Off to the USA

Sitting at home waiting on the taxi to come take me to the airport. Direct to JFK (a 14 hour flight!) then to Charlotte, then Savannah, en-shallah!

So the first semester in Cairo comes to a close. It has been a neat experience, and I am awed at all you guys following this blog. I can't wait to see (most) of you. [I mean, I will only see most, but not all, of you--I would love to see you all, but I cannot travel that much!] I hope at least some of you will make plans to travel to Cairo in the spring, I would love to have you here and I assure you I am a terrific tour guide, and my Arabic is getting better.

What a feeling it will be to get off that plane in NYC!

Wedding in Bani Suwayf

I have spent a little time with the Boab’s son here. Boab is an Egyptian thing, that is the person who looks after the apartment building, kind of like the apartment manager in the US. His son is named Mohammed. Here is a picture of him:

His English is just enough that we can communicate, so I have talked to him some. I asked him to teach me to play dominoes (the Egyptian game) so one night we sat outside his apartment and he showed me how to play. I had my English/Arabic book which helped us communicate some, but it was difficult for him to talk to me sometimes, so I the next day I gave him an Arabic/English dictionary as a gift.

I went out for coffee Monday morning (Nov 30) and when I returned to my apartment I saw Mohammed at the entrance to my building. I greeted him in Arabic, the usual, and then he told me that today was his brother’s (Mahmoud’s) wedding day. I said wow! And then, after some careful Arabic/English translations and a lot of gesturing, I realized that Mohammed was inviting me to attend the wedding that evening. The wedding was in their home town of Bani Suwayf, which is about 100 km south of Cairo. Once I realized what he was saying, I accepted without hesitation.

Mohammed asked me if I could drive in Egypt, and I told him absolutely not, so he said we would take a bus there. Again, after some careful deliberations and consulting my Arabic book, I think I understood that we would return that evening and get home about midnight. He told me to be ready to go at about 3PM that afternoon.

At about 2:40 my doorbell rang, and it was Mohammed ready to go. So I grabbed my things and we headed out. We took a taxi to the bus station, which is really kind of like a parking area with a lot of vans queued up. It is absolute chaos, with a lot of people running around and lots of traffic moving in and out. I think most of the rides are just private citizens with their own van, who stand outside their car and shout their destination. Once their van is full they take off. We walked until we heard someone shout “Bani Suwayf!” and then Mohammed told me to hop in that van. We waited another ten minutes or so until the van was full and then headed out. It was a harrowing 2 hour ride down to their small farming village near Bani Suwayf.

I didn’t know where we were, obviously, and all the conversations were in Arabic, so I was bewildered and lost the whole time. Eventually, the driver pulled over and Mohammed motioned to me to get out. We jumped out of the van and a motorcycle was parked there. Mohammed jumped on and motioned for me to get on also. I hesitated (as you might imagine) and he said in English “problem?” After a short moment of deliberation I said “mafeesh muskella” (no problem) and hopped on with him. He took off down this small country road, with me hanging on for dear life.

Mercifully, his village was only about 5 minutes away, and Mohammed dropped me off and then sped off somewhere else (I think to the mosque) leaving me with his father, who is the Boab of my building. We were in a pasture area next to the village, and the men were setting up the lights and sound system for the party that evening. They found me a seat, and as the guests arrived they all came over and shook my hand, and I used all the Arabic I knew (which didn’t take long) to say hello and thanks for the hospitality.

Here is a picture of Mohammed's father at the wedding party site:

After about 30 minutes of sitting around, the Boab got up and said “Mister” to me, which I think is the only English word he knows. He motioned for me to follow him. We walked into the village to a small home (I found out later it was the bride's home) where we went upstairs and a meal was brought to us. The women brought the meal in, set it on a small table in the middle of the floor, and once everything was ready the Boab motioned for us all to take a seat on the floor and dig in. I was obviously the guest of honor, and everyone waited on me to start eating. The meal consisted of lots of flat bread, beans, rice and roasted meat (I wasn’t sure what kind). I’ve been in Egypt long enough to be wary of eating things I’m not sure about, but I really had no choice but to dig in enthusiastically or terribly embarrass my host. I will say, however, that it was all delicious. Not fancy, but very good and I ate until I was stuffed, because my host kept pushing food onto my plate. But I was sure I would be in the Maadi hospital the next day, just because I know that my stomach has never seen the microbes that were in that food.

