Xmas in Cairo – Monday 25 December 2006

Well this is the first Christmas I’ve spent away from my family – in fact it’s the first time EVER that our whole family hasn’t been together… I was a bit concerned I’d be massively homesick all day but I survived quite well.

Firstly I stayed up late last night and rang Manda and then rang home and got to talk to Mum, Dad and Aidan all on Christmas Day morning so that was great. Unfortunately I had to buy an international phone card which from here is bloody ridiculously expensive. I paid £100 LE, which equates to about AUD$23 and for this hard earned cash I got a total of 25 minutes and 30 seconds talk time. When Chris buys them he usually gets about 40 minutes to the US… 25 minutes is ridiculous – that works out to be almost a dollar a minute. Normally we’d use Skype but I didn’t want to have to wait at Beno’s til midnight and I didn’t think I’d be able to hear coz it gets quite loud in there.

Then this morning when I got to work mum rang me so I got to talk to everyone again while I opened the lovely necklace that my mummy had chosen and posted to me. I worked till 1:30pm then fought the traffic home. I found out later that there had been demonstrations in Downtown and Mohandiseen – no idea what for or where, presumably politically motivated – but apparently these demonstrations were to blame for the excessively busy traffic.

Once I finally made it home I walked up to the BCA for Christmas lunch. It was a 5 course meal for £120 LE (plus you get to go back for leftovers on boxing day :) ). First up it was soup (tomato -sensational or mushroom – quite good). Second course was a prawn cocktail with teeny tiny shrimps that were absolutely swimming in cocktail sauce. Third course was the main affair with turkey, lamb, roast potatoes, steamed potatoes, broccoli, brussel sprouts, peas, carrots and stuffing and gravy – the plates were overflowing. Very tasty but so much food! This was followed by some sort of Christmas pudding type thing and brandy butter sauce (that had about 10 quarts of brandy in it!). After all this food we were so stuffed we went to sit outside. As a result we missed the last course of cheese and crackers (not that I could have fitted it in).

After stuffing ourselves with all this food most people started to drift off. By about 6:30pm there were only about 25 of the 60 or so people left. Most were just sitting around having a few drinks. I was sitting at the bar with Helen (British hasher) and her partner and this Scottish couple form the Hash came up and started talking to me. Well I don’t think I stopped laughing for the next 2 hours. They were hilarious – they were half cut and Dougal was doing Billy Connelly lines and telling stories. I was laughing so much my face hurt. At times Dougal would say ‘eh, what are you laughing at’ then he’d turn to Margaret and say ‘look at this lass – what’s she laughing at’. I was in hysterics they were so funny. I even got up and danced the hokey pokey and various other action related dances with Margaret – she was adamant that she wasn’t leaving until she’d danced the hokey pokey.

Anyways but 8pm I was fairly tired so decided to pack it in. Margaret and Dougal were off to Harry’s pub (I decided I didn’t need another hung over work day so declined) and I wandered home.

When I got home I opened the present that Chris, sorry I mean Santa, had left behind for me – chocolates, biscuits and lollies – what more does a girl need :)

It was a really good day. I got to talk to nearly everyone either on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day and I got presents, a decent feed and some laughs. For a girl a long ways from her family I think I did pretty well for Christmas Day.

Maadi Hash and a fiery On On – Friday 22 December 2006

Lots of people go away for Christmas, lots of the expats go back to their normal world or go meet their family in other exotic locations. For those left behind there is the Hash. Usually the Hash during Christmas week doesn’t have many people so they hold it in Maadi, just walking round the streets, then they do the circle at the Ace club. This year Mary Fran was kind enough to offer her house for the On On.

So the Hash started late because it was in Maadi – everyone met at the Ace Club at 3pm and we set off on the walk. There was no trail to follow – it was more follow the leader. They didn’t ‘set’ the trail because one year the front runners ended up in gaol! They had dropped the flour trail and set the checks (a circle with a cross in it) early on Friday morning when all the shops were shut. When the shops opened, they though the crazy foreigners were either making religious symbols or making signs to stop people going into their shops! They were picked up by the cops and held until someone else arrived that could explain what was going on. Ever since this little adventure, they haven’t dropped a trail in the streets of Maadi.

So we all set off – the first thing we have to do is cross a road. In Downtown this would have been impossible – about 50 crazy foreigners straggled along 200 meters. In Maadi it was a little easier… Dougal, this hilarious Scotsman, just stood in the middle of the road with his hand up stopping the traffic. Then this guy beeped at us and an American women said, well yelled I guess, ‘do you honestly think that’s going to help speed things along’. He probably didn’t understand the words but I think he got the point.

As we walked around another guy would blow a bugle from time to time to keep us on the right track. About half way through we stopped at a house of a hash couple and had some mulled wine and a chat. Then we continued on back to the Ace club. We didn’t walk very far or very fast but this little wander took about an hour and half. We got back to the Ace Club about 4:30pm for the circle. There were loads of raffle prizes again - I won a point setter plant – that’s two raffle prizes now :).

During the week I’d emailed Wesley (Hash GM guy) to ask for the words to the songs that they sing in the circle. I was sick of not knowing what we were suppose to be saying. Some how this turned into me making the songs of another international Hash group into a draft song book for the Cairo Hashers and leading them in a new song.

I went through the songs that were on the other website, pulled out the completely vulgar ones and threw the rest into a word doc as a song book template. This done I created a short list choosing 3 of the songs as potential options then let Wesley chose which one we’d start with.

The song we tried was to the tune of Yesterday, the Beatles song:

Yesterday,
All my muscles seemed to feel OK,
Now my body doesn't work today,
Oh I went hashing yesterday.
Muscles ache,
They'd be better if I'd stayed in bed,
Now it feels as if they're made of lead, Wish I had stayed at home instead.
Why, I, ran that hash,
Was so rash,
But what the heck?
Now, it's, clear, I'm a mere,
Physical wreck.
Bloodshot eyes…


It wasn’t a roaring success – mostly coz no one could actually sing in tune, in time or at remotely the same speed. Might have worked better had the person leading had any vocal ability whatsoever – given it was me leading then it was a little screwed from the start.

People were fairly responsive though… everyone joined in so that’s something. I think next time I’ll try and make a new song up from scratch. I think it has to be short, fast and simple then it can be ‘said’ rather than ‘sung’.

All this circle business done we stood around for about 20 minutes waiting for the time to tick then headed over to Mary Fran’s. She has a pretty swish house – way too nice to let loose this bunch of dodgy characters! It was a £30LE entrance fee to cover the cost of the food. There was LOADS of food – turkey, lamb, spring rolls, vegetable platter with dips etc. I decided that it wasn’t fair that Mary Fran had to ask people for money given it was her house and as usual with these sorts of things if you don’t ask then people ‘forget’ to pay, It shouldn’t be that Mary Fran end up out of pocket. Given this (plus my previous door bitch experience) I decided to volunteer for the job.

So we kept the front door closed and each time people rang the bell I’d open, say welcome to the Cairo Hash on-on £30LE please. Most people were really cool about it, but some people probably thought I was a bit rude. But I decided bugger it, if someone wasn’t at the door with their hand out Mary Fran would have ended up footing the bill.

Anyways, as party’s go it was pretty good. Lots of people came, we stood around chatting, laughing and drinking – the standard party atmosphere. I had arranged for Essam (Driver Man) to pick me up at 930pm… at 9pm I decided I wasn’t ready so sms’d to say 10:30-11pm… at almost 11pm I decided he’d waited long enough and asked for directions on how to get back to the Ace club (where he was picking me up). One of the guys said he’d walk me back so I didn’t get lost in the dark. I totally would have – the streets all look the bloody same in Maadi :)

So that was the on-on over. Then Saturday morning I find out that after everyone had left Mary Fran was about to go to bed and decided to do one last check over of the lounge and her cabinet was ON FIRE!!

Apparently she had a tea light candle burning and it got too close to some other stuff next thing woosh and the cabinet needs re-finishing and the picture frame above is all sooty. It was just bloody lucky that she decided to do one last round of tidy up before bed – especially as she was pretty hammered and could easily have just fallen into bed and thought she’d deal with it tomorrow. Very lucky.

BCA Christmas Party – Thursday 21 December 2006

Tonight was the Christmas party at the BCA. I had planned to go up just for a few hours… a few hours turned into midnight. There weren’t many people there, a couple of people form the hash turned up - Wael (Egyptian) and Steve (Canadian). Plus Helen and Moody some hash people, but who I normally see at the BCA. We were just sitting round chatting and having a few drinks.

It was suppose to be a party, but there were only 20 people there at most. About 10pm they put the music on, not bad music, but it was too loud. You couldn’t really talk over it. Then Mike got the microphone out and started singing along. It was funny, but not enough to get me up dancing! It was a pretty fun night. Not all that Christmassy, but a lot more fun than I expected. The people at the BCA are a good laugh.

New Years is Planned – Bring On Prague! – Tuesday 19 December 2006

About 2 weeks ago we found out that while Egypt doesn’t recognise Christmas and therefore has no public holidays, their second Eid festival happens to start on New Years Eve. This means Sunday 31 Dec to Jan 3 are all public holidays for Eid. The Thursday is a government holiday, then it’s the weekend, then the Monday is Coptic Christmas so another public holiday.

Since we found out so late about the holiday (no one even mentioned it when they reviewed the project plan) we didn’t have much time to plan. So Chris has been having daily chats with Lufthansa trying to change his flights so he can stay longer in Canada, and I’ve been in frantic emails with my well travelled friends trying to sort something out for myself.

I needed somewhere that someone had already been so I could do the minimal amount of research and planning, but it also had to be somewhere that wasn’t going to cost me millions of dollars in airfares and accommodation. Croatia my first choice was too expensive for flights (over $1500) so I checked availability and costs of flights to pretty much everywhere. Finally I got lucky and found reasonable flights and good accommodation so I’m going to PRAGUE for new years!!

