Eid in Sinai

We took our first major trip out from the hustle and bustle of Cairo for the Eid holidays. As we did not have the car when we booked we decided to fly, rather than drive, down to the southern tip of Sinai to just chill out of the beach in Sharm El Shiekh. We took Egyptair (or Egyptscare as they are locally known) which was actually on time, very efficient and good value! We flew over Safwa (its the patch of green left of centre on the photo left) Kattameya, the northern Red Sea and the beautiful Sinai Peninsula.

Kattameya is the large green patch below with the ring road bending round.


The northern Red Sea, you could just make out the Suez canal in the North. And the Sinai uplifting Nubian Shield, beautiful geology!



Getting a taxi in Sharm was a typically Egyptian affair:

"Taxi?"
"Yes, how much to Naama Bay?"
"120 pounds"
"No way 30 pounds"
"OK, lets say 100"
"Lets say 35"

..............cue 5 mins of going back and forth, numerous bit part actors coming in and giving their two peneth, much wailing and waving of arm, taxi rank supervisor coming saying pay no more than 40, etc etc. Its entertaining in its own way, though a little wearing! After a 15min white knuckle Hyundai-induced blur we arrived at the hotel, check in and then hit the beach.

P used his skills honed in the souks of the Middle East to kit everyone out with snorkels and fins. The boys were very impressed with his tough bargening stance, and the shop keeper, who had more than a passing resemblance to Frank Lampard and who we visited several times, called him the Mafia-man as he drove such a hard bargin (Yeah right, shopkeeper was pretty happy too - so do not know who was the winner). It was fun seeing them arguing over the last few pounds - then you realise they just spent 20mins fighting over less than a Euro!! Still P says its all about respect. Respect the Mafia-Man and his extra Euro!

In Naama Bay we had a blast, you can snorkel from the beach onto some nice reef packed full of fish. Within a day, with the addition of the spotters guide of Red Sea Fish, we were having indepth dinner discussions of how many species of butterflyfish we has seen and whether we had seen only Rusty Parrotfish or Bullhead Parrotfish also. The snorkelling was fantastic, particularly out and under the pier on the end of the bay, many of the species we knew from Oman, but some new and fish also, including some potential dangerous ones. The lionfish were spectacular and can be dangerous if cornered, but are otherwise docile, the boys found 5 under the pier. We also had a nice encounter with a large Common Porcupinefish who seemed to be enamoured with the boys who would shoot off like torpedos everytime the fish would come towards them. We also saw a large Yellow Trigger fish about 1m long and later found out it can be the most aggressive of reef fish! Luckily he was deep. J spotted a large moray eel. T found a stonefish in the shallows, I knew of these from Oman, they are venemous if stood on! It was pretty well camoflaged.





When J and P were out on the reef by themselves that came across a very large Napoleonfish of avout 1m+ length. Apparently in came to look at Joe who took off like a jet towards shore! P then said it was just him and the fish and although he knew it was not dangerous it was a little disconcerting to be near such a large animal. We hired a pedalo with a slide on it for a few hours and pedaloed out to some other reefs.

We became beach-bums for a few days, our lives rotating from sun lounger to snorkel to lunch to boat to snorkel to beach. T was told several times she had "beautiful eyes" by egyptian men and had a massage from one of them!



One morning the boys did the "Bubblemaker" PADI diving course, the intro to diving for small children. Normally this is done in a pool but here in Naama at the Red Sea diving college they take them out to the shallow reef. They had a personal instructor Steve, who got them kitted out (gear-freak Tom loved all the gadgets) and explained all the hand signals and then they were off down the beach. Joe was hilarous as the equipment was very heavy and he had to be helped in. Then they were off underwater to the reef and as they done really well and were comfortable they went out to deeper reefs and were gone for 30mins. They came back full of stories of what they had seen, lionfish, pipefish etc. they both said it was seriously cool.