After eating, we went back to the pasture area and everything was set up. The bride and groom arrived in a car followed by a motorcade consisting mostly of motorcycles. The music was turned on (very loud) and for the next 2 hours or so the family, and most of the village I think, spent the evening dancing and carrying on. It was much like you might expect from any wedding, although there was no alcohol. There was some smoking of hash, which I was surprised to find done out in the open with very little fuss. I was offered, but politely refused. I also noticed that the men danced on one end of the dance floor (very energetically) while the women had a much more subdued style at the other end. Mohammed did dance with his mother at one point, but that was the only mixing of the sexes that I saw all night.

Some pictures of the bride and groom. She is 19, he is 20, and I must say (because I know none of them will ever read this blog) they looked terrified most of the time.

Here is a picture of some of the kids at the party. They thought I was fascinating!

A picture of the bride and groom leaving the party to their awaiting car. I'm not sure where they went:

The party wound down, and I was invited to another house, which turned out to be Mohammed’s home, for another meal. This is a picture of Mohammed's Mom and younger sister (who was just adorable) in their home before the meal:

The food was pretty much the same thing, bread, rice, meat, but with some pickled vegetables too. I showed Mohammed the word for “beef” in my phrasebook (it is written in English and Arabic) and asked him if that was the meat I was eating. He said no. So, I turned to “goat” and he said yes! That was it. Again, I ate enthusiastically and as much as I could. Once the meal was over, we got into his uncle’s car and drove back to Cairo, which took about an hour and a half. I was in the car with 4 Arabic speakers, who chatted on most of the time, and I didn’t understand a thing. I’ve learned a lot of Arabic, but in that situation where they are talking so fast and about random things, what I have learned seemed pretty useless.

We got home about 12:30. Quite an experience! Oh, and by the way, it is Wednesday evening now and I guess I digested all the food with absolutely no problem. Either just lucky, or adjusted to Egypt. Maybe a bit of both.

A poorly planned trip to Alexandria

I traveled to Alexandria the Friday after Thanksgiving. I didn't plan the trip very well, I just went down and hopped on the train, and I really did not enjoy it too much. The train ride was nice, and the catacombs were interesting, and dinner at the Fish Market was good. But I had to catch a late train back to Cairo and I ended up tired, impatient, and just ready to get home. And the library was closed for an Islamic holiday, which is the main thing I wanted to see.

I will say that the train ride was inexpensive, comfortable and easy, so I will have to go again. I also enjoyed the moment of getting off the train in Alexandria, a city in a foreign country that I have never been to before, with no idea about where anything was, but just striking out on my own to explore, armed only with my guidebook and a very limited knowledge of Arabic. I felt as if I had finally made it as a world traveler.

Fortunately as I rounded the first corner in Alex I ran into a young lady (Kate) who I saw on the train, and after a brief conversation I saw that she seemed to have a much better plan for seeing the town than I did, so I tagged along with her for the afternoon. She lives in Dubai and works for FIFA, the soccer organization, planning some big upcoming soccer event in Dubai in the very near future. I'm sure my ignorance about soccer was obvious to her, but I got a pass because I'm from the US. She is originally from Australia, but (like everybody I meet here) has lived all over Asia and the Middle East, mostly because of the rotating locations of the big soccer events.

Anyway, our first stop was the Roman theater, which isn't much really. But here are a few pictures:

Then we took a cab to Pompey's pillar. Again, not a lot on this site other than the obvious pillar (which actually has nothing to do with Pompei), but I took a few pictures:

From there we walked to the catacombs. On our way down there, we passed by some of the hides stacked in the street from the Islamic holiday that same day. The holiday remembers Abraham taking his son (Ishmael in the Koran, Isaac in the Old Testament) up the mountain to sacrifice, but then God allowed a lamb to be sacrificed instead. So observant Muslims celebrate this holiday by literally slaughtering a sheep. The picture below is hides stacked in the street from the slaughter. I was reminded of the saying that if we all had to slaughter our own meat there would be a lot more vegetarians.

Anyway, we got past the slaughter and to the catacombs. These were interesting, but I don't know what to write about them--you walk down into the tombs and wander through the passageways. The link above has some nice pictures, and here are some that I took:

From there, we headed over to see this old fort, but it was closed for the holiday, and so was the library. So we went to the Fish Market and had dinner, which was excellent and very inexpensive. From there, Kate took a cab back to the train station for the 7PM train, and I was going to check into my hotel. But it turns out the hotel I reserved was a long way from the area I was in, and I really just wanted to get back to Cairo. So I caught a cab to the train station, hoping to get on the 8PM train. But there were no seats available, so I had to wait on the 10PM train, which left me with 2 hours to kill in the train station. It reminded me of Greyhound bus stations in the US because (1) there wasn't much for food, drink or entertainment available at the station and (2) it wasn't in the nicest part of town. So I was tired, hungry, and bored during my two hour wait for the train ride home. Fortunately, the train was right on time, the ride home was fine and I had my iPod to pass the time. I got to the train station in Cairo around 12:30 AM and caught a cab to Maadi, so I got home about 1AM.

