of things we should have at least twice as many more!
We only use 110 volts in North America and they scare us silly “educating” us at school about the dangers of electricity. We’re taught how to unplug an appliance properly (by the plug, not the cord) and that we shouldn’t use the phone during an electrical storm. My elementary school went so far as to bring in a miniature “green box” and electrocute a hot dog just to show us how much energy was running through those wires. I don’t think I’d ever been so scared in all my life.
Here they use 220 volts but they don’t seem the least bit concerned about being electrocuted. How do they do it?
Andrew had led us all the way to Maadi Club (or Clup, depending on which sign you’re reading) and we stood at the gate for a while not knowing what to do. He didn’t have any money on his phone so he told me to call someone but I hate making phone calls so I handed him my phone and told him to call someone.
He called Kevan who told us just to look at the guestbook, choose someone in the branch as a sponsor, write our names down as their guests, and go on in.
We tried explaining this to the guards. Andrew took the book and opened it. The guard slapped it shut. Andrew explained again that we had friends inside and tried to open the book. The guard slapped it shut again and told us that this was a private club and, essentially, to get lost.
We resumed our previous position outside the gate looking stupidly lost and out of place.
Andrew handed me back the phone.
“You call someone,”
Fair is fair. I looked through the numbers in my phone. I need to program more numbers in there. Phyllis was the first on my list. She wasn’t going swimming. Then the Masons. Finn had a doctor’s appointment so they weren’t swimming either. Then Sara.
I need to add more numbers in my phone. I know more people than that. I called Sara who told us that Kevan had just gotten home and would be over shortly to let us in.
A while later Kevan called back. Andrew answered.
“Where are you guys?” Kevan asked.
“At gate #1, right by the circle,” Andrew answered.
“There’s no circle…”
Ah, we were supposed to be at Maadi House not Maadi Club (or Clup). Things were beginning to be clearer already. We wandered our way over there, crossing Boor Said twice, much to my dismay. I hate that street with a burning, fiery passion.
At any rate we found our way and had a wonderful swim, even if Rachel wasn’t in to the whole thing. When she’d completely come undone, we decided to call it a day, but not before stopping by the Lewis’s to use the internet.
Once home, Andrew showered while I put Rachel down for a nap, and then it was my turn in the shower. As luck would have it, the power went out the minute I was in. Again, very reminiscent of Jordan (I don’t know why it took us so long to replace that burned out light bulb—was it just a hard light bulb to find or our laziness that allowed the bathroom to remain dark for so long? Perhaps the bathroom was simply more welcoming in the dark. It was a scary bathroom, eh, Crystal?), showering in the dark while praying that the hot water didn’t run out before I finished rinsing my hair out.
The power goes out here all the time, but just in little spurts. It rarely stays out for longer than 30 minutes. Andrew and I did a little sleuthing around our apartment to see if we could figure out why the power goes out so often. It really wasn’t hard to find dozens of reasons why, especially when you consider that every apartment here has similar “features.” Is it any wonder we get a few blackouts now and again?
Amateur electricians are everywhere, including Andrew who daringly spliced our phone line together and then, in a death defying feat, chipped away the paint in the phone jack so that we could plug in our phone. (Amateur painters are everywhere, too. They seriously painted over our phone jack, completely filled the little hole with paint). I don’t think they have to train at any special trade school or do apprentice work or anything here. It’s all learn-as-you-go, as evidenced by every single cord in our house. Each one has been cut in half, mangled, and then taped back together. The bigger question is how we get away with so few blackouts. From the looks of things we should have at least twice as many more!
We only use 110 volts in North America and they scare us silly “educating” us at school about the dangers of electricity. We’re taught how to unplug an appliance properly (by the plug, not the cord) and that we shouldn’t use the phone during an electrical storm. My elementary school went so far as to bring in a miniature “green box” and electrocute a hot dog just to show us how much energy was running through those wires. I don’t think I’d ever been so scared in all my life.
Here they use 220 volts but they don’t seem the least bit concerned about being electrocuted. How do they do it?
Water Woes, Mother Woes
At dinner this evening, Rachel denounced her babyhood. We ate out, at Pizza Hut, because I had failed to have dinner ready when Andrew got home and so everyone was starving to death. I had been intending to have some rice ready to serve up with leftover curry but our pipes ran dry all afternoon.
I immediately began to have day-mares of life in Jordan, day after day with no running water. We averaged 3-5 days with water. Sometimes, when we were lucky (or out of town for half the week) we’d have running water clear to the end of the week. Most often, though, we’d run out on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. It was dreadful. I’m not sure water ever meant so much to me until I had to live without showering, dish washing, or toilet flushing, among other things.
Quite paranoid, I checked the pipes every 10 minutes or so all afternoon.
With no water to boil the rice, I sat down and wondered what else to make for dinner. Pita bread and cheese somehow didn’t sound terribly filling.
When Andrew came home from work, he checked the pipes and, much to my surprise and relief, found that we had water again. He then suggested we just go out for dinner. I think he noticed how much stress not having water for one afternoon had caused me. I was a blubbering idiot when he came home.
“And I couldn’t do the laundry or clean Rachel off after lunch or *sniff* anything!”
Cowboy up, girlfriend! It was only one afternoon. Clearly I’ve seen worse, though I think that was really what pushed me over the edge—the prospect of having worse once more.
Anyway, we went out to dinner. There were several Muslim families there, waiting for the call to prayer so they could, essentially, dig in. As soon as the call to prayer started sounding there was a rush of waiters dropping pizza off at this table and that. I felt a little left out as we had to wait quite a while for our pizza to show up. I hadn’t even been fasting and my tummy was protesting the wait loudly. I’m kind of harboring the idea that our waiter was punishing us for being non-fasting Christians while he was a fasting-Muslim because he was surly. He didn’t bring our ketchup out with our pizza, if you can believe, and we actually had to ask for it.
Ordinarily this wouldn’t have been a big deal since Americans that I know of, including ourselves, don’t eat ketchup with their pizza (maybe Megan does…) but Arabs do eat ketchup with their pizza and I’ve come to expect a full bottle at my table. Besides, we’d ordered “potato wedges” and clearly those call for ketchup. Unless you happen to live in the Middle East, in which case you have to learn to eat your fries plain.