Also thanks to Ange I don’t have to think too hard about what to do while I’m there coz she was kind enough to give me a list of sites that she and Cam saw while they were there. Only downside was that the flight times are fairly average… I’ll work through Christmas, then on Friday night... well technically Saturday morning at 3am, I’ll fly to Prague for 6 days. I’m very excited :)

Hash 4 – Hare and the Naming – Friday 15 December 2006

During the week Wes (the main Hash guy) sent an email round begging for Hare’s. To be a Hare you go out to the site several hours earlier and set the trail by dropping handfuls of lentils or flour for the Hashers to follow. It’s fairly straight forward, but they have a hard time getting people to do it. I guess coz you have to go out so much earlier.

Anyway, Chris and I volunteered to hare for this week. However, when we volunteered we didn’t realise that the first time you hare, you get named. That’s what we get for being helpful… Chris is going to help set the run and I’m going to do the walk. Basically it means that Chris walks 9 or 10kms dropping handfuls of flour with a guy from Holland called Piet and I walk about 4 or 5kms with two Egyptians Karim (Squashed Balls) and Mona (Should Have Been Blonde) dropping handfuls of lentils.

Anyways, this morning we met up with Piet, his wife Mary, their daughters Powla 11 and Doreen 8 and a golden retriever called Sandy that they were dog sitting. Essam our driver man dropped us off at a petrol station near the site and Piet and Mary picked us up from there.

We were suppose to meet the rest of the hares at 11am…we arrive just before 11am and by 11:15am the others still hadn’t turned up. Chris and Piet decided to set off. They loaded up a backpack with bags of flour and carried an additional two containers of flour. They had a GPS and compass and Powla went with them to help set the trail. They were nice and organised.

At 11:30 I was starting to get concerned so I rang Mona. She said yeah yeah yeah, we’re nearly there, we’re just setting up the signs… Anyway, 25 minutes later they finally arrive. In the meantime I’d been chatting with Mary and Doreen. The dog they were ‘dog-sitting’, that we’d thought was peacefully sleeping by the car, had disappeared. After a few minutes frantic search (it’s quite challenging looking for a golden retriever in the desert!) Mary got a phone call from Piet. The dog had wandered off – following their trail – and caught up with them. This is the most overweight, lazy golden retriever you’ve ever seen and it had just committed itself to a 9km walk through the desert! In the end they had to carry it up the steep bits – he just wasn’t coping!

Doreen had planned to play with Sandy while she was waiting for the proper Hash to being. Since Sandy had abandoned us she decided to come with us to set the walk.

So Mona and Karim finally show up and we set off. Mona had previously set 7 or 8 trails and Karim had only done one, so Mona kinda took over. She had the lentils and she was dropping them at random interval… being a little stingy I thought. All through the walk she and Karim were having little chats in Arabic… I think they might have been disagreeing over how to set the trail. Mona wanted to make it really easy and Karim wanted to make it really hard.

To keep ourselves entertained Doreen and I were running around. Every time there was a steep-ish section I’d send her down ahead of me so I could follow in her footsteps. About 3/4 of the way around Mona gave the lentils to Karim and he took off. The wind was blowing flat out and hurting her ears. After about 50 minutes we got back to the cars.

Setting the trail wasn’t as much fun as I thought it would be… I think it would be better depending who you set it with. We didn’t have a plan and our trail crossed the runners twice. It was all wiggly too, so not easy to follow (as we found out on the actual trail).

From the start people took off in the wrong direction, people got confused between our trail and an old one that was there from a few weeks before. They missed a check point and they didn’t follow the trail much at all. In fact it was a complete shambles. I didn’t realise that the Hares were suppose to go near the front of the group and keep them on track without actually leading them. I asked if we were suppose to lead and they said no, but I didn’t realise we were suppose to provide directional support… oh well, I know that now.

Doreen and I were messing around and one of the guys had a go at us for running on the walk. It was a wide bit of the trail, not like we were running on a bit that was really hard to negotiate. It was really pissing me off. Mona had set the trail (I’d just really followed along) but she was at the back of the group and I couldn’t remember where the trail went. By the time we got back to the circle I was thoroughly pissed off. People kept bitching and moaning (I guess reasonably, it was a pretty shit trail), but it seemed as though the ones bitching were the ones who never set the trail themselves… Anyways, everyone made it back to the cars eventually (grumbling an all).

The runners had better luck. They stayed on trail and no one seemed to be moaning about it. Although Chris said he wouldn’t’ have set as long a false trails as Piet did. But all in all the run went quite well.

After everyone was back they called the circle. Thy harassed the virgin hashers and called in the sinners (people who’d forgotten to sign back in etc). Then Chris and I were called into the circle. It was our first time Haring so now we needed to be named.

First things first Wes took my scarf (that I had wrapped around me like a shawl). I said to him is this where you throw beer at us and he said yes. I’d come prepared and brought two tops. Unfortunately it was so firggin cold I had both of them on. So I took off my top and of course everyone starts yelling and carrying on chanting more, more, more. I went back to the centre of the circle in my tank top. Then they started calling for name suggestions. Wes said it was going to be hard to name us because we hadn’t been around long so people didn’t know us that well…

Chris was made go first. They asked him about himself he said Canadian, living in Denver, played hockey…working for the Ministry…I can’t remember what else. Then people stated yelling out suggestions. There were loads of options, ranging from Puck Seaman (not idea where seaman came from but the Puck is from the hockey) to Mother Pucker. They vote by yelling. Basically they call out each name that was suggested and people have to cheer for which one they like the best. When they called out the options Mother Pucker got the loudest cheer by miles so Chris is now and forever know as Mother Pucker.

While they were calling Chris’s possible names out Mary brought my scarf back over to me. She said wear it while you’re waiting or you’ll freeze to death. Even with it on I was still cold!

Once his name had been selected they started in on me. When they asked me about myself I asked Wes to be a bit more specific. I had no idea what to say. So he said where am I from I said Australia, originally Tasmania now Victoria. How old am I, am I married, have I ever been married (at which point ‘No Baggage’ was suggested). Then Wes said ‘so you’re 27, single and only here for 4 more months – that makes you the perfect girl to fool around with’. I think that comment combined with my taking my outer top off lead me to my final name.

They started calling out suggestions – the first being ‘Iceberg’ (coz I was almost turning blue), then because I was still single ‘Ice Maiden’ was suggested. Most of the suggestions were along these lines then someone yelled out Tassie Teaser. Everyone was laughing their butts off. Then they did the voting and Tassie Teaser was met with a resounding cheer.

So with our names selected we were handed beers and asked to kneel on the ground. I was made take my hair out (and shake it all around twice!). Then we put our hands over our beers and they said:

"By the Sands of the Saharra
By the Holy Waters of Sakara
On this Hash and Every other Hash
You shall Always Be Known as
Tassie Teaser”

Then they poured beer and sand all over my back and hair.

It was freezing cold, and I had beer and sand (so mud basically) all over me. It was so gross! This bit done we had to skull our beers and accept our new names.

Covered in sand and beer I then went over to Piet and Mary’s car and did a quick strip and change while everyone was still focused on the circle. I ripped my tank top off and used it to wipe most of the sand off my back. Then I pulled my now very ratty, beery, sandy, curls back into a hair band. Put my other top back on, wrapped my scarf around me for some warmth and returned to the circle. My hair was SO ratty!

By the time we got back Powla and Doreen were just being summoned into the circle. People were much kinder when choosing their names… Powla’s options were twig, twiggly wiggly, ponytail, and Tulip – Tulip won. Then Doreen got double dutch, munchkin and Dorito. Wes had been calling her Dorito all day and I thought that was a cute name so I cheered for that one. From now on Piet and Mary’s kids are called Tulip and Doritio :).

Last but not least was Piet. Technically Piet already has a Hash name but as he got it in Malaysia its too vulgar to be spoken. I fact when asked point blank in the circle what his original name was he said ‘not in front of the children’. This was then suggested as an alternative name. However given he is from Holland ‘finger in the dyke’ was the next suggestion (apparently there is some folklore story about a little boy from Holland who put his finger in the dyke to stop the water). Things deteriorated from there and his new name is now ‘Wet Fingers’.

The funniest thing was that he was happy with the new name because it was still so much better than his previous name (which he still wouldn’t divulge).

This over and everyone moaning about the cold the circle was brought to a close. Chris and I caught a ride back to Maadi and wandered around Road 9 for a while then went to the On On. Piet and Mary had suggested Dragon House as the On On venue (same place as last week) so we went there. The food was good again but exactly the same as last week. More people turned up this time. We were there so early so we were on the big table with a bunch of other random hashers and by the time Piet and Mary arrived they had to sit at a different table. It was fun but we were totally shattered by 8pm so we left.

All in all an interesting day… I would set the trail very differently next and I’ve got a new name… not sure its something that I’ll ever use outside the hash but I got off lightly I think :)

Christmas Quiz at the BCA – Tuesday 12 December 2006

Tonight we went up to the BCA for the Christmas Quiz. It was £20 a team to enter and the prizes were all donated (we were going to donate the beer but we were too rushed to carry it all the way to the BCA, we nearly didn’t get there in time as it was!).

Because we were so late we couldn’t find people to make up a team of four, so I asked the MC guy if there was anyone else who wanted to join our team and an English guy called Phil came and joined us.