Lola and Linda's birthday, Thanksgiving meal no. 1

Tuesday night I was invited to my neighbor's house up on the 6th floor (I'm on 3) for a birthday/early Thanksgiving celebration. They are all going out of town Thursday, and there were two birthdays in their circle of friends, so we had a party on Tuesday night. The party was hosted by the residents of flat 6A in my building: a couple from Columbia, Lola & Fernando, and Heidi, who is from Canada. Lola and Heidi are teachers at the Canadian International School which is located near the new AUC campus where I teach.

Our hosts have decorated their home for the holidays, and also provided turkey, sangria, wine, dessert, good music (an ABBA DVD was playing, and some Columbian music) and wonderful conversation. Some pictures follow. Honestly, I took most of these so my Mom would know I was eating well and around real Christmas decorations at this time of year...

A picture with the Christmas tree.

Here is the turkey, salad and wine. It was all delicious!

Here is Fernando.

A picture of me with Lola.

Here are all 3 hosts: Lola, Heidi and Fernando:

And the birthday cake. It was Linda's birthday and Lola's birthday.

Linda & her husband are from Sweden. Also attending was Heidi from Canada; Lola, Fernando and one of their friends who are all from Columbia; an Egyptian; Angus from Poland; Alessia from Italy; 2 more Canadians; Laura (I think) from China, and actually I was the only American at this Thanksgiving celebration.

We sang Happy Birthday to Linda & Lola in English first, and then someone mentioned how many languages were in the room. So they sang it in Swedish before I got the camera rolling, but then it was sung in:

Polish:

Italian:

Chinese:

German:

And finally, Spanish:

Pretty cool, eh?

A nice time. I have an invite to another Thanksgiving meal tomorrow (Thursday, which is yom el khameese in Arabic) in Dokki and then I am going to Alexandria on Friday, if I can get a seat on the train, en shallah. So more stuff to post then.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you in the US!

Friday in Maadi

The work week in Egypt is from Sunday-Thursday, so our weekend is Friday/Saturday. Which takes some getting used to. Actually, I think I could be here 10 years and still think of Sunday as Monday, if you know what I mean. Even the language reflects this, the days of the week are just the number of the day, so Monday is yom el itnayn, since itnayn means "2" in Arabic. But whenever I try to come up with the Arabic word for the day, my mind just starts numbering from Monday as 1. So I usually have to correct myself (or I just end up saying it in English, which most everybody I deal with understands).

My usual routine on Fridays is to sleep in and then head out for coffee at Cafe Greco on Road 9. Road 9 is a busy street in Maadi, it has the Metro station, and lots of Cafes, restaurants and shops. It is a 10 minute walk or a 5 pound (about 80 cents) taxi ride. I was going to take a picture of the Cafe Greco sign, but they had the umbrellas outside up and I couldn't get a good picture of it. I taxied to the cafe, but I walked home. My walk home takes me by McDonald's on Road 9:

Mike, the sociology professor I know, recently asked his students to write an essay along the lines of the "westernization" happening in Egypt (I don't know the exact assignment--sociology stuff is beyond us finance folks). Anyway, he said he was struck by the comments his students made about McDonald's. Most of them said, "We like McDonald's!" They said the appeal was that is was efficient, consistent, clean, predictable. Which most business ventures in Egypt are not! I find I generally see western things here as seeming out of place and a bit colonialist, if you know what I mean, but it was nice to hear a positive spin of what I too often see as simply crass consumerism pushed out of the US.

I turn at McDonald's and head up Road 85 (I think) in Maadi to go back to my apartment. This is a beautiful walk along quiet neighborhood streets, and it always reminds me of how lucky I am to live here. Maadi is a bit of an oasis in crowded, noisy Cairo, and it is nice to be close to but not in the midst of the city (this is a great article about Maadi: link). There are few places in Cairo like this:

Here is a picture of the gourmet eating establishment conveniently located in the bottom floor of my apartment:

I am starting to make real progress reading Arabic (hum di li lah!). The sign on the restaurant here says" domynoz bytza." There is no "p" in Arabic, so they spell things with a "b" but they will pronounce "p." I have been practicing reading Arabic, so the last time I was in there, I looked over the menu which is printed in both English and Arabic. . I still have to study each individual character to read the Arabic. So I see in English "cheesy bread" and then I try to decipher the Arabic. I'm expecting to find the Arabic word for cheese, and then Arabic for bread, right? I work out "sh" then "y" then "z" then "ee" and hey! wait a minute! It just says "cheesy bread!" Then I notice that it says "chicken wings" in English, and right below it in Arabic it says "chicken wings" spelled out phonetically in Arabic. No wonder they think we are nuts some times!