Surly waiters and ketchup problems aside, there was a cute little family sitting on the other side of the room from us. They had a little girl who was probably about a half year older than Rachel, and Rachel was rather excited to see her. She kept turning around in her chair and grinning so hard I thought her face would fall off.
For lack of a better term, we called the little girl a baby. I don’t know if Rachel was excited to see another girl her age or if she was simply jealous because this little girl already had her food.
“Where’s the baby, Rachel?” we asked, “Do you see the baby?”
She’d turn around and point to the little girl, who was clearly older than she was. When Andrew asked if she, herself, was a baby, Rachel vehemently shook her head no, much to my dismay.
And I suppose that she really has grown up in the past few weeks. We went swimming at a branch party and she kind of chickened out at the pool (wouldn’t blow bubbles or put her face in or do anything exciting), but after we’d met for iftar in the evening, Rachel was off playing with the rest of the kids. I was so sure she’d get trampled, or worse, but she really held her ground well.
I sat and watched her play for a while. She was chasing after Sam and mimicking his every move (except for sliding down the stairs—that was too tricky for her) and I was just sitting deftly to the side, wishing that she was my little baby again and not this grown up toddler.
When I asked her if it would be alright if I left, she gave me a look that said, “What have you been hanging around here for, anyway? I don’t need you!”
I went to mingle, albeit nervously, with some of the other “useless” mothers while Rachel played. I did see her get bowled over a few times by some tag-playing boys but she didn’t even cry or come find me. She just brushed herself off and rushed to catch up with whatever Sam was doing. Talk about feeling useless! Perhaps I just shouldn’t have spied on her playtime. Then I wouldn’t know how absolutely useless I was.
Aside from letting her venture out of my sight to play unchaperoned, Rachel has unleashed a few surprise words on use recently. She can say “dog” and “car,” although they come out more along the lines of “D-indiscernible vowel-G” and “C-random vowel-R.”
“Arf! Arf!” we hear somewhere in a distant street.
“Dog!” Rachel will say, although to me it sounds much more like “dig” and then she’ll start into her monkey sound, which is apparently also what a dog says, “Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!”
It will take some time to get used to all the changes Rachel is imposing on me. She’s just growing up too quickly—still hasn’t given up nursing, though. Although that is getting increasingly embarrassing to do in public since I never know whether she’s planning on starting the nursing session off by growling like a lion and gnashing her teeth at me or crooning a song of gratuity. I know you’re all thinking the lion growl would be more embarrassing but she usually gets enough milk in her mouth to gurgle with while she sings. I thank my lucky stars each time she goes through a public feeding without putting on a show.
I also thank my lucky stars that we were only without water for a couple of hours this afternoon and not for days on end.
I’m not sure I could hold together if both my baby and my water pipes abandoned me in one day!
I immediately began to have day-mares of life in Jordan, day after day with no running water. We averaged 3-5 days with water. Sometimes, when we were lucky (or out of town for half the week) we’d have running water clear to the end of the week. Most often, though, we’d run out on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. It was dreadful. I’m not sure water ever meant so much to me until I had to live without showering, dish washing, or toilet flushing, among other things.
Quite paranoid, I checked the pipes every 10 minutes or so all afternoon.
With no water to boil the rice, I sat down and wondered what else to make for dinner. Pita bread and cheese somehow didn’t sound terribly filling.
When Andrew came home from work, he checked the pipes and, much to my surprise and relief, found that we had water again. He then suggested we just go out for dinner. I think he noticed how much stress not having water for one afternoon had caused me. I was a blubbering idiot when he came home.
“And I couldn’t do the laundry or clean Rachel off after lunch or *sniff* anything!”
Cowboy up, girlfriend! It was only one afternoon. Clearly I’ve seen worse, though I think that was really what pushed me over the edge—the prospect of having worse once more.
Anyway, we went out to dinner. There were several Muslim families there, waiting for the call to prayer so they could, essentially, dig in. As soon as the call to prayer started sounding there was a rush of waiters dropping pizza off at this table and that. I felt a little left out as we had to wait quite a while for our pizza to show up. I hadn’t even been fasting and my tummy was protesting the wait loudly. I’m kind of harboring the idea that our waiter was punishing us for being non-fasting Christians while he was a fasting-Muslim because he was surly. He didn’t bring our ketchup out with our pizza, if you can believe, and we actually had to ask for it.
Ordinarily this wouldn’t have been a big deal since Americans that I know of, including ourselves, don’t eat ketchup with their pizza (maybe Megan does…) but Arabs do eat ketchup with their pizza and I’ve come to expect a full bottle at my table. Besides, we’d ordered “potato wedges” and clearly those call for ketchup. Unless you happen to live in the Middle East, in which case you have to learn to eat your fries plain.
Surly waiters and ketchup problems aside, there was a cute little family sitting on the other side of the room from us. They had a little girl who was probably about a half year older than Rachel, and Rachel was rather excited to see her. She kept turning around in her chair and grinning so hard I thought her face would fall off.
For lack of a better term, we called the little girl a baby. I don’t know if Rachel was excited to see another girl her age or if she was simply jealous because this little girl already had her food.
“Where’s the baby, Rachel?” we asked, “Do you see the baby?”
She’d turn around and point to the little girl, who was clearly older than she was. When Andrew asked if she, herself, was a baby, Rachel vehemently shook her head no, much to my dismay.
And I suppose that she really has grown up in the past few weeks. We went swimming at a branch party and she kind of chickened out at the pool (wouldn’t blow bubbles or put her face in or do anything exciting), but after we’d met for iftar in the evening, Rachel was off playing with the rest of the kids. I was so sure she’d get trampled, or worse, but she really held her ground well.
I sat and watched her play for a while. She was chasing after Sam and mimicking his every move (except for sliding down the stairs—that was too tricky for her) and I was just sitting deftly to the side, wishing that she was my little baby again and not this grown up toddler.
When I asked her if it would be alright if I left, she gave me a look that said, “What have you been hanging around here for, anyway? I don’t need you!”
I went to mingle, albeit nervously, with some of the other “useless” mothers while Rachel played. I did see her get bowled over a few times by some tag-playing boys but she didn’t even cry or come find me. She just brushed herself off and rushed to catch up with whatever Sam was doing. Talk about feeling useless! Perhaps I just shouldn’t have spied on her playtime. Then I wouldn’t know how absolutely useless I was.