We were decidedly average. All the questions were Christmas questions, like why is it called boxing day and what does the X stand for in Xmas and who was born on this xmas day in year blah blah blah. We got a few right… we were lucky Phil joined us coz he got some right that I’d never heard of. I did earn my place in the team though when the question came up ‘who had a number one hit song in 1995 with ‘can we fix it’?’ Thanks to Manda’s kids I knew straight off that it was ‘Bob the Builder’. Hardly anyone got that one :) I also took a punt on another question and got it right. The question was if you find a sixpence in your xmas pudding its suppose to bring wealth, what is it suppose to mean if you find a button? The choices were you will travel, be poor, something else I can’t remember or ‘remain unmarried’. I decided a button was kind of ‘spinster-ish’ so went with ‘remain unmarried’ and we got that one right too. I think we got about 5 or 6 points out of ten each round.

They had a ‘joker’ card and the round you played your joker you got double points. Most people player their joker in the first or second round. We played ours in the third which was really lucky because only one other team played theirs and we won the round. For winning the round we got a £50 drink card and £50 cash. Well worth the £20 entry fee!

It was a fun night and people really got into the sprit of it. Unfortunately one of the guys (a South African I think) got a little too much into the spirits rather than into the spirit… he was totally smashed and started being really rude and obnoxious. To the point when at the end of the night he was asked to leave. One of the questions was which of these four stars was born on xmas day in 1971 and they were all girls like Victoria Beckham, Dido and I can’t remember the others… the drunk guys yelled out – ‘I don’t care she’s got bit tits’. I assumed he was talking about the multiple choice selection but I found out later that he was commenting on the Egyptian barmaid. He was basically just being a drunk obnoxious bastard, but it was extra obvious because everyone else was being really fun.

Other than that it was a really fun night. We didn’t win, but we also didn’t wooden spoon so that was ok… I think we came equal second last with about 5 other teams. I really like trivia nights even though I’m total crap at them! I think there is one every month so I’m going to see if I can do better when the questions aren’t so specific to Christmas.

The very last question was what were the names of the traditional reindeer that pulled Santa’s sleigh (traditional meaning not Rudolph). We got Prancer, Donner, Vixen, Comment, Cupid, Dancer Blitzen and couldn’t for the lie of any of us remember the other one… well we’ll never forget poor old Dasher now!

Pyramids at Sunset – Saturday 9 December 2006

Chris and I spent most of the day just bumming round home. I went up to Beno’s yesterday and to the Bakery this morning because I’ve FINALLY got my skype working so I can phone home. It was awesome to finally get to talk to people back home. I’ve been relying on email for 2 months apart from a couple of quit chats to my brother. I could get my skype to work computer to computer, but from work I can’t dial a landline using it. I think its something to do with the firewalls or similar at work. Some technical thing I don’t understand :)

Anyways it’s all sorted now, although it does mean I can only phone home on the weekends because during the week by the time we get home from work all my people from home are a long time asleep… in fact if I stay up late enough they’re all just getting out of bed when I’m going to bed. Bloody time difference!

So this afternoon Ahmed rang to see if we wanted to do anything today. Normally we don’t get the driver for both days of the weekend but I guess he was bored. So Chris asked him to take us to the pyramids so we could take some picture of them with the sun setting around them.

We nearly had to ride camels – yuck. I was prepared to suffer through a camel ride, but lucky for me the stable we went to were either out of camels or it was decided that they’d be too slow so we got horses instead.

I’m not the most confident rider… ok I’m not a confident rider at all so after a little ways the boy who was leading our horses let Chris go and just kept leading me. There was Chris and I on ragged horses, a ‘guide’ on a horse, and the boy running along side me. They took us up through the sand dunes to a plateau type place. Unfortunately we were about 20 minutes too late for the proper sunset and it was quite hazy. We got some good photos, but not the ones we were expecting.

The boy leading my horse was at time running through the desert, running up sand dunes etc. The horses were very boney… they don’t treat them very well considering they are their income, but then I guess some of the people don’t live very well themselves…

When we got back to the stable Ahmed took us inside to the perfume seller (of course, why wouldn’t a stable and a perfume shop be connected!! Here everything seems to be connected.)

We smelled the perfume oils and there was the whole ‘no pressure to buy’ blah blah blah, but we decided to get some anyway. They were only £40 a bottle – little bottles but enough. We each bought a few bottles – Lotus, Jasmine, Lavender – they had every smell under the rainbow. They even had ‘peppermint’. They got a glass of boiling water and put one drop of peppermint in and had us breath in the steam. Man it nearly took my head off. It was like the most potent vicks vapour rub you’ve ever smelt in your life. I didn’t buy any, but I think I’ll go back before the adventure is over and get some more…including a peppermint.

I think I’m going to be sore tomorrow from horse riding… I used muscles that I didn’t know existed!!

Hash at Lower Wadi Digler – Friday 8 December 2006

Well it’s Friday again and we’re braving the hash at Lower Wadi Digler. It’s just a different part of the desert than last time.

It was a good walk. It started off really steep, but then the downward return journey was a relatively gentle slope. It took about an hour and then they had a really short ‘circle’ because tonight is the BCA Christmas Ball. We decided not to go to the ball – mostly coz it was black tie and I don’t have any dresses here and Chris doesn’t have a formal dinner suit. We could have bought one, and I did look for a dress as I was shopping the last few days, but I didn’t find anything I’d even try on let alone wear!!

They have a raffle in the Circle most weeks and I went around selling the tickets this time. Wes was selling them and trying to organise other stuff so I offered to sell them. I bought four tickets myself then wandered around harassing everyone to buy raffle tickets for £10 each. The prizes were 2 slabs of beer or a slab of diet coke. The prizes are different every time – I think it depends what Wes picks up on his way to the Hash!

They had other people choose the tickets and I was the second winner so I took a slab of beer. Not a bad effort… cost me £40 coz I bought 4 tickets, but that still only equate to $10. Unfortunately I don’t think Chris or I can drink a slab of beer (even considering my new found ability to skull beer!) so I’m going to donate it to the BCA for their Christmas party. It seems that most of the prizes at all the Christmas events are donated so I figure this is an easy thing for me to donate.

After the hash we went grocery shopping at the Carrefour in Maadi. While we were walking around Chris and I decide to only buy things that would survive being in the car for a couple of hours and we went back to the ‘On-On’.

There is an ‘On-On’ after each Hash – all the people who did the Hash are invited to a dinner somewhere, generally to continue drinking and carrying on. It’s all at your own expense so you can do whatever you want.

Today’s On-On’ was at a place called Dragon House in Maadi (most the On-On’s seem to be in Maadi). It was an all you can eat buffet of Chinese food. The food was pretty nice, but the refilling of the buffet containers was fairly slack. There never seemed to be much in each pot and they only brought out about 5 at a time of the appetizers (won-tons, dumplings, spring rolls etc).

We left about 8pm but it was a nice way to finish off the day.

Hash Christmas Party – Thursday 7 December 2006

Tonight Chris and I went to Ma’adi (the suburb of Cairo where ALL the expats seem to live). The Hash was having its Christmas party at the local rugby club. It was a good night, but not very Christmassy. I expected there to be decorations and lots of people carrying on in a Christmassy kind of way. Instead it was a bunch of people standing round a basementy type clubhouse talking amongst themselves… not much carry on at all really… We arrived about 9pm and left just after midnight.

It was a good night. We were talking to a few of the other hashers… a couple of the hashers came up to me asking me if my name was Lindsey. I said no, Lindsey is a kiwi with black hair… this happened about 3 times until one of them said ‘Are you sure you’re not Lindsey?’ I told him I was fairly confident that I wasn’t Lindsey.

We were talking to one of the Hashers (AKA Transvestite) he is a Hare for tomorrow’s run. We said that we’d signed up to hare next week and weren’t really sure what we were getting ourselves in for. He gave us a bit of a run down on what we’d have to do and then told us that we’d get ‘Named’ after we’d hared. I didn’t realise that the naming was because you’d hared… I’m a little less excited about volunteering now… could be dangerous :)

Water Falling From The Sky – Wednesday 6 December 2006

Last night as we were driving home it started to rain. We were teasing Essam (our driver man) saying ‘what’s going on?’ and he said ‘yes I know, water falling from the sky!’.

We said we didn’t think it ever rained in Cairo and he said it didn’t rain much, just a shower now and then during winter then within a few hours it will be like summer again.

This morning when we got up the air was clear, the clearest we’ve ever seen it. The streets weren’t clean (I think it’d take a solid downpour for at least 4 weeks to clean the streets), but at least the air was nice and the fields looked extra green.

Essam said that the air is always clearer after the rain and that the whole day would be beautifully clear. He was a little keen with this pronouncement. It rained from about lunchtime onwards… not really heavy. More than a shower, but less than a total down pour… just steady rain.

By the time we were driving home the roads were all flooded. They have some drainage, but generally the few drains they have are blocked with sand and rubbish so the water has no where to go.

We were going along the freeway and at one point the road we asked Essam if he had a felucca license – we thought we were going to end up rowing home! (felucca’s are the boats they sail up the Nile). The cars were driving really slow, but even so I was sure they were going to end up aquaplaning.

By the time we got back to Mohandiseen the rain had stopped, it was just the water pooling everywhere that was the problem. Then, there were guys on the street with the squeegee’s they use to ‘mop’ the floors – they were pushing the water to the drains! There were loads of them squeegeeing the streets!

I guess with no natural (or man made drainage) they have to do something to get rid of the water… it’d get manky pretty quick with all the rubbish that’s laying around.

Survived My Second Hash – Friday 1 December 2006

Chris and I went on our second Hash today. It was at the same place in the desert as last time, but the trails were much harder. Last time I had to climb up and down sand dunes, this time I had to climb a damn mountain! Actually it was a ‘wadi’ – I think that’s what they are called… its basically and sand/rock formation that’s caused by the wind eroding the loose sand.

The walk trail was only 4km, but we had to climb this massive wadi. Actually going up wasn’t as bad as coming back down again. Up was harder physically, coz it was really steep, but I was more scared coming down because it was loose shale in places.