Dominoes being Dominoes, of course, they run a busy delivery business. Actually, one of the neat things about Cairo is that nearly everything can be delivered. Virtually all the restaurants will deliver, even the high class ones, and so will grocery stores and dry cleaners. The cleaners will even come pick up your laundry and then bring it back the next day. I really have not taken advantage of this because I like to get out and walk around, but I know it is possible.

Most of the deliveries are by scooter, so you see these things zipping around all the time:

It takes a certain amount of courage to drive those things in Cairo traffic, which I'm glad to say I do not possess and hopefully will continued to live the privileged life of a professor and never have the need to develop such intrepid driving skills. Those guys drive around in ways that makes me cringe, but I have never seen one in an accident, although I am sure they occur. I am also convinced that they target me as a westerner and pull off their most harrowing maneuvers when they know I'm watching, and I'm also convinced they gleefully zip by me leaving only inches to spare just to get a rise out of me.

Here is the grocery market where I do most of my shopping:

Actually, I eat out virtually 85% of the time, but when I buy groceries it is usually here.

I have been playing softball in the Cairo American Softball League. After a slow start, I have really enjoyed it. The guys are easy going and we all have a good time. It is good for this slightly middle aged man to get out and compete too. Not that I'm getting older, you understand, I'm just saying it is good for me. This really is a little slice of Americana carved out in the middle of Maadi. Here is a picture of the field:

We play the games on Friday, which is the "church" day for Muslims. (The days of the week are numbered in Arabic, as I mentioned, except for Friday, which is "el gommA," loosely translated as "mosque day.") The field backs up to a mosque, and the call to prayer and services are broadcast over a loudspeaker. Imagine a fire and brimstone preacher's Sunday morning sermon being delivered via loudspeaker through the entire neighborhood, and you will pretty much get the idea. This used to seem weird to me, but now I don't even think about it. Anyway, our games on Friday often have this going on in the background. Here is a brief video of the game with the sermon in the background.

My comments are about the extra player we picked up to fill out our 9--the league has some wonderful rules such as (1) You can get as many as 2 players out of the stands to bring your team number up to 9 so you do not have to forfeit. (2) You are allowed to pinch run once an inning for anyone at any time without having to bring that player out of the game. (3) You start batting with a count of 1 ball and 1 strike, before any pitch is thrown. This is great, because it really speeds up the game. If you let what might be a good pitch go by, and it turns out to be a strike, then you have 2 strikes, and you can't let another go by. I also like the way they call balls and strikes--they have an orange mat that fits right behind home plate and extends for maybe about a foot(?) behind it. Then it is simple--it the pitch hits the orange, it is a strike--it is doesn't, its a ball. That really makes the game go along faster and eliminates a lot of worrying about the umpires calls.

Here are some pictures of the guys at the game:

The only softball league I've ever been in where smoking between innings is a major part of the game!

Most of the players are either working at the embassy for the state department or are working for the US military. But there are several AUC folks on the team--here is a picture of Scott (political science professor) and Justin (biology professor):

And of course, the star player:

I've never hit all that well, but I've been in a real slump the last few games. So I was elated to have a well hit run scoring double to left center in this game.

A picture of Coach Charlie. He is a Vol fan, but we let him play anyway:

After the game, I met Scott and another Fulbright professor (visiting Cairo for the weekend from Alexandria) at Abu El Sid for dinner. This is a great Egyptian place very close by in Maadi. We had a lot of Egyptian food, including koshery and um ali (a dessert.)

Scott then headed home, so I met Justin and Nate at a local bar in Maadi called 55, because it is located at 55 Road 9 in Maadi. We had a few beers and listened to a local band. The band was a cheesy pop band (they played Kool & the Gang's Get Down on It, for example), but exactly what the locals in there wanted. By midnight the place was full of young Egyptians enjoying the music and dancing.

I taxied home a little after midnight. Not a bad day! Back to my grueling life as a college professor on Monday (which is really Sunday!).