Aside from letting her venture out of my sight to play unchaperoned, Rachel has unleashed a few surprise words on use recently. She can say “dog” and “car,” although they come out more along the lines of “D-indiscernible vowel-G” and “C-random vowel-R.”
“Arf! Arf!” we hear somewhere in a distant street.
“Dog!” Rachel will say, although to me it sounds much more like “dig” and then she’ll start into her monkey sound, which is apparently also what a dog says, “Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!”
It will take some time to get used to all the changes Rachel is imposing on me. She’s just growing up too quickly—still hasn’t given up nursing, though. Although that is getting increasingly embarrassing to do in public since I never know whether she’s planning on starting the nursing session off by growling like a lion and gnashing her teeth at me or crooning a song of gratuity. I know you’re all thinking the lion growl would be more embarrassing but she usually gets enough milk in her mouth to gurgle with while she sings. I thank my lucky stars each time she goes through a public feeding without putting on a show.
I also thank my lucky stars that we were only without water for a couple of hours this afternoon and not for days on end.
I’m not sure I could hold together if both my baby and my water pipes abandoned me in one day!
Monday, September 08, 2008
Another quick update
Yes, we're alive. No, we weren't even close to the landslide, although I think the bus to AUC goes by those hills on the way out to the new campus.
School started yesterday and the campus was actually a lot more ready than anyone expected. All the buildings had electricity and most even had air conditioning. All buildings have wired internet connections and the library (where I am right now) has a pseudo wireless connection working. The busses have worked pretty flawlessly from what I've seen, too.
The only problem is the lack of food. Since the overwhelming majority of the students aren't eating for the next month, getting food service operational wasn't high on the list of priorities. There are two working restaurant booths: Cilantro (kind of like Subway and Starbucks combined) and Jared's Bagels. Only 3 people work in each booth and inventory runs out fast. I didn't eat anything yesterday (and I was stuck on campus from 8 AM until 2:30); I stood in line for an hour for a bagel this morning.
Internet is going to be trickier to get. Not only is it Ramadan (when nobody does anything here), apparently our landline has already been signed up with an ISP and the company we were working with can't tell us who we have service with. So in theory, we already have internet - we just don't have a username, password, modem, or any other equipment. It'll be interesting to figure all that out. Ugh.
So, that's what's up with us. Nancy's working on a whole bunch of posts at our internet-less home and I'll get them posted here on campus tomorrow, in sha allah.
School started yesterday and the campus was actually a lot more ready than anyone expected. All the buildings had electricity and most even had air conditioning. All buildings have wired internet connections and the library (where I am right now) has a pseudo wireless connection working. The busses have worked pretty flawlessly from what I've seen, too.
The only problem is the lack of food. Since the overwhelming majority of the students aren't eating for the next month, getting food service operational wasn't high on the list of priorities. There are two working restaurant booths: Cilantro (kind of like Subway and Starbucks combined) and Jared's Bagels. Only 3 people work in each booth and inventory runs out fast. I didn't eat anything yesterday (and I was stuck on campus from 8 AM until 2:30); I stood in line for an hour for a bagel this morning.
Internet is going to be trickier to get. Not only is it Ramadan (when nobody does anything here), apparently our landline has already been signed up with an ISP and the company we were working with can't tell us who we have service with. So in theory, we already have internet - we just don't have a username, password, modem, or any other equipment. It'll be interesting to figure all that out. Ugh.
So, that's what's up with us. Nancy's working on a whole bunch of posts at our internet-less home and I'll get them posted here on campus tomorrow, in sha allah.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Journey to a New Campus
It was pretty much impossible to get anything done at the old campus during orientation. I stood in a 1 hour long line twice to get my ID card—I was rejected the first time because I didn’t bring a receipt from paying tuition, which I was told I needed an ID card to do….
I stood in a 1.5 hour long line twice at the bank trying to pay for Nancy and Rachel’s insurance—I was rejected the first time because apparently it has to be paid for in American dollars. I had to go to an ATM, get a whole bunch of pounds out, go back to the bank, have them convert it to dollars, and then convert those dollars back into pounds, finally depositing them in the appropriate AUC department account.
Lastly, I had to stand in a 45 minute line 3 times while trying to get a student visa. Apparently they lost some important medical and security forms during the transition to the old campus so I can’t legally get a student visa right now. Instead we all got a 6 month extension on our tourist visas. They hope to have all the medical and security clearances done by November, in sha allah (yeah, right).
So, on Monday, after getting as much done as I could at the old campus, I decided to make the brave journey out to Qatamiyya/New Cairo and see what I could do there. Because it’s still summer break (and it was the first day of Ramadan to boot), there is only one operative bus route, going from the old campus to the new campus like 5 times a day. I knew it would be risky getting out there; I could be waiting for a bus in Cairo for hours or I could get stuck in the middle of nowhere in New Cairo for hours, but I knew I had to get out there to get anything else done. My goal was to get on the 10:00 bus going there and the 11:30 bus coming back (ambitious, I know). If I messed up I’d have to take the 11:00 bus there and the 1:30 bus back. My resultant itinerary follows:
9:00 – Leave the apartment. Walking down the stairs I hear a heartbroken Rachel chant “Da da da da da”
9:03 – Go back to the apartment to get a camera. Find a happy Rachel who again starts babbling “Da da da” until I leave again.
9:07 – Arrive at Sakanaat al Maadi metro station.
9:10 – Get on metro.
9:35 – Arrive at Sadat metro station at Tahrir square.
9:36 – An AUC bus pulls up to campus
9:37 – I arrive outside of AUC and see tons of AUC faculty getting on the bus. I follow suit. Nobody checks for my bus pass or ID. Phew.
9:40 – Bus leaves. Don’t know whether this was the 9:00 bus, the 10:00 bus, or the “it’s the first day of Ramadan and there’s no schedule whatsoever” bus
10:30 – Bus arrives at the new campus. I start my mad errand run.
11:40 – Finish errands.
11:43 – Bus pulls up to campus. I push my way on past dozens of Egyptian students. I’m the second to last person to get on. Again, no bus pass check or ID check. Phew again.
12:20 – Make it back to the old campus. Only 3 hours and 40 minutes!
Apparently that last 1% is a huge percent. There was no electricity on the whole campus, no internet, few buildings even have water; it is a complete hard hat zone. Graduate secretaries and advisors bring their laptops and write down what needs to be done once they get back to an internet connection.