In fact, for half the time coming down I was in a crouch, kinda sliding on my feet. I must have slipped more than I thought coz when I was climbing back up the next hill a guy behind me said I was bleeding! It’s funny, I hadn’t even noticed until he mentioned it (and of course then it started to sting!). It wasn’t too bad, just a few scratches, only 2 deep enough to leak – and didn’t leak much really.

Then we had to climb up another massive sand dune – I was concerned about getting back down, it wasn’t quite as steep, but it was longer. I’m not sure I’m cut out for this scaling mountains and sliding down sand dune business – turns out I’m a bit of a wuss! However, given there was about 30 other people walking I couldn’t really sit down and have a little cry before I slithered down the wadi! I finally made it back to the main area with everyone else… minor war wounds, but largely unscathed :)

There was a naming in the circle today. It was funny. First they tell the circle a bit about the person up for naming, then they go around the circle getting suggestions. Generally speaking, the suggestions are for names that the person really wouldn’t want to be lumped with.

The guy getting named was Karin (not sure if that’s spelt right or not). Basically they said his name, that he was the Egyptian squash representative and that was about all we had to work with. Not many people had suggestions to start with, but once they started it seemed to go down hill from there. Some of the suggestions were ‘Spotted balls’ (as in the spot that’s on a squash ball), ‘Karin, de la crème’, ‘Nivea’ (as in the face cream), ‘Skinny Good Looking Bastard’ and ‘Squashed Balls’. Voting was done by yelling - they yelled out each name until some were more obviously being cheered for more than others. In the end it came down to ‘Nivea’ and ‘Squashed Balls’. So Karin is now known as ‘Squashed Balls’.

Once the name had been chosen, Karin ‘Squashed Balls’ crouched down, they sung the naming song threw sand on him and poured beers over his back. The naming song had something in it like ‘by the sands of the desert’ that’s when they threw the sand on him. It was fairly funny.

Cairo Tower – Wednesday 29 Nov 2006

Tonight we went to look at the Cairo Tower in Zamalek. It took for bloody ever to get there. I guess we were going through rush hour traffic, but seriously… we can walk there in about 50 mins from our place and it took us over an hour to drive there!

We paid £60 pound to go up. There were different prices depending what you wanted to do – from just looking at £60, to having a meal up there for £100. We only wanted to look so just got the basic ticket. The girl at the counter seemed quite upset that all we wanted to do was look… I wonder if she works on commission…

We got in the lift and a lift man pushed the button for the top… took about 5 minutes to get up there then we had to walk up about a dozen steps. At both bends in the steps a guy was stood pointing us around the corner (coz we had so many other choices!!)

It’s not that high, only185m. The view was pretty cool – you can see quite a ways from that high up. All the lights of the city seem to go on for miles. You can see all the traffic too... it was just wall to wall cars!

Of course there were the dodgy characters up there pointing out sights that you can see for yourself then asking for baksheesh. I was trying to figure out my camera and this guy kept trying to get me to come look at something – I kept saying ‘I’m Fine’… eventually he wandered off. Meanwhile Chris got hit up by some guy pointing out a soccer field (which blind Freedy could see) then asking for baksheesh.

My camera has a ‘night mode’ but unfortunately I couldn’t get it to work very well. I got a couple of good pics when I used the image stabiliser but most of our pics are either too dark, or too blurry…

We could almost see our apartment. We could see the shooting club that we live next door to (the lights are like the ones at the MCG!).

It’d be an awesome view during the day, but then you run the risk that the pollution would be so bad that you wouldn’t be able to see more than 10m.

I’m not convinced it was worth £60, but then I guess that’s only about $15 which is about what you’d pay at home for Rialto.

Khan Al-Khalili & The Citadel – Saturday 25 Nov 2006

Today we were going to go to Ismailia, but yesterday when we were to Yasser’s farm we saw most of it. So today decided to do a bit of more local sight-seeing.

First we went to Khan Al-Khalili – it’s a huge bazaar. Kinda similar to the vic market though – lots of stalls of the same stuff. Although here the stalls are perfume bottles, clothes, shoes and jewellery boxes. We wandered around for a while, just looking at the stalls. Then Chris said that he wanted to get some Christmas decoration. He said, that each time he goes on holiday to a new place he buys Christmas decorations so he’s reminded of his holiday each year.

I thought that was a brilliant idea, so we were talking about it as we walked down the aisle. All the stall holders call out to you, saying ‘free to look’, and ‘lovely tops here’ etc and as we were walking down one aisle, after just having talked about it, one guy yells out ‘perfume bottles, crystal, Christmas decorations’. We stopped, went back and said to the guy did he hear us talking and he said no, he has lots of Christmas decorations.

We looked at some and they were cheap thin glass ones. Then he got a box from the corner and showed us some thicker ones. They were really nice. Chris bought one in the shape of a camel! Plus we both bought globe type ones with gold pyramids on them. They are pretty cool :)

Normally I get fridge magnets from every country I go to, but I’ve already got one from last time I was in Egypt so I wasn’t sure what I’d get this time. Now I’ve decided I’ll get a Christmas decoration for every Christmas I’m away from home (if I’m ever away from home again!).

They look pretty cool. They are made just like the perfume bottles, and use the same colouring etc. I bought two that were purple and gold (gold was the only choice). They are oval globes with the outline of the pyramids on them.

Once we’d wandered around there we headed up towards the Citadel – the Mohammad Ali Mosque.

We didn’t go in (the book says there isn’t really much to see). Instead we drove up the same mountain thing that Yasser took us up yesterday and took some photos of the Citadel and the city from there. It was fairly smoggy and hazy so the photos look like we took them through a Vaseline lens, but some came out fairly well.

Mango farms and Seafood in Ismailia – Friday 24 Nov 2006

Yasser and Ayman picked up Chris and I at about 1:30pm today and we went out to Yasser’s farm. He grows Mango’s on a small plot of land about an hour out of Cairo. So we drove out there and looked around, had a cup of tea and then drove into Ismailia for dinner.

On the drive into Ismailia, Ayman asked Yasser if Ismailia was a big place. Yasser said ‘no, its just a small town. Only about 1 million people live there’. We were cracking up that a ‘small town’ means only a million people!

We got to Ismailia and went to a seafood restaurant right on the edge of the Suez Canal. It was right on the street, called The Conch - it had conch shells hung all over it. Yasser and Ayman ordered the food – again enough to feed a small Norwegian army.

First of all we had Conch. It didn’t really taste of anything, but it was like chewing rubber. I chewed and chewed and it just wouldn’t mush up. In the end I decided if I can eat oysters I can swallow this. I gagged on it, just coz it was so big, but got it down. It was kind of like really tough calamari with a bit of scallop roe on it. Not particularly tasty.

Then we had a seafood soup with calamari, clams crab etc in it. I struggled a bit to get the crab meat out of the crab legs, my fingers weren’t tough enough! On top of this, we had fried calamari (beautiful) and tiny shrimps with rice, plus flat bread and tahini – and that was all for entrée.

For main we had fried Sole (but they were fairly small), plus another whole fish each. I forget what this one was called but it was baked with butter and garlic and delicious.

Then we drove around Ismailia some more – looking at random things relating to the Suez Canal.

As we headed back to Cairo after dinner, Yasser said his suspension was playing up and would we mind if he just called into a mechanic to get it checked. Of course we said that was fine.

So at 830pm on a Friday night, we called into ‘Mechanic town’. Chris and I couldn’t believe it… there’d have easily been 1000 shops there. Each one specialises in different makes and models and in different mechanical areas. So we pulled into the Jeep suspension place and a guy who looked just like mechanics do everywhere (pants falling down… beer gut… bondsy type tank top – the works) spent 15 minutes fixing the suspension and we were good to go.

I’m sure that nowhere else in the world could you get your suspension fixed at 830pm on a Friday night!

Thanksgiving Dinner, BCA, Heliopolis – Thursday 25 Nov 2006

Today was thanksgiving so given that Chris is American we decided to roast a chicken for dinner. We bought a toaster oven a week or so ago, its pretty big so I thought we’d be able to do a small roast.

We don’t have much in the way of basic ingredients so we just put lemon juice and fresh rosemary on the chicken, put it in a little foil boat and put it in the oven. Then we had roast potatoes and sweet potato (which over here is white not orange) and steamed broccoli and beans. It wasn’t quite a proper thanksgiving, but it was very yummy.

Then we walked up to the BCA (British Community Association). It’s an expat’s club only about a 6 or 7 minute walk up the road from our apartment. It’s got pool tables (one American, one British) and a book and dvd library (books are free, DVD’s are only £8 for a weeks hire). It’s also got a big screen that they play movies on, or to play the sports channel. There is also a big outside area with a bbq and a restaurant that has ‘British’ food and most importantly ‘the best stocked bar in Cairo!’. That’s its claim anyway, and I must say it’s got more types of spirits than the couple of other bars we’ve been to. One of the guys there explained that most members bring something back when they go overseas, something a little off the wall so that there is always a good selection in the bar. Then they get all the basics off the ‘black market’ :)

So we joined up - £120 for the rest of this year – all 6 weeks of it, and then it’ll be another £250 on January 1 for 2007 (even though we’ll only be here for 4 months). They only do memberships annually and start discounting it from July.

At least this way we have a bar within walking distance and some place to go that is foreigners only (they are not allowed to have Egyptian members). It’s like being in a different world in there, a very ‘English pub’ right in the heart of Cairo.

About 10pm Yasser rang to see what we were doing and said he was in Mohandiseen and if wanted to do something. So he and Ayman picked us up and took us touring around. We drove around old Cario and saw the wall that was originally built as a fortification around the city. Then he took us past the Citadel and up a mountain where they are building a new residential area. The views were great, the lights of the city went for miles, but we didn’t have cameras with us so we’ll have to go back.