The boys getting equipment and a briefing.

Learning the signals and equipment.


Ready to go....

And finally onto the reef.........................

Tom before and after.........


Going down.... and being helped out....

Whilst T made friends with the Dive School cat!

Last day we went down to the tip of the Sinai to Ras Mohummed National Park for more snorkelling. It was really worth it, we have snorkelled and T dived in Oman, Malaysia, Caymans, but we think the snorkelling here is the finest, some say the best in the world. The coral gardens were truely breath-taking, thousands of fish, many many different species, it was beyond words really. Luckily we had another encounter with a Napoleonfish of around 1m, so both T and Tom got to see this huge fish, proving it was not just a story that J and P made up! Pity we did not have a underwater camera, here is a link to a you tube clip, maybe its the same fish we saw!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqnLM8DUUTk

We also saw Panther Torpedo Rays, huge triggerfish, Bigeye jacks and numerous other ones we had not seen. It was such a riot of colour its hard to describe. Apparently this was the "best thing of the holiday" jointly with diving.

Naama Bay was a great place to stay, we were just out of the centre and so could walk to the resturants at night and wander round the souks and shops, hasstling was not bad, just a Laa'a shukhran and people would leave you alone. Best meal of the holiday was voted the Lebanese and everynight would be finished off with a stop at a great icecream shop called Vanilla an then a drink at a very friendly cafe which we called the sofa brothers where we watched the world walk up and down.

Then soon it was....

"Taxi to airport, how much?"

"120 pounds"

"no 30...."

Home on the Range

Afterschool activities are slightly different here than at the BSN in Holland. The boys are signed up for golf, as well as golf lessons on Friday mornings, as well as visiting the range by themselves! Still its a nice way to catch a late evening breeze and watch the sun go down.

Into the Maelstrom: with bull bars.

We managed to buy a used Mitsubishi Pajero from my friend who has just left Egypt but we have been waiting to get it registered. Nothing is ever straight forward and there is always one more hoop to jump through. Anyway Hamdi "da car fixa" took the car off on a merry little jaunt to Port Said and turned up at work this a.m. with all the official paperwork. Therefore I faced the daunting task of driving back though the general melee of a Cairo rush hour. Even worse we are still in Ramadan and my fellow road users, who are generally lacking in courtesy and concern for their neighbouring road travellers, were all low in blood sugar and trying to speed to get home for their fast breaking Iftar meals. I say trying to speed because Heliopolis where the office and my journey started was "chocker", we were packed in like a Chrismas North Sea ferry. Still I could practice my "edge into a milimeter gap" technique, which is aided by the Mitsis fabulous bull bars and all round testosteronic front view. Also had a good "leaning on th horn for no apparent reason along with everyone else" event (I have no idea why). Must admit it felt quite good though. We then sped up a little and everyone changed lanes 4 or 5 times for fun, flashing and horning the cars in front to get out of the way even though there was nose to trail traffic as far as the eye could see into the smog. Then we slowed up near the area called 4.5km where the entrance to a poor housing area is close to the road - nose to tail again with added kamakazie pedestrians, date sellars, kids, motor cyclists and the odd bored looking policeman all sauntering back and forth. Again speeding up to the dizzying speeds of 50 to 60km/hr we reached the Ring of Death (the Ring Road), narrowly avoiding several zigzaging black and white Taxis I sat in one lane all the way home, this seemed to annoy some other road users who, thinking this "straight line concept" rather alien behaviour tried to cut me up left, right and pretty much always. Made it home in one piece, and even managed to fill the car up with fuel (just to make those of you in Europe jealous, 18 quid for a full tank).

Everton Reds and Sevilla Yellows.