Classes start in a few days. This will be fun!
I stood in a 1.5 hour long line twice at the bank trying to pay for Nancy and Rachel’s insurance—I was rejected the first time because apparently it has to be paid for in American dollars. I had to go to an ATM, get a whole bunch of pounds out, go back to the bank, have them convert it to dollars, and then convert those dollars back into pounds, finally depositing them in the appropriate AUC department account.
Lastly, I had to stand in a 45 minute line 3 times while trying to get a student visa. Apparently they lost some important medical and security forms during the transition to the old campus so I can’t legally get a student visa right now. Instead we all got a 6 month extension on our tourist visas. They hope to have all the medical and security clearances done by November, in sha allah (yeah, right).
So, on Monday, after getting as much done as I could at the old campus, I decided to make the brave journey out to Qatamiyya/New Cairo and see what I could do there. Because it’s still summer break (and it was the first day of Ramadan to boot), there is only one operative bus route, going from the old campus to the new campus like 5 times a day. I knew it would be risky getting out there; I could be waiting for a bus in Cairo for hours or I could get stuck in the middle of nowhere in New Cairo for hours, but I knew I had to get out there to get anything else done. My goal was to get on the 10:00 bus going there and the 11:30 bus coming back (ambitious, I know). If I messed up I’d have to take the 11:00 bus there and the 1:30 bus back. My resultant itinerary follows:
9:00 – Leave the apartment. Walking down the stairs I hear a heartbroken Rachel chant “Da da da da da”
9:03 – Go back to the apartment to get a camera. Find a happy Rachel who again starts babbling “Da da da” until I leave again.
9:07 – Arrive at Sakanaat al Maadi metro station.
9:10 – Get on metro.
9:35 – Arrive at Sadat metro station at Tahrir square.
9:36 – An AUC bus pulls up to campus
9:37 – I arrive outside of AUC and see tons of AUC faculty getting on the bus. I follow suit. Nobody checks for my bus pass or ID. Phew.
9:40 – Bus leaves. Don’t know whether this was the 9:00 bus, the 10:00 bus, or the “it’s the first day of Ramadan and there’s no schedule whatsoever” bus
10:30 – Bus arrives at the new campus. I start my mad errand run.
11:40 – Finish errands.
11:43 – Bus pulls up to campus. I push my way on past dozens of Egyptian students. I’m the second to last person to get on. Again, no bus pass check or ID check. Phew again.
12:20 – Make it back to the old campus. Only 3 hours and 40 minutes!
Apparently that last 1% is a huge percent. There was no electricity on the whole campus, no internet, few buildings even have water; it is a complete hard hat zone. Graduate secretaries and advisors bring their laptops and write down what needs to be done once they get back to an internet connection.
Classes start in a few days. This will be fun!
AUC Campus Limbo
The American University in Cairo was founded in 1919 by some American evangelical missionaries and was added to a long string of other foreign-based universities (American Universities of Beirut, Paris, and Rome all exist – there are probably more too…I don’t have Google right now). They eventually dropped the religious aspect of their educational goals and became plain ol’ American universities abroad.
The founders of AUC leased/purchased an old Ottoman palace right in downtown Cairo, off of Midan Tahrir (across from the Egyptian Museum), intending to establish a temporary campus until they could set up a permanent base elsewhere in the city. That was in 1919. It’s 2008. Not very temporary...
In the meantime AUC bought several other buildings in the area. The old AUC campus is spread across the neighborhood in three general sections: the main campus, the Greek campus, and the Falaki campus. To get to the library from the administrative building you have to walk 3ish blocks. Some offices are even in totally separate buildings; the Arabic Language Institute offices are above a Cilantro café across from the main campus.
From what I’ve seen in my past week of orientation and general errand running on the old campus, AUC outgrew its facilities like 20 years ago. A normal, single person sized office has 6-7 offices crammed inside. The student visa office is an addition on the roof of the administrative building; the only way to get there is to go up a fire escape stairwell. Also up on the roof, across from the big A/C spinny thingies, is the department of international purchasing, faculty housing, and risk management (ironic that they’re only accessible via fire escape).
So, 89 years after AUC was started, the founders’ dream can finally be realized. For the past ten years AUC has been building a brand new $400 million campus on a huge 260 acre piece of land in a suburb of Cairo named Qatamiyya, nicknamed New Cairo. Well, it’s kind of a suburb. It takes 30 minutes to drive there from Maadi and there is absolutely nothing out there. It’s really truly in the middle of the desert. They don’t even get cell phone coverage out there in New Cairo (and our cell phones had full bars at Petra!)
According to a speech given to the faculty by the AUC president in June, the new campus was 99% complete and would be completely ready for school to start in September. At orientation last week the president again said that the new campus was 99% complete. Neat how the percentage hadn’t changed in 3 months...
Orientation was originally scheduled to be held entirely at the new campus but they changed their minds at the last minute and moved everything to the old campus. All department and faculty offices are currently stuck in transition to the new campus. This made orientation very exciting. I couldn’t really get anything done because all the offices I needed to see didn’t really exist; they weren’t at the old campus anymore and they weren’t at the new campus yet. They were stuck in the realm of office limbo.
Since New Cairo is so far out there, AUC has set up a complicated bus system with perfectly timed private bus routes scattered through the main neighborhoods of Cairo. In order to ride the busses you have to sign up for a bus pass and choose your route and scheduled time. Everything is set up on a nicely designed website and in theory the entire bus system should work flawlessly. However, this is still the Middle East; they don’t believe in schedules here. At all. Even better, though, is the fact that in order to get the physical bus pass I have to visit an office. Guess where that office is? In office limbo! Yep. Once the office is set up on the new campus I somehow have to take a bus out there to get my bus pass.
Classes start on Sunday at the new campus. My Arabic class starts at 8 AM. I have to take the first bus to run from Maadi to Qatamiyya in the history of AUC. I don’t even know where exactly to get on the bus. This will be awesome!
The founders of AUC leased/purchased an old Ottoman palace right in downtown Cairo, off of Midan Tahrir (across from the Egyptian Museum), intending to establish a temporary campus until they could set up a permanent base elsewhere in the city. That was in 1919. It’s 2008. Not very temporary...