Then we drove to Heliopolis and drove around looking at a few of the sites. I was so tired at this point I could have fallen asleep in the car. Also, given the insane driving over here I also could have thrown up – it was almost an either/or situation! Finally, just when I was getting to the point of stopping Yasser to tell him I needed to throw up, we pulled over. I thought we were going to look at some building coz we seemed to be in the middle of a residential area. Then Yasser said only locals know about this place – no one else would be able to find it! The bottom floor of one of the apartment buildings had been converted into a restaurant, café type thing. They bake the bread right on the premises, very yummy. So here we were, at midnight, eating toasted sandwiches in Heliopolis.

This is part of the culture that Chris and I are both struggling with… they eat ‘lunch’ about 4-5pm, then have ‘dinner’ about 10-11pm then go to bed about 1am… this is a normal night even on a school night. I’d be dead from sheer exhaustion after a week!

Bond in Cairo – Wednesday 22 Nov 2006

Well tonight we went to the cinema to see the new Bond movie with one of the girls from work. She picked us up in her BMW (seems like government employees do ok!) and took us to a cinema about 20 mins away.

Not a bad cinema, but not exactly the height of technology. The screen was fairly small…big enough to appreciate the explosions and construction yard chases, but small for a cinema. Chris wasn’t coping with the fact that the ‘projectionist’ had to change reels between the shorts and the film. When they slipped off the shorts reel and changed to the feature he’s all ‘What the?!’ and I said ‘They’re just changing the reel…’ thinking he thought it was broken and then he goes ‘Reels?!?’ it seems Egypt hasn’t moved to the digital era that the States so enjoys…

I liked the new Bond… a sexy blue eyed Bond, but a bit gritty… not as polished. But then he’s suppose to be just starting out as a 00, he’s not suppose to be all shiny and smooth. I liked the movie… you just have to suspend the rules of time and space and disregard how much damage a kick to the abdomen can do – same as any good Bond movie. It was a bit slow at times, but they were setting up the character I guess… given I’d never seen the original it answered some questions. But then I’m easily pleased at the movies :)

Also, it was an interesting insight into the Egyptian culture. Firstly, smoking in the foyer - but then over here they smoke everywhere (including in the toilets at work – so gross. I go to the bathroom and come out reeking like I’ve spent 4 hours partying in Spurs). Secondly, they have a 5 minute intermission in the middle of the movie – again so people can go have a smoke. Can you imagine the carry on if c-max or Village tried to stop a movie half way through just so the ashtrays could be filled up again? There’d be an outcry from all the people who like their lungs pink and not black and clogged. Although, I was interested to discover they weren’t allowed to smoke actually IN the cinema – I thought there was a distinct possibility that we’d have to watch the film through a carcinogenic haze.

The other thing was the general rudeness of the people. The people behind us talked through the whole movie – the girl from work who was with us told them to shut up twice. The cinema was loud (at times REALLY loud), but you could still here this bubble of chatter going on - friggin annoying.

Anyways, I love the movies so I can cope with intermissions and chatter (particularly when the popcorn is only £5 LE so about $1.20!! – yumo)

Crazy Workshop – Tuesday 14 Nov 2006

Well I’ve finally experienced a workshop worse than the Deployment workshop in Canberra.

For those of you who suffered through the trials of the deployment workshops at Erindale you will know I was scared by the one in December – a whole day of being yelled at will do that to a girl :)

Up until today I thought that was as rude as people could get to presenters… now I know better.

Today Chris and I attended a presentation put on by one of the partners to our client. It was suppose to be a 5 hour workshop presenting to the people who will benefit from our project. A little bit of propaganda, but still interesting for the participants.

They invited 230 people and 485 turned up… as you can expect this had a serious impact on the set up of the room. Primarily there weren’t enough chairs for all participants. So these 485 people walk into the room, not quite half of them get seats and then the rest are quite distressed…So distressed in fact that when the presenter is trying to tell them that she’s asked for more chairs to be brought up and asking if she can begin the welcome, one of them came up, took the microphone and said that on behalf of all the headmasters here that they were crabby they still didn’t have seats.

Of course we couldn’t understand what any of them were saying coz they were speaking Arabic - one of the girls from our team did some rapid translation so we could follow along.

So the first 4 presenters all start by apologising for the seats (or more precisely the lack there of). Admittedly it took ages for the chairs to be brought up by the reception centre but these people just wouldn’t get over it.

The whole event hadn’t got off to the most auspicious start and by lunchtime we were running nearly 45 minutes late. One of the CISCO presenters was up doing her little piece of propaganda and this guy yelled out that she was suppose to only go for 45 minutes, that 45 minutes was up and that she should finish.

I was appalled. She still had about 10 slides to go. If I had been presenting I’d have been mortified. There was nearly 500 people in the room and she got totally roasted by this guy.

I asked the girl who was translating for us if this was normal behaviour and she said no. She said it was very rude and that it would not normally happen. But the whole day was like that, people talking over presenters (really loudly) and generally just being rude bastards. At lunch time people were taking whole trays of sandwiches and going into corners to eat them all… trays that were suppose to be shared between everyone!

Anyways – this experience hasn’t scared me (coz I wasn’t the one being yelled at!) but it has shown me that it doesn’t mater what country you’re in, people can still be rude bastards!

Aussie Girl Can Hold Her Liquor – Saturday & Sunday 11 & 12 Nov 2006

Well today was such a wasted day (followed by a different sort of wasted night!).

Due to last nights waterlogged adventure I had to spend today waiting for the hot water man to come and fix the cylinder. He was suppose to come at 1pm, but over here things run on ‘Egyptian time’ so he didn’t actually get here until about 2:45pm.

I was so cranky having to wait all day for them to come. Both the owner’s son and the hot water man came to fix it. Neither of them speak English so it was a challenging encounter (used my phrasebook – pointing at the words works well!).

With that finally under control Chris and I walked down to the bakery to get some wi-fi access. On Thursday Yasser (the project sponsor) asked what we were up to this weekend. I said we didn’t have much planned so he suggested we do something Saturday night (remembering that we work Sunday to Thursday). We said sure, good idea so at 5:30pm Yasser picked us up.

We went to a restaurant in Zamalek called ‘Abu e-Sid’ - it serves traditional Egyptian food. Yasser ordered enough food to feed a small Norwegian army and we tried lots of local food. I even tried kibda - chicken liver (EEEWWWWW I guess it didn’t taste too bad, but I couldn’t get past the texture or the thought that I was eating an organ GROSS). We also had Kisch (dip), ta-miya (some kind of mashed up bean mixture rolled into balls and deep fried, like falafels and quite nice). For mains we had rabbit Mulukhiyya (a green broth thing), chicken in a walnut sauce, a fish in tomato type sauce, and a veal tagen (stew type thing, very tender). All very yummy, although I’m glad we got a variety I don’t think I could have eaten a whole plateful of any of them...except maybe the Mulukhiyya, that was nice (even with rabbit).

Anyways, we were about two-thirds of the way through dinner when another friend of Yasser’s turned up. He was an Egyptian-American. He has lived in the States most of his life and is just moving back to Egypt.

After dinner we went to The Marriot Hotel. First we looked around at the ball rooms etc – everything is SO ornate. It used to be a palace (and you can tell!). Then we went to Harry’s Pub in the Marriot.

When we sat down they were ordering drinks and of course they all got beers. Yasser asked what I wanted and I figured if I could survive the beers yesterday I should give it another go. The beer they were ordering was a Meister Max. I figured what the hell. Actually it wasn’t too bad. It’s very light in colour/flavour (if not in alcohol content – it’s an 8% alcohol beer). I was slow drinking mine, so they all had 2 to my one (but I was still doing a good job of upholding the Aussie stereotype!). Then we moved onto spirits… 3 Bacardi’s later Ayman (Yasser’s friend) decided shots were in order. Now as most of you know I don’t do shot… I don’t like them, they make me too drunk and I generally find them a bad idea. However – as they say – when in Rome…

Several tequila shots and more Bacardi later things were looking decidedly grim for my poor liver. From about midnight onwards I kept pointing out that it was a school night and that we all had to work tomorrow etc etc etc. My suggestions that we might not be fit for work if we stayed much longer were not taken seriously until about 1:30am.

By this time (4 beers and 3 tequila shots later) Chris had already spewed and I was well and truly over my limit. We got home about 2am to find more water on the kitchen floor. Not too much, nothing like yesterday – maybe 10 litres… we decided it wasn’t growing and we couldn’t figure out where it was coming from so we’d leave it till tomorrow to sort out.

After much head spinning I finally convinced my body that sleep would be the best solution to my internal ills. When my alarm went off at 7am I swear I’d only been asleep for 3 minutes…I managed to make it through the shower, got dressed and ready for work. At 8am (our normal leaving time) I yelled out to Chris to see if he was ready and he informs me that he’d texted our driver to say 8:30am instead of 8am. I called him a bastard! said I could have had another 30minutes sleep and promptly laid down on the couch.

It had been touch and go for my belly all morning so I decided to bite the bullet and made myself throw up. I felt much better and at about 9am we finally staggered down to the car. Now as you all know I can get car sick driving around the block so you can all image just how excited I was by the prospect of over half an hour in peak hour traffic to get to work. I sat in the front seat and as to be expected there were some close calls. By the time we got to work Ahmed the driver man was quite concerned for my wellbeing… I bailed out of the car and went to the edge of the grass sure it was about to be all over… after 5 minutes of feeling seedy I decided I could brave the lift. We got to the first floor and I walked straight past our office door to the bathrooms and threw up.