This weekend saw the first games of our teams in Cairo Youth Soccer, oh joy! football season again! Ps team "Everton", although they play in red, look quite promising, the standard of some of the kids is reasonably high, with only a couple who have not played much. The team is composed on English, Egyptians, Americans, Egyptian Americans, Canadians, Egyptian-Canadians, Japanese, Koreans etc etc. so makes for a nice mix. Parents are a good friendly group also. The kids responded well to Coaches organisation and came out 9-1 winners against Aston Villa in a balmy 30oC at 9am (although coach wanted to know how they let one in - typical). Toms team is much more mixed ability (poor and very poor!) and he is head and shoulders the best. This mean't he tried to do the job of 4 players in 35oC by kick off time = resulted in one very hot, knackered, slightly disillousioned footballer (lost 0 - lots). Still he picked himself up and now sees the benefits - developing his leadership skills, organising the team etc so im sure he will get something out of it.

Both are signed up for the junior golf program at Katameya on Friday mornings and what with football thats our weekends sorted for the next couple of months. Still P has requested some golf lessons for his birthday and Im going to have a ladies beginner course with some friends so we will all be out there! Its such a beautiful facilites and right on our doorstep we would be silly not to use it.

We're off to swim with the fishes in the Red Sea on Saturday - flying to Sharm El Sheikh for the Eid holidays (Eid is the festival after the holy month of Ramadan). 4 days relaxation by the sea is just what the doctor order after the last couple of months! As we are residents we get good rates of flights and cheap deals in hotels which is good as we have been boosting the egyptian economy these last few weeks.

"Schools out for Swine Flu"

Not a song by Alice Cooper. We have had rumours for a few days and today we just heard school will close tommorrow till 3rd October. Not sure what the real story is, more may be revealed later, but its not too bad as it just means a prelonged Eid holiday. Homework packs will be brought home tommorrow, and then for a bit of home schooling with strict Mrs T!!!

The Oldest City in the World

The oldest city with the slowest Immigration lines at an airport!.....Business took me on a short visit to Syria over the last couple of days. Ive been there previously and this visit confirmed it, I like Damascus very much. The city is great, the climate fantastic and the food is wonderful.

Had to "slum" it a bit - Stayed in the Fours Seasons hotel, in a room overlooking the city, very nice. Its one of the hotels which prides itself on attentive service, must admit I find it a bit disconcerting. We worked much of the day at the company offiices, however it was not all business...I did manage to fit in 2 Iftar meals (these are the "breaking of the fast" meals the muslims look forward to after fasting daylight hours during Ramadan) with my Egyptian collegues, one in the hotel and one in a nice rooftop resturant in the old Town. Also had the chance to go shopping with them in the fabulous souk and watch masters of negotiation at work! Even the egyptians complained about the starting prices! - still they were getting final prices at about 30% of the original quoted price. It was fascinating, only pain is it take sooo long to buy anything - I leave that for next time as we did not get time to visit the antique area of the souk that I know.

I know i must have been in Cairo long enough, Damascus by comparison looked very provincial and organised, much less tooting of horns, better driving and cleaner streets!

I also wanted to visit the famous Umayyad mosque again but as it was Ramadan it was getting ready for the next prayer event. Still next time....and Ill bring the family. Most mosques do not have pictorial materials on the wall, only the beautiful arabeque patterns. This most has some great mosaics on the walls, probably the influence of the Romans. The boys would like to se them Im sure.

The british concept of the orderly queue has not quite reached syria! And when they do exists boy thy can be slow. I joined the queue at Damascus airport passport control clean shaven and left with a heavily stubble! and then arriving in Cairo it was Iftar so we had to wait some more for the guys to eat. Ah! traveling in the Middle East, you've gotta love it, and gotta have your ipod and a good book!

The view from the office window....

Some veiws of the Hamadiyeh Souk, the roman arch and the mosque.

A modern day Good Samaritan Story.

A young Samaritan was waiting by the side of the road in the early dawn waiting for his friend to take him into town to work. When along the empty road a car came coughing and spluttering, coming to a halt close to waiting Samatian. A young arab exited the run down jallopy