In the meantime AUC bought several other buildings in the area. The old AUC campus is spread across the neighborhood in three general sections: the main campus, the Greek campus, and the Falaki campus. To get to the library from the administrative building you have to walk 3ish blocks. Some offices are even in totally separate buildings; the Arabic Language Institute offices are above a Cilantro café across from the main campus.
From what I’ve seen in my past week of orientation and general errand running on the old campus, AUC outgrew its facilities like 20 years ago. A normal, single person sized office has 6-7 offices crammed inside. The student visa office is an addition on the roof of the administrative building; the only way to get there is to go up a fire escape stairwell. Also up on the roof, across from the big A/C spinny thingies, is the department of international purchasing, faculty housing, and risk management (ironic that they’re only accessible via fire escape).
So, 89 years after AUC was started, the founders’ dream can finally be realized. For the past ten years AUC has been building a brand new $400 million campus on a huge 260 acre piece of land in a suburb of Cairo named Qatamiyya, nicknamed New Cairo. Well, it’s kind of a suburb. It takes 30 minutes to drive there from Maadi and there is absolutely nothing out there. It’s really truly in the middle of the desert. They don’t even get cell phone coverage out there in New Cairo (and our cell phones had full bars at Petra!)
According to a speech given to the faculty by the AUC president in June, the new campus was 99% complete and would be completely ready for school to start in September. At orientation last week the president again said that the new campus was 99% complete. Neat how the percentage hadn’t changed in 3 months...
Orientation was originally scheduled to be held entirely at the new campus but they changed their minds at the last minute and moved everything to the old campus. All department and faculty offices are currently stuck in transition to the new campus. This made orientation very exciting. I couldn’t really get anything done because all the offices I needed to see didn’t really exist; they weren’t at the old campus anymore and they weren’t at the new campus yet. They were stuck in the realm of office limbo.
Since New Cairo is so far out there, AUC has set up a complicated bus system with perfectly timed private bus routes scattered through the main neighborhoods of Cairo. In order to ride the busses you have to sign up for a bus pass and choose your route and scheduled time. Everything is set up on a nicely designed website and in theory the entire bus system should work flawlessly. However, this is still the Middle East; they don’t believe in schedules here. At all. Even better, though, is the fact that in order to get the physical bus pass I have to visit an office. Guess where that office is? In office limbo! Yep. Once the office is set up on the new campus I somehow have to take a bus out there to get my bus pass.
Classes start on Sunday at the new campus. My Arabic class starts at 8 AM. I have to take the first bus to run from Maadi to Qatamiyya in the history of AUC. I don’t even know where exactly to get on the bus. This will be awesome!
Mara Taniya, Mauritana!
Sometimes I forget how embarrassing it can be to learn a language—other than a first language, that is. Rachel doesn’t seem to ever get embarrassed and so far everything she knows is somewhat embarrassing.
She knows several animal noises. Snakes say “Ssss!” while dogs, owls, and monkeys say a variation of “Oo! Oo!” Lions, tigers, bears, and anything that looks like it could eat a person say “Arrrwwwrr!”
She can say the first sound of book and ball. I often confuse what she wants that way.
“Buh!”
“Book? Do you want to read a story?”
Temper tantrum ensues. “Buh! Buh! Buh!”
“Alright then…ball? Do you want throw some balls?”
Temper tantrum ceases. “Buh, buh, *sniff, nod* buh!”
Most of what she says are 1 syllable of whatever it is she wants to say, often with hand gestures thrown in.
“Dada!” said while pounding on the door and screaming means “Why did Dada go outside without me? Come back, Dada!”
“Dada!” said while clapping hands and running to the door means “Did I just hear the key in the door? I think Dada is home. Maybe he will take me outside!”
“Dada!” said while shrugging her shoulders and putting her hands up in the air means “Where is Dada, anyway?”
She’ll act out anything she understands, too. Poke, jump, yawn, head, eye, ear, nose, etc. Sometimes we use these words on purpose just to see, for example, how many times she’ll poke herself in the eye or how long she can keep jumping. Other times we spell words to avoid having her pull out her h-a-i-r.
Aside from those little breaks in our strictly non-communicative relationship, Rachel’s main method of communicating involves screaming (sometimes with hand gestures). This is the embarrassing part.
“Ahhhhh!” while clutching at her diaper means “You’d better put me on the potty, and now!” That, or, “Ooops! I just went!”
“Ahhhhh!” while pulling my shirt up or down means “I’m starving here!”
“Ahhhh!” while rolling around on the floor and banging her head can mean just about anything, but it’s still just as embarrassing as the two previously mentioned situations, if not more.
Recently she’s started repeating things that I say. Usually she’ll catch either the beginning or the end of a word or sentence and she’ll repeat it. Most often it’s when we’re having a “learning moment” and I say something like,
“It’s not okay to scream when you want to _________. You need to use your words, ok?”
She’ll nod and repeat, “Ok!”
I think she does that because she knows that if she does I’ll let her go. I wonder if she knows that I take her word as a binding contract.
Alas, when I’m learning a new language screaming and rolling around on the ground simply is not an option. I have to plow on through sticky situations and pretend that I understand things when I don’t. Like finding my way through Zamalek.
Me: How do I get to Um Kalthum?
Arab (with hand gestures): Gibberish globbity gibberish. Mashi!
Translation: Something I totally didn’t understand. Keep going!
Me (repeating directional hand gestures): Okay, thanks!
My favorite part about being me right now is that I’ve reached the stage where I’ve started hearing words, remembering them, and repeating them (to myself and aloud). I did it while learning Russian and would walk around the library muttering “двоюроднaя сестра” or “четыре” to myself. Rachel is in that same stage right now. She walks around muttering "good" and "ok" and things like that. I walk around muttering things all the time and then I will ask Andrew about them over dinner.
“You said a word today,” I will say to Andrew.
“I said lots of words,” he will respond.
“Yeah, but you said this one several times today and so did the guy you were talking to and I don’t know what it means.”
“What word was it?” he will ask.
The problem is that by the time I get a chance to ask him what a certain word means I’ve repeated it to myself so many times that it mutates. Yes, I play the telephone game with myself.
Today’s word was مرة ثانية. Andrew said it so many times in the taxi and I just couldn’t figure out what was going on. The conversation moved from Rachel to where we’re from to why we’re here to if we like President Bush to if we’re Muslim or Christian to a sight-seeing tour of Cairo where the taxi cab driver pointed out several synagogues to us.