Even though I was throwing up nothing I still felt much better and managed to settle down at my desk and start some work. There is nothing quite like throwing up in the toilets at work because you spent the night drinking beer and doing tequila shot when you’re living in a muslin country…

Under normal circumstances I would admit to an hangover, not proudly, but prepared to take my self inflicted punishment. However, living in a country where they are not suppose to drink getting so drunk you throw up is not a good impression to make so I just said I felt a bit off… failed to mention why…

I must have been white as a ghost coz even one of the guys from work asked if I was ok! How embarrassing. I was doing some work but the progress was very slow. Lucky for me Chris was actually in worse shape than me. So much so that at one point he actually spewed in our office! Lucky for both of us I am a prepared girl and had two plastic bags (originally intended to support me through the drive to work!) so I quickly passed him a bag.

Once he’d cleaned up and returned to our office he said ‘at some point we’ll look back on this day and laugh, but not today’

Our saving grace was that we’d been out with our project sponsor, he was the one ordering tequila shots and it was about 11am and he still hadn’t showed up at work yet.

By 11:30am Chris decided that he wasn’t going to be productive today so should just go home. I was starting to recover, but knew I was still on the edge – and lets be honest there is no point being a martyr :) so at 12noon we had the driver come back and get us to take us home.

The drive home was again touch and go for me but we made it home by about 12:30pm and crawled back into bed.

Unfortunately for me at 1:30pm Ahmed (driver man) rang to make sure I was ok (I had been, coz I was asleep!). He was really sweet though, he offered to have his wife come around and look after me!! I politely declined, said I’d just sleep and I’d be fine…

Then at 2:30pm I was woken up by the door bell – it rang 10 times before I finally gave up and answered the door. Before I could answer the door though I had to retrieve my dressing gown (couldn’t go answering the door in pjs!). It was the bloody gas man – he wanted to read the meter. Once he finally communicated that to my foggy brain I let him in, then he wanted money to pay for the gas. Our gas is being paid for by the apartment owner. The gas man wasn’t coping with my explanation (and I was well and truly over trying to explain myself) so I’ve just put my hand up, said Wait! and called Ahmed and got him to explain it in Arabic. Much simpler…

With this interruption over I crawled back into bed… 20 minutes later there is another ring of the doorbell. I was a little ticked by this point… my answer at the door with basically ‘What?!?’ and its another gas man. I’m saying no, the gas man’s already been… same language barrier issues so I give up and ring Ahmed again. Turns out this guy is a gas fixer man and was I having any problems, if so he’d fix them for free. I got him to fix the auto-ignition on the plates (now only 1 is broken instead of 5!). I spent the 20 minutes he was fixing them leaning again the wall in my pj’s, hair everywhere, drinking my water and watching him try to fix the ignitions. This combined with trying to communicate in a mix of broken Arabic and English and failing to get anywhere did not make for a pleasant experience. Finally he left and I went back to bed. By now its nearly 3pm and I can’t get back to sleep… so I decided bugger it and gave up.

I got up, spent 20 minutes cleaning up the water than we found on the floor last night and were in no condition to deal with. I wonder what the gas people thought having to splash through this big puddle in the middle of the kitchen – bugger it, they interrupted my recuperative sleep, serves them right (although they probably thought crazy foreigners)

Then I spent the afternoon curled up on the couch watching the first 3 episode of Firefly and telling myself that I’ll do some work in a minute, just when this episode finishes…

Meanwhile Chris slept through all of this commotion, in fact he didn’t surface until about 6pm and was still seedy.

Anyways, that was our adventure out drinking with the client on a school night. I figure I’ve again supported the Aussie stereotype but that’s my alcohol quota done for the year! I hate to think the conversation we’ll have with Yasser when we go back to work tomorrow… Never ever ever ever again (especially not on a school night!!!!!)

Waterlogged – Friday 10 Nov 2006

After the Hash Chris and I came home, got changed and went to grab some dinner. We just went down to a little café near the apartment. On the way back we were deciding if we should go investigate a place we thought might be a bar up the road, but in the end we decided we were a bit buggered from the Hash so we’d just go home and try and find something on the 1000 channels of the TV (1000 channels and they’re all crap!).

Anyways, we’d been gone a little over an hour and when we opened the front door I could hear a tap running flat out. I thought maybe the bathroom tap was running, that I hadn’t turned it off properly when it was spluttering at me earlier… Then I looked inside and the floor was COVERED in water.

The kitchen, dinning and lounge room floors are all tiled (big stone slabs that look like marble) with ‘oriental’ rugs and mats and the whole main area of the apartment was about 3cm under water. The hot water cylinder had broken. We quickly turned off the tap (all the water was cold by this point) and I grabbed by laptop which lucky for me was sitting in its bag on the floor, but on a mat so the water hadn’t had a chance to soak through yet.

Then we started to try and find a way to clean it up. I also went down to get the security guys, so they could help us. In the end it took one the security guys and the owners son 45 minutes to push all the water into my bathroom and down the drain in the floor.

It’s just lucky that over here when they ‘mop’ the floors what they actually do is pour on loads of water and use a squeegee type thing to push the water to the drain. So they had these squeegee things and between the two of them they pushed all the water down the drain and laid the mats over the balcony rail. Actually it was REVOLUTING how dirty the mats were – black water was pouring off them.

All the chairs were soaked (water had soaked up the sides of all the couches), we have some little material footstools and two of them were drenched… I was also concerned about the sheer volume of water that was on the floor given the TV cables, the lamp cables etc…

They are coming back tomorrow to fix the hot water cylinder. Luckily Chris’s bathroom runs off a different cylinder so I’ll use his bathroom for a shower tomorrow.

The good thing to come from this waterlogged adventure is that the floors all through the main area are sparkling clean now!

The Hash – Friday 10 Nov 2006

Well today was a bit of an adventure… When we were on training some of the guys there were telling us about The Hash House Harriers. It’s an expat running group… well actually that’s a bit of stretch – on the website it describes itself as ‘a drinking club with a running problem’.

It was started in the 30’s by some Brit’s in Hong Kong. Basically a trail is left by a ‘Hare’ and then all the ‘Hounds’ have to follow the trail. When the guys on training first started talking about it I thought it would be too hard core running for me, but then one of the girls said ‘some people run, some jog, some walk… some stumble’. It’s not so much about being the first one back, it’s more about a group of expats getting together for some exercise and a lot of carry on.

Anyways today Chris and I decided to give it a go… we got Ahmed (driver man) to take us to Maadi (ritzy expat section of town about 20 min drive from us on a Friday afternoon, loads longer any other time of day). After some driving round we finally found the meeting point. We had no idea what to expect, no idea what we were getting ourselves in for…

When we got there we met a kiwi teacher and she gave us a quick 2 minute chat about what is going on. Then another guy showed up and we followed two other cars for about 40 minutes into the middle of nowhere. There was nothing to see for miles and miles but sand – we were seriously in the middle of the desert.

Once we got there we had to sign in under ‘Virgin Hashers’ then we got introduced to the group. The kiwi girl we met at the meeting point (Lindsey) was giving us a run down on what happens. We were warned that as newbies there would be significant effort put into taking the piss out of us, drinks would need to be skulled and other general carry on.

Everyone stood around for a bit and then at 2pm the main guy (Wes) called everyone to attention. He gave a little run down on what the walk and the run involved. Both were in different directions, the walk was about 6km and the run about 8 or 9km – though the desert (I walked, Chris ran).

Then he called Chris and I into the middle of the circle. Of course everyone assumed we were married so Wes was taking the piss out of us.

Then we all set off on the walk and run. There weren’t many runners. Chris, two ‘Hares’ and another couple of guys. Most people did the walk. We walked through the dessert, up and down massive sand dunes following little piles of orange lentils. The rules are pretty basic – you walk along following the trail (little blobs of lentils for walkers and flour for runners) and when you get to a blob that’s within a larger circle you have to wait for all the other stragglers to catch up. That’s so none if left really on their own at the end. There are definite advantages to being towards the front of the group… you get a little rest, then when the last straggler wanders in everyone sets off again.

It took about 1 hour and 20minutes to do the work. I had sand all through mu shoes, in my hair, in my teeth… The runners were already back by the time we got back. There’s an Egyptian guy who brings a truck out to the site and sells beer, soft drink and chips. So everyone bought beers and then the real carry on began.

Now all of you back home in the ‘Lucky Country’ will be oh so very proud of me!!. When we’d all got back Chris and I were called back into the circle. We were told that to commemorate our first Hash we had to participate in a ‘Down Down’. The comment was made that being an Aussie I’d have no problems skulling the drink… I looked in the mug (a ‘Down Down’ mug) and it was beer. I seriously thought I was more likely to throw up than succeed in skulling it. But I did our Aussie culture proud. They sing a song... I can’t quite remember what it was, something that ends with ‘down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down…’ then ‘why are we waiting, why are we waiting…’ etc During the ‘Down Down’ bit you’re suppose to skull your beer. I skulled it down like a professional and wasn’t the last to finish! I was very proud of myself for upholding our fine Aussie traditions. When you finish skulling you have turn the cup upside down on your head (wearing any beer left in the mug if you haven’t drunk it – I didn’t wear any!).

For the next hour or so loads of people were called into the circle for a variety of reasons. Things like, having a birthday, having done something noteworthy at the last hash or whatever – I think half the reasons were just random! I had to re-enter the circle when in celebration of Remembrance Day they had all the ’Allies’ drink to their success (then they had people represent the Axis to commiserate their downfall – including nominating the kiwi girl to represent the Japanese simply because she had black hair!). Again I did us proud and skulled another beer. I think I’ve drunk more been in the last 2 hours than I’ve drunk in my life!

When Wes called Chris and I up for our first Hash drink he was making cracks about us again and asked something to which Chris replied he was my boss. Wes looked confused and I said, yes he’s my boss. So then Wes apologised for some of his earlier comments. Not that I was ever offended. Man, Aussies have tougher skins than that!