Egypt vs. Algeria Part 1

If you live in the US, you are probably completely unaware of the recent Egypt/Algeria soccer game, but here it was an extraordinarily big deal. I tried to get a ticket to the game but was unable to do so. But that was probably a good thing, because even though I am quite adventurous about going out and mixing in with down to earth Egyptian life, I think (in hindsight) being with 100,000 crazy soccer fans on Saturday night at the Cairo stadium would have been more than I wanted.

I did spend the afternoon before the game downtown and it was like one giant tailgate party. People flooded the streets honking horns, waving Egyptian flags, painting their faces, and getting the good seats at the cafe hours before the game started. Here are some pictures from downtown the afternoon of the big game.

I have no idea who this is posing with me. I asked a western couple on the street to take my picture (they were from France, I think) and this guy just worked his way in. I'm wearing the Egyptian jersey, so I guess he thought I was just part of all the festivities.

Boy--my hair is getting long!

Here is a scene on one of the main streets downtown (Talaat Harb). Keep in mind that this is all spontaneous--there are no traffic cops, roadblocks, etc. There are policemen everywhere (there always are in Egypt) but not exactly a lot of oversight on the streets.

I took a video of an impromptu parade up Talaat Harb street. this was at about 3PM in the afternoon.

Here are a few more scenes on the street. Everybody was out waving Egyptian flags or flying them on their car.

Here is a young man who noticed my camera and jersey, so he struck up a conversation. His English was about 80%, and my Arabic is about 2%, so we understood each other about 82% of the time.

I have also learned to be wary when people approach me downtown. There is a typical game downtown--the locals spot a Westerner looking around, come up and say "Hi! Can I help you find something." And if you ask for directions they will tell you they know exactly how to get you there. So you follow them and you just happen to end up right by their shop, where you can buy lots of lovely perfume, or pictures, or pyramid statutes, etc. I've also learned that the better their English, the more likely they are just trying to hustle you into their shop. So since this guys English wasn't that great, I wasn't too suspicious. I think he just thought it was cool that I was wearing the Egyptian team shirt.

On that note, I do find the hustlers annoying, but in terms of language they are pretty amazing. They almost always start in English, but they can switch to Italian, or French, or Spanish if they need to. It seems a tremendous waste of talent.

Once, I was walking downtown at night looking for a particular restaurant called Tabula. I knew it was near the American Embassy but not much beyond that. So I walked down the street by the Embassy where there are a lot of policemen stationed around. The address of the place was on South America Street, so I tried to ask one of the policemen in Arabic if this was "Sheera Latinya Amerikeya. " He looked at me and answered in English "Are you looking for Tabula?" Evidently, most Westerners on that street are heading for that restaurant. But the language thing threw me off, and for some reason, when I got flustered in Arabic my brain reverted to Spanish (go figure) so I answered him "Si, si." So then he started speaking to me in Spanish, I think giving me directions, but after a minute he noticed the blank look on my face, so he asked me, "English, or Spanish?" To which I replied, "English--please!" So he gave me directions to Tabula, in English. So Dr. Williams, professor at the American University in Cairo, walked to that restaurant feeling quite humbled by the traffic cop working the post in downtown Cairo.

That same afternoon downtown I took some pictures of the places and things most familiar to me in downtown Cairo. Here is a Cairo staple, the black and white taxi:

How they keep some of those running I have no idea. They mostly seem 30 years old and held together with bailing wire and chewing gum, but they find a way to keep them working. There are newer cabs around, but you haven't lived until you've been in a rickety, shaky old black and white cab in Cairo and smelled that lovely exhaust.

Here is a picture at Tahrir Square. The Cairo Tower is in the picture, with the Nile Hotel to the right.

Below is the Semiramis Hotel, which is my favorite place to go to the bathroom downtown. Public toilets are difficult to find in Cairo, but as a Westerner you can stroll into any 5 star hotel just like you own the place.

This is the Mogamma building, which is the center of bureaucracy and red tape in Cairo. Thankfully, the university takes care of my visa, etc. so I don't have to deal with this, but I have heard that it is quite an experience to have to go here and find your way through the system to get your visa renewed, etc.

The picture below is one of my favorite squares downtown, Talaat Harb. The square has a great bookstore with lots of books in English, Groppi's (a bakery), several clothing stores, and nearby is Cafe Riche, where you can have Stella beer and a snack, and Felfella's, a reasonable place to eat dinner, and lots of other bars and food places are close by.

By the way, Egypt won the game 2-0. That means they will have a playoff at a neutral site (in the Sudan) Wednesday night. The winner will advance to the World Cup in South Africa next year.