Through all of these subjects, Andrew mentioned Mauritania several times.
I’m in the backseat chanting to myself, “Mauritania, Mauritania, Mauritania…” hoping that I will remember it long enough to ask Andrew what the deal is with Mauritania and what Mauritania has to do with Bush, our family, and synagogues.
By the time we got home, had dinner, and put a screaming Rachel to bed, I had forgotten the word. But I knew it started with an em. Now I really sounded like a lunatic. I have a series of questions that I ask Andrew when I think I remember a word. It goes like this:
“What does _________ mean?”
“That’s not a word.”
“Okay, then is ______ a word?”
“No,”
“Well, does it sound like any words?”
He’ll then try to list whatever word it is I’m trying to think of. Sometimes we’ll find the right word. Sometimes we won’t. Tonight we didn’t.
“You said a word and it started with em and you used it when you were talking about Bush. What was it?”
“Mushkilgi?” he offered, “Problem-maker?”
“No, I basically understood that one. It was a different word.”
Enter Nancy the monkey (if Rachel was saying this she’d say “Ooo! Oo!”).
“Ma… Ma… Mu… Moo… Mo… Mau… Mauritania!”
“Oh, Mauritania,” said Andrew knowingly.
“Yeah, it’s all over the place. It’s on TV all the time. On the news…and even in cartoons, which doesn’t make sense. And everyone talks about it all the time. Either, either Mauritania is really important (which it isn’t) or it means something I don’t know…”
“Mara taniya,” corrected Andrew, “Mara means time and taniya means…”
“Two…”
“Right. Time two… It means again or repeat that or…”
“Can it also mean ‘Later’ or ‘not now?’ ‘Cuz I think I’ve heard it used that way, too…”
Awesome. So it turns out this is a common problem among Arabic students. The best part, however, is when Andrew said,
“So, have you been confused about this since Jordan?”
“No. I don’t think I even knew Mauritania was a country when we lived in Jordan.” That proves that I’m geologically challenged. I seriously had no clue where or what Mauritania was before Andrew came home from school and said that he had a job offer in Mauritania. We seriously considered moving there instead of here.
“But come to think of it, I think I remember hearing mara taniya before,” I continued.
“So basically,” he concluded, “You knew mara taniya meant again, but when you learned that Mauritania was a country you completely replaced mara taniya with Mauritania and have now just learned mara taniya again.”
That pretty much sums it up. I have a memory glitch. Maybe one day Mauritania will hold its own on the news but until then, Mauritania, mara taniya!
She knows several animal noises. Snakes say “Ssss!” while dogs, owls, and monkeys say a variation of “Oo! Oo!” Lions, tigers, bears, and anything that looks like it could eat a person say “Arrrwwwrr!”
She can say the first sound of book and ball. I often confuse what she wants that way.
“Buh!”
“Book? Do you want to read a story?”
Temper tantrum ensues. “Buh! Buh! Buh!”
“Alright then…ball? Do you want throw some balls?”
Temper tantrum ceases. “Buh, buh, *sniff, nod* buh!”
Most of what she says are 1 syllable of whatever it is she wants to say, often with hand gestures thrown in.
“Dada!” said while pounding on the door and screaming means “Why did Dada go outside without me? Come back, Dada!”
“Dada!” said while clapping hands and running to the door means “Did I just hear the key in the door? I think Dada is home. Maybe he will take me outside!”
“Dada!” said while shrugging her shoulders and putting her hands up in the air means “Where is Dada, anyway?”
She’ll act out anything she understands, too. Poke, jump, yawn, head, eye, ear, nose, etc. Sometimes we use these words on purpose just to see, for example, how many times she’ll poke herself in the eye or how long she can keep jumping. Other times we spell words to avoid having her pull out her h-a-i-r.
Aside from those little breaks in our strictly non-communicative relationship, Rachel’s main method of communicating involves screaming (sometimes with hand gestures). This is the embarrassing part.
“Ahhhhh!” while clutching at her diaper means “You’d better put me on the potty, and now!” That, or, “Ooops! I just went!”
“Ahhhhh!” while pulling my shirt up or down means “I’m starving here!”
“Ahhhh!” while rolling around on the floor and banging her head can mean just about anything, but it’s still just as embarrassing as the two previously mentioned situations, if not more.
Recently she’s started repeating things that I say. Usually she’ll catch either the beginning or the end of a word or sentence and she’ll repeat it. Most often it’s when we’re having a “learning moment” and I say something like,
“It’s not okay to scream when you want to _________. You need to use your words, ok?”
She’ll nod and repeat, “Ok!”
I think she does that because she knows that if she does I’ll let her go. I wonder if she knows that I take her word as a binding contract.
Alas, when I’m learning a new language screaming and rolling around on the ground simply is not an option. I have to plow on through sticky situations and pretend that I understand things when I don’t. Like finding my way through Zamalek.
Me: How do I get to Um Kalthum?
Arab (with hand gestures): Gibberish globbity gibberish. Mashi!
Translation: Something I totally didn’t understand. Keep going!
Me (repeating directional hand gestures): Okay, thanks!
My favorite part about being me right now is that I’ve reached the stage where I’ve started hearing words, remembering them, and repeating them (to myself and aloud). I did it while learning Russian and would walk around the library muttering “двоюроднaя сестра” or “четыре” to myself. Rachel is in that same stage right now. She walks around muttering "good" and "ok" and things like that. I walk around muttering things all the time and then I will ask Andrew about them over dinner.
“You said a word today,” I will say to Andrew.
“I said lots of words,” he will respond.
“Yeah, but you said this one several times today and so did the guy you were talking to and I don’t know what it means.”
“What word was it?” he will ask.
The problem is that by the time I get a chance to ask him what a certain word means I’ve repeated it to myself so many times that it mutates. Yes, I play the telephone game with myself.
Today’s word was مرة ثانية. Andrew said it so many times in the taxi and I just couldn’t figure out what was going on. The conversation moved from Rachel to where we’re from to why we’re here to if we like President Bush to if we’re Muslim or Christian to a sight-seeing tour of Cairo where the taxi cab driver pointed out several synagogues to us.
Through all of these subjects, Andrew mentioned Mauritania several times.