Then they had a raffle – there were a bunch of prizes to choose from including 2 slabs of beer and bags of lollies. One of the kids won and when she went up to collect her prize everyone assumed she’d choose the lollies and she chose the slab of beer. It was hilarious. She was only about 12 and had to carry the slab all the way back to her mum at the edge of the circle.

It was really good fun. Everyone was really nice and after the Hash they have an ‘On and On’ which is just a party at someone’s house or going out for dinner or something like that.

Because we didn’t know what we were getting ourselves in for we’d had Ahmed drive us to Maadii then out into the desert. So he’d been sitting in the car in the desert for nearly 3 hours (the walk itself took about 1hr 20min, then there was all the carry on). So Chris and I decided we’d just go home tonight. We might go to an ‘On and On’ next time. The only problem is that nearly everything is in Maadi (coz that’s where most of the expats live) so it’s a fair ways from our place. Apparently there are some others from Mohandiseen so maybe once we met them it’ll be a bit easier.

Also while we were there they told us about a BCA… British Club Association (I think that’s what it stands for). There is a branch in Heliopolis but also one here in Mohandiseen. Apparently it’s near the shooting club (everything seems to be – including our apartment) and its got a pool table, a bar… stuff like that. So that’ll be cool (once we find it!!).

Most expats clubs here in Egypt can’t have Egyptian members (Hash can, but they’re the only one). Because of this the other expat clubs don’t advertise their presence coz they don’t want to have to be constantly turning away Egyptians who come to the door. So we were told roughly where the club was, but that description included ‘walk down a little corridor and it’s the wooden door’. Tucked away it seems. It’ll be good though if we can find a bar walking distance from our place.

Its funny – all of you back home know I’m not the biggest drinker amongst us – not by a long shot! But here, just because it’s hard to get drinks, I feel like I haven’t had a drink in MONTHS... well I have now of course– I’ve drunk beers in quick succession… but still I’m talking normal drinking. It just doesn’t happen here. So I look like the biggest alcoholic gagging for a drink!

Anyways, if we can find the BCA we’ll meet some more expats enjoying the Egyptian lifestyle and might be able to get a drink into the bargain.

The Apartment – Wednesday 8 Nov 2006

Well we’ve been in the apartment for a week or so now… it’s ok… We keep looking around and thinking to our selves ‘so this was the best one we saw…’ unfortunately it was the best one by a LONG way!

Its ok, its got big rooms – plenty of space. It’s just that everything has about 30 years of in ground dirt and grim. I used about half a bottle of disinfectant spray to clean the bathrooms on the night we moved in (even though the real estate man had sent cleaners there during the day – I don’t think they did anything!)

We hadn’t thought ahead, so we didn’t have fresh sheets and I didn’t have a towel – I had to use another sheet for a towel! We went to the Carrefour (supermarket – some French chain kind of a combination of coles and k-mart) and bought some basic food and towels etc…

The kitchen just has a gas stove top – no oven, no microwave, no toaster – in fact there aren’t really any appliances at all – not even an iron or a kettle!. It’s like there the previous tenet took everything that wasn’t nailed down! We’re thinking about buying either a toaster oven (about $180) or a convection microwave (about $350)… so we can have more than stir-fries and one pot meals..

Actually we have cooked a meal – chicken stir-fry. It was really yummy. At least that’s a start.

I had to get a new mattress – Chris’s room had a double bed, but mine just had two singles pushed together! The mattresses here are just cotton – so they are hard as a rock – but that’s better than saggy springs so the new mattress is pretty good.

Work Life Balance – Tuesday 7 Nov 2006

Well any of you still slaving away on R2 or trying to get a kick start on R3 will want to skin me alive... My new manager is committed to an 8-hour day – this means that on Sunday we arrived at work at 8:40am and we were out the door by 5:15pm, then yesterday 8:40am to 4:15pm… admittedly we ate lunch at our desks, but there aren’t really any other options for lunch anyway (and lets be honest most of us are used to scoffing some lunch between meetings or while typing anyway…)

Its funny, he’s not consulting and it’s a different mind set in the development centres. The centre that he comes from enforces an 8 hour day. I’m not sure how long this luxury will last, but while it does I’m lapping it up :)

Yesterday we got home from work just a little after 5pm, had a snack, wandered around the neighbourhood trying to set what we have nearby, cooked tea and cleaned up by 8pm… I know some of you will just be getting home from work at 8pm!

I keep telling myself that millions of people work just an 8 hour day everyday, but its just not what we’re used it - even counting travel time its only a 9 ½ hour day.

I’m not convinced it can stay this good forever, but while we’re setting up and getting into it it’s lovely not to be dragging myself home each day.

Anyways… best knuckle down and do some work seen as how I’m trying to fit 10 hours of work into 8 hours! Focus, focus focus :)

Training in South Africa – Wednesday 1 to Saturday 4 Nov 2006

Well this adventure started off early and sleep deprivation seemed to be on order for the rest of the trip.

We got up about 4am on Wednesday and headed off to the airport. We spent an hour lining up to check in and get through passport control then climbed aboard the Air France plane for a 5 hour flight to Paris. Air France is a pretty good airline, even with the French staff!

The flight was uneventful (which is always good!). We both got a bit of sleep which was lucky because we arrived a bit late into Paris and spent forever walking around the airport trying to find a place to store our bags while we went into the city. Finally we found where we needed to go, but it was very expensive so Chris just left his laptop there ($15 euro just to leave a single bag!) and we just carried our little backpacks.

Once we got all of that organised we caught the training to the city ($16.20 euro each return) and spent the afternoon wandering around. We went to the modern art museum – Pompidou. There were some freaky exhibitions… one of them had some cool work – kind of like collages, all sorts of weird medium stuck to the canvas – doilies, newspaper etc. I liked them until I saw some of his later stuff that was just plain weird. A prime example being an angora goat, stuffed, with paint on its face standing with a tyre around its middle all stood on a canvass that looked like he thrown the pain can at it. I don’t care how much it was suppose to ‘represent the joining of the past and present’ or how it was suppose to ‘reflect the narcissistic nature of life today’ or whatever other bullshit explanation the critics gave it – it was dumb. That’s not art, it’s not something you can hang on the wall, or would even want in your house. Its just plain wired!

The next major exhibition was a guy obsessed with the colour blue. Admittedly it was a very cool shade of blue – cerulean blue I think. In one part of the gallery it was just white walls with about 6 canvasses of different shapes and sizes (most really big) all painted to a perfect finish with this bright startling blue. It actually looked quite impressive.

We spent a bit of time wandering around these exhibitions then went downstairs to the next freaky section. Some of these used TV screens to show the art, like lots of picture of different flowers flicking by at an epileptic seizure rate. One even showed the building of a car back in the old days, the first days of assembly line construction, but sped up to a minute for the whole process. That was fairly interesting to watch. Others were just weird… either weird ideas, weird medium or just plain freaky. Ok art critic I’m not!

Then we stopped at a café and had panni’s and crepes for dinner - very yummy J and then trained back to the airport. Funny thing was the train back was supposed to be the easy bit, but first we got on the wrong train (right platform, wrong train). Then on the right train, but going the wrong way. Then on the right train, but not going to the stop we needed. Then finally on the right train and it even expressed most of the way to the airport. I was getting a little stressed coz we were suppose to pick up Chris’s laptop by 6:30 and the place closed at 7pm… we got there about 6:50pm so it was fine. Then I rushed us all the way to the gate (we were suppose to start boarding at 6:40pm) only to discover the plane delayed (didn’t leave until nearly 8pm). I don’t think we caught a flight that left on time all week.

We finally made it to South Africa – arrived bright and shiny… well we arrived at least. We got in about 8am and got changed into work clothes in the airport bathroom. Then we got a cab to the Accenture office. We were so disorganised. Normally I’m a little control freak and need everything planned to the finest details, but this time I just got on the plane… We didn’t have the addresses written down, didn’t know them, didn’t know how much a cab should cost… absolutely zero planning. In fact we weren’t even 100% sure our accommodation had been booked!

We arrived safely at the office, but cabs in South Africa are weird. In fact they aren’t really cabs… not official looking in any way… they just some dude in his car.

The Johannesburg office is flash. Its huge too, its been built in a business park that’s fairly new I think. Everything is very shiny anyway! It’s very strict though – everything is cost code driven. I needed a phone so Phoebe (UK girl) could call Chris and I and they wanted a cost centre for it. I said but they are calling me, I just need to know what number to dial!

Considering Chris and I had been in transit for 24 hours we coped pretty well with the first day of the course. In fact the course was much better than I was expecting. We thought it was a ‘cultural diversity’ type course but it was so much more than that. We went through how the development sector works (very interesting), how certain treaties, wars and decisions impacted the developing nations. Evelyn (the facilitator) even went through how decision made with the best intentions, like those made by the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the UN etc have long ranging impacts. The decisions like the loans given to developing nations (with string attached of course) helped them develop, but also had negative implications when interest rates rose. All in all a very interesting day. Almost unheard of at an Accenture function there wasn’t any presentations! Just lots of discussions and activities. We even played this game called the ‘Trading Game’ where we were split into countries – Tanzania, India and the US then we had to manufacture ‘shapes’ and sell them to the bank. It was a managed game – so the outcome was set from the beginning and we were manipulated towards that outcome (US ending up with all the money) but it let us experience what it would be like to operate from a position if disadvantage. Very funny to play because we were all carrying on, but good experience.

There were 5 of us at the course. Chris and I of course for our Egypt project, plus Amy (San Francisco – now in India), Bart (Chicago – now working in Atlanta and all over Africa working with CARE) and James (Manchester – now in Uganda). It was really good getting the advice, stories etc of everyone else. Most people had travelled to different places before and everyone had examples and stories that did and will help us deal with challenges here in Egypt. Even little tips like always carry your torch and pen knife with you are things I should know but hadn’t really thought about (I brought them to Egypt, but they’ve never been out of my bag!). Plus it was reassuring to have other people with the same challenges as us. People to reinforce that what we were doing was the right way to handle it. I even got a little pep talk from one of the guys saying that I wasn’t ripping off our driver man. That we were paying him loads and that he wouldn’t be driving us round and being so helpful if we weren’t paying him more than he could get for his normal job.

We went out for dinner at an African restaurant which was really good. The food was delicious – we got a bunch of entrees to share (including ostrich spring rolls which were delicious!!) then each got a main, but everyone tasted everyone else’s stuff. I got a rack of springbok for my main J it was yummy. Although I was a bit concerned about eating the national animal!

The hotel we stayed at was lovely – opulent luxury after the apartment in Cairo!! I’ve never been so happy to see a hot forceful shower and bed with crisp clean sheets in my life!

The second day of the course was really good too. We focused more on health and safety (again lots of tips and advice from both the facilitator and the other guys on the course). Then we talked about the AIDS pandemic and what the different types of organisations that work in the development sector do, what role they play. It was really good.

With the course over the only thing left was another 20 or so hours in transit back to Cairo. The return trip was pretty easy. We both slept most of the way between Jo-berg and Paris – guess we were exhausted.

The only thing to happen out of the ordinary was when we were boarding the Paris to Cairo flight. As we were getting on we could hear this guy moaning “No. No. No. No” over and over again. We assumed he was having a panic attack, but then the police took him off the plane. The airline staff then broadcast (in French which luckily Chris could understand) that he was being deported back to his home country and didn’t want to go. So I guess they’ll have to find some other way to get him home.

We arrive safe and sound back in Cairo ready to go back to work on Sunday. Spending the weekend in airport lounges is not ideal!

Egyptian Museum – Friday 27 October 2006

We spent a few hours today at the Egyptian museum. It cost 40LE to get into the Museum, which is cheaper than back home, but then it cost us another 100LE to get into see the mummies.

Although like everything else here just getting in the door was challenging… First we had to line up to get in (with the crazy security man pointing us the wrong way) and then again to buy tickets. Once we had our tickets we had to negotiate the obstacle course of ‘guides’ who wanted to help us find our way (for a small fee of course). We made it to the ticket collection gate at which point my hand was stroked and the security man said he loved me… (ahh the trials of being a blue eyed foreigner!). So at this point we’ve spent 20 minutes inside the complex and we can see the door of the museum, but first we have to go through yet another metal detector… I realise that the safety is a good thing, its just a little tiresome. Finally we’re inside the Museum and unlike home there are no maps to show us around (that’s because we’re suppose to pay some dodgy bloke to show us around instead). Lucky for us I brought The Book – the Egypt Lonely Planet has a lovely little tour laid out in it so we followed that… It doesn’t have all the room covered, but enough to get the gist of what is there and why they are important.

The museum has changed a bit since I was there last I think. I can’t remember if we had to buy extra tickets and go through funky glass doors last time to get to the mummies. It took us 3 goes to figure out what was going on and get to the right door. Then we had to scrounge together every last pound we had to raise the 200LE it cost us both to go into see the mummies.

The room the mummies are in are kept at a constant temperature of about 20°c which is lovely after the heat of the rest of the place. Its funny, the mummies don’t look all that impressive until you remind yourself that they are between 3000 and 4000 years old! They just look like skeletons with skin stretched over them… same as you see in the movies. It when you read the little biographies on the bodies that you get kind of awed at the work of people thousands of years ago. They had some seriously clever people back then!

The rest of the museum is really good. The whole place looks like a cross between a warehouse and a gallery. There are sections of stone tablets covered in hieroglyphics positioned as they would have looked back in the day, but held together with boxes and mortar because they are all cracked. Then across from that is a statue in perfect mint condition, as if it was carved yesterday using laser tools, not 3500 years ago using chisels. There are even piece you can touch – run your fingers over the hand of a pharaoh carved 4000 years ago…

Tutankhamun Galleries are impressive mostly because he was pharaoh for such a short time yet everything in the tomb was coated in gold or silver. Kind of makes you wonder what Ramses stuff would have been like... I bet the grave robbers who got that stuff were about to set themselves up.

Anyways, we wandered around for a few hours and checked out all the stuff. They are actually building a new museum out near the pyramids (wont be ready until about 2008). They’ve already moved a statue of Ramses II out there because all the lung chocking pollution is ruining the statues etc. When they are done there will be two museums (they aren’t closing the city one). I think they are going to just split up all the mountains of artefacts that they have accumulated over the last 5000 years!

Eid and Alexandria – Tuesday 24 to Thursday 26 Oct 2006

We’ve just had the Ramadan feasts. On Tuesday and Wednesday Egypt celebrated Eid – its kind of like Christmas back home (but without the fat man in the red suit or the presents!).

Chris and I spent Tuesday and Wednesday sitting around the pool trying to get a jump start on our work. We couldn’t go anywhere because everything was closed for Eid. There were lots of people at the hotel – extra locals and extra tourists. There was even a contiki tour (at one point they were being so loud and boisterous that I thought one of the local Egyptian ladies was going to have a go at them – it was very funny).

Eid is basically the feast days after all the fasting they have done for the month of Ramadan. Its where they get to really celebrate.

It is very hard to concentrate on work when you are laying in the sun by the pool, but we got through a fair bit so that’ll help next week.

On Thursday we went to Alexandria. We basically toured around and saw loads of stuff. We went to Port Qaitbey and saw The Fort of Qaitbay. Its a big castle like fortress on the edge of the Mediterranean sea. We wandered around the Alexiandria Museum – that was pretty cool. Most of the stuff they found in Alex was either buried under 6m of sand, or in the ocean. So at this museum they have huge pictures of the monuments etc under the water where they found them. Its weird seeing a 5 m high statues with just its head and shoulders sticking out of the sand.

Then we went to the Catacombs of Kom ash-Shuqqafa. We walked down a spiral staircase into the bowels of the earth to look at where they have interned the bodies of the dead. On ground level there was just a little hut and a few monuments, but under the ground there were loads of holes when coffins used to sit. It was huge underneath, very deceptive! Unfortunately we couldn’t take photos inside the catacombs – they didn’t want to damage the paiting that are still there thousands of years later.

We also looked in the door of a few of the other sites – like Pompey’s pillar and The Roman Amphitheatre. Then we had lunch at the Fish Market. Its three stories high and overlooking the Mediterranean sea. Absolutely gorgeous view, plus very nice food. You have to pick the fish you want from the tabled. I had a sea bream, very tastey but I didn’t likeit coming ou to em with the head and tail still on it – eyes and all!

Once we’d had lunch we drive across town to the Montaza Palace and wandered around the palace gardens. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of people there celebrating Eid (it’s a pretty huge area). People were having picnics and playing with their children. It was nice to walk around by the sea – getting that sea breeze. I think it was the first time in two weeks that Chris and I weren’t breathing in smoke! Its unbelievable how many people smoke here and where they smoke – everywhere!! And they chain smoke – its disgusting actually. They are even allowed to smoke in the restaurants. So gross and we’re SO over it!

They were even smoking in the toilets!. I had the misfortune of needed to pee before we left Alex so had to go into one of the public toilets – that was an extremely revolting experience! I had to roll my trousers up and my thongs were sticking to the ground… I’m going to have to get some gumboots in future. Because they don’t use toilet paper much here (mostly wash with water instead) there was water all over the floor. SOOOO gross. If it hadn’t been a 2 hour car ride home I’d have crossed my legs and waited it out J

The palace itself was lovely, it’s now mostly used by foreign dignitaries when they are staying in Alex. There is a public bit that people can stay in, but it’s fairly expensive. We even wandered around the waters edge. There were loads of people just sitting watching the waves, but also lots fishing – we saw one kid catch a fish, but I would have only been 5 or 6 cm long, too tiny to eat. We couldn’t decide what they thought they were going to catch – maybe bait for bigger fish later on!

The weather was beautiful; all in all it was a lovely day wandering round Alexandria.

House Hunting & Adventures in Downtown – Friday 20 Oct 2006

Yasser (our boss at the E-Learning Competency Centre) picked us up today and took us to look at a couple of apartments. There was a really nice one in City View, but that’s miles from everywhere. It’d mean we’d have to get a driver that could take us into town to go out for dinner, to do anything.

Then we went into Zamalek, a really trendy inner city suburb (actually on an island in the Nile) and checked out another apartment. It was nice, but very small and on a very busy intersection. I think we’re going to keep looking at apartments for a bit longer, see if we can find something in Zamalek or Mohandiseen (both really close to Downtown).

Once we’d looked at a couple of places, Yasser dropped us in Downtown and we wandered round looking for a camera shop (Chris needs a lens for his camera). Downtown was a little confronting… there were people sitting on the footpath wanting to shine shoes… one women had 3 kids sitting around her and a baby on her lap. There is quite a bit of poverty and the streets were dirty.

However, crossing the street was the biggest challenge. The cars just keep coming… even when the green walk sign is flashing the cars just keep driving don the road! I’ve been reading the lonely planet (religiously!) and it suggests using a local as a human shield to cross the street. So… that’s what we did, we just crossed when someone else was crossing. After a few times we started to get the hang of it…

I tell you what – never mind the dysentery and muggings (which by the way I’ve had no problem with) it’ll be the traffic that kills me. There are no road rules - so the cars just drive all over the place. Driving down the road, crossing the road… being anywhere near the roads has risk! But the funny thing is that the cars just go around the people, just swerve around the other cars… Even when they pull out in front of each other, everyone just beeps and keeps on driving!

Once we survived wandering round downtown we hailed a cab and went back to the hotel. I think we’ve decided that we like Zamalek and Mohandiseen as areas, but don’t really want the apartment on the busy intersection that they showed. We’ll keep looking, I’m sure we’ll find a place at some point…