I’m in the backseat chanting to myself, “Mauritania, Mauritania, Mauritania…” hoping that I will remember it long enough to ask Andrew what the deal is with Mauritania and what Mauritania has to do with Bush, our family, and synagogues.
By the time we got home, had dinner, and put a screaming Rachel to bed, I had forgotten the word. But I knew it started with an em. Now I really sounded like a lunatic. I have a series of questions that I ask Andrew when I think I remember a word. It goes like this:
“What does _________ mean?”
“That’s not a word.”
“Okay, then is ______ a word?”
“No,”
“Well, does it sound like any words?”
He’ll then try to list whatever word it is I’m trying to think of. Sometimes we’ll find the right word. Sometimes we won’t. Tonight we didn’t.
“You said a word and it started with em and you used it when you were talking about Bush. What was it?”
“Mushkilgi?” he offered, “Problem-maker?”
“No, I basically understood that one. It was a different word.”
Enter Nancy the monkey (if Rachel was saying this she’d say “Ooo! Oo!”).
“Ma… Ma… Mu… Moo… Mo… Mau… Mauritania!”
“Oh, Mauritania,” said Andrew knowingly.
“Yeah, it’s all over the place. It’s on TV all the time. On the news…and even in cartoons, which doesn’t make sense. And everyone talks about it all the time. Either, either Mauritania is really important (which it isn’t) or it means something I don’t know…”
“Mara taniya,” corrected Andrew, “Mara means time and taniya means…”
“Two…”
“Right. Time two… It means again or repeat that or…”
“Can it also mean ‘Later’ or ‘not now?’ ‘Cuz I think I’ve heard it used that way, too…”
Awesome. So it turns out this is a common problem among Arabic students. The best part, however, is when Andrew said,
“So, have you been confused about this since Jordan?”
“No. I don’t think I even knew Mauritania was a country when we lived in Jordan.” That proves that I’m geologically challenged. I seriously had no clue where or what Mauritania was before Andrew came home from school and said that he had a job offer in Mauritania. We seriously considered moving there instead of here.
“But come to think of it, I think I remember hearing mara taniya before,” I continued.
“So basically,” he concluded, “You knew mara taniya meant again, but when you learned that Mauritania was a country you completely replaced mara taniya with Mauritania and have now just learned mara taniya again.”
That pretty much sums it up. I have a memory glitch. Maybe one day Mauritania will hold its own on the news but until then, Mauritania, mara taniya!
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Ramadan and the Khan
On the first night of Ramadan we went out walking. The city was dead quiet. It would have been eerie had I not know that everyone was just inside with their families eating. We saw almost no one. We went right into downtown Maadi and could walk up and down Road 9 at our leisure. There was no traffic.
Rachel is going to get spoiled this month. We let her get down and run around in the street—something she hasn’t been allowed to do since we left the States. She walked all the way home from McDonald’s the other day. (On a side note, we don’t eat at McDonald’s all the time…it’s more of a landmark).
She doesn’t really understand the whole fasting thing, not that we expect her to yet. We took the metro to Khan al Khalili today and, to postpone a temper tantrum, we gave her a poo cookie.*
She kept offering it to everyone on our car. She’d take a nibble and then hold it out to the man sitting beside me. He’d shake his head and she’d laugh, take a nibble, and offer it to the man standing in front of me. He’d shake his head and she’d laugh.
It was rather embarrassing for us because we knew that everyone was fasting, but everyone was really nice about it. No one expects her to fast because she’s too young and it’s fairly obvious (from the looks of her parents) that she’s not a Muslim.
Khan al Khalili was fun. We like to go to the very end of the street where more locals than tourists shop. We walk past all the vendors until we are the only foreigners around and the shopkeepers can’t carry a conversation in English. Then we’ll start looking for what we want to buy.
Our goal for today was to find some new sandals for me. I left my beloved sandals at home in the States. Really they were fit for the trash. I picked them up at Khan al Khalili 2 years ago and didn’t really expect them to last for more than a week. I think I spent 10 LE on them, or something like that. They just jumped out at me and I instantly fell in love. We’ve been constant companions ever since. Needless to say, I took quite the toll on them. They’re totally falling apart, which is sadder than sad because they are the most comfortable sandals in the world.
I looked at a lot of sandals today. Not one pair even came close to the perfection of my last pair of Khan al Khalili sandals. And then I spotted them: the exact pair of sandals I have sitting in a box in my mother-in-law’s basement waiting to be tossed when I unpack them and see how ratty they truly are. Only this pair was new…and far, far too big. Andrew asked the shoe-man if he had anything smaller. The smallest he scrounged up was size 39, which, unfortunately, was still too big.
I suppose I could branch out and try a different pair of sandals, but part of me wants to hold out for another pair of MY sandals. It would give us a reason to visit Khan al Khalili and practice our bartering skills (we’re both a little rusty).
We might have to wait to return until Ramadan is over, though. Things were a little crazy at the firework booths. People were lighting firecrackers in the streets, which I think is a little dangerous, especially when the streets are full of people. Andrew got hit in the ear by a piece of something hot and fiery…and they kept going off right above our heads. It was rather cacophonous with the firecrackers, and the call to prayer, and the vendors yelling about their wares.
Andrew has a friend in his program who lives by Khan al Khalili. According to him downtown Cairo also goes deathly silent for the iftar. It’s almost hard to imagine Cairo being that quiet.
As for the grumpiness, Bridget, we’ve yet to experience that. Of course, we’re only on day 3…so we have a long way to go. And although the vendors at the Khan didn’t seem quite as chipper as usual—sleeping all over their hud and not caring about whether or not they made a sale--they didn't really seem crabby.
The guys at our fruit stand are still happy as well. We went to buy some fruit yesterday (this would make a better story if I could remember the guy’s name. Let’s call him Halid) and Halid (whose real name I can’t remember) went to get Rachel a banana. He peeled it for her and started giving her bites. Andrew got all our fruit and then we acted like we were going to go because in America we would have.
Halid insisted that we stay, though, because he was feeding Rachel a banana. (I keep typing bandana). We talked with him about Ramadan while he fed Rachel her banana.
“I’m so jealous of her…she can eat, and I can’t.”
He was just kidding, of course.
Another upside of Ramadan is the fasting. They fast from eating, drinking, and even smoking. We really have enjoyed the lack of smoking. It’s nice to walk down the street and not feel like I’m going to die of lung cancer after walking two blocks…
*The word "poo" is used to describe the cheapest variety of anything (cookies, milk, bread, etc.); usually they are chock full of preservatives and taste less than real.
Rachel is going to get spoiled this month. We let her get down and run around in the street—something she hasn’t been allowed to do since we left the States. She walked all the way home from McDonald’s the other day. (On a side note, we don’t eat at McDonald’s all the time…it’s more of a landmark).
She doesn’t really understand the whole fasting thing, not that we expect her to yet. We took the metro to Khan al Khalili today and, to postpone a temper tantrum, we gave her a poo cookie.*
She kept offering it to everyone on our car. She’d take a nibble and then hold it out to the man sitting beside me. He’d shake his head and she’d laugh, take a nibble, and offer it to the man standing in front of me. He’d shake his head and she’d laugh.
It was rather embarrassing for us because we knew that everyone was fasting, but everyone was really nice about it. No one expects her to fast because she’s too young and it’s fairly obvious (from the looks of her parents) that she’s not a Muslim.
Khan al Khalili was fun. We like to go to the very end of the street where more locals than tourists shop. We walk past all the vendors until we are the only foreigners around and the shopkeepers can’t carry a conversation in English. Then we’ll start looking for what we want to buy.
Our goal for today was to find some new sandals for me. I left my beloved sandals at home in the States. Really they were fit for the trash. I picked them up at Khan al Khalili 2 years ago and didn’t really expect them to last for more than a week. I think I spent 10 LE on them, or something like that. They just jumped out at me and I instantly fell in love. We’ve been constant companions ever since. Needless to say, I took quite the toll on them. They’re totally falling apart, which is sadder than sad because they are the most comfortable sandals in the world.
I looked at a lot of sandals today. Not one pair even came close to the perfection of my last pair of Khan al Khalili sandals. And then I spotted them: the exact pair of sandals I have sitting in a box in my mother-in-law’s basement waiting to be tossed when I unpack them and see how ratty they truly are. Only this pair was new…and far, far too big. Andrew asked the shoe-man if he had anything smaller. The smallest he scrounged up was size 39, which, unfortunately, was still too big.
I suppose I could branch out and try a different pair of sandals, but part of me wants to hold out for another pair of MY sandals. It would give us a reason to visit Khan al Khalili and practice our bartering skills (we’re both a little rusty).
We might have to wait to return until Ramadan is over, though. Things were a little crazy at the firework booths. People were lighting firecrackers in the streets, which I think is a little dangerous, especially when the streets are full of people. Andrew got hit in the ear by a piece of something hot and fiery…and they kept going off right above our heads. It was rather cacophonous with the firecrackers, and the call to prayer, and the vendors yelling about their wares.
Andrew has a friend in his program who lives by Khan al Khalili. According to him downtown Cairo also goes deathly silent for the iftar. It’s almost hard to imagine Cairo being that quiet.
As for the grumpiness, Bridget, we’ve yet to experience that. Of course, we’re only on day 3…so we have a long way to go. And although the vendors at the Khan didn’t seem quite as chipper as usual—sleeping all over their hud and not caring about whether or not they made a sale--they didn't really seem crabby.
The guys at our fruit stand are still happy as well. We went to buy some fruit yesterday (this would make a better story if I could remember the guy’s name. Let’s call him Halid) and Halid (whose real name I can’t remember) went to get Rachel a banana. He peeled it for her and started giving her bites. Andrew got all our fruit and then we acted like we were going to go because in America we would have.
Halid insisted that we stay, though, because he was feeding Rachel a banana. (I keep typing bandana). We talked with him about Ramadan while he fed Rachel her banana.
“I’m so jealous of her…she can eat, and I can’t.”
He was just kidding, of course.
Another upside of Ramadan is the fasting. They fast from eating, drinking, and even smoking. We really have enjoyed the lack of smoking. It’s nice to walk down the street and not feel like I’m going to die of lung cancer after walking two blocks…
*The word "poo" is used to describe the cheapest variety of anything (cookies, milk, bread, etc.); usually they are chock full of preservatives and taste less than real.
Monday, September 01, 2008
Fans
We've purchased a few fans recently. We have a little meter in our house that counts our electricity usage and when we run the AC the wheel ominously zooms by. We're not sure our student budget will allow for that.
At first we bought one fan and it seemed to cool things off nicely...as long as you were sitting right in front of it...so we decided to buy two more so that we could each carry our personal fan around the house to keep ourselves cool.
So far it's been working. We haven't used the AC at all in the past few days.
And as an added benefit, they've provided Rachel with some nice new toys.
Can you guess what happened about two seconds after we snapped this photo?
At first we bought one fan and it seemed to cool things off nicely...as long as you were sitting right in front of it...so we decided to buy two more so that we could each carry our personal fan around the house to keep ourselves cool.
So far it's been working. We haven't used the AC at all in the past few days.
And as an added benefit, they've provided Rachel with some nice new toys.
Can you guess what happened about two seconds after we snapped this photo?
Ramadan Kareem
It's Ramadan here in Egypt. Since it's only the first day of Ramadan and since it's my first Ramadan, I'm not really sure what it entails. All I know is that there are pretty lanterns everywhere, Andrew's school schedule will be all messed up for the first few weeks of classes, we're not suppose to eat/drink in public during the day, and shopping the night before Ramadan is a little crazy.
I'm sure we'll learn a lot more as Ramadan continues.
Last night after putting Rachel to bed we went outside to take a picture of our apartment building's Ramadan lamp. We had our tripod, our camera, and our baby monitor. Everyone walking by looked at us like we were crazy. I'm not sure if it was because we stood there taking picture after picture of a lamp, or if it was because I was holding a baby monitor blaring Italian Primary songs...
Just our own little way of bringing in the Ramadan season. Happy Ramadan!
I'm sure we'll learn a lot more as Ramadan continues.
Last night after putting Rachel to bed we went outside to take a picture of our apartment building's Ramadan lamp. We had our tripod, our camera, and our baby monitor. Everyone walking by looked at us like we were crazy. I'm not sure if it was because we stood there taking picture after picture of a lamp, or if it was because I was holding a baby monitor blaring Italian Primary songs...
Just our own little way of bringing in the Ramadan season. Happy Ramadan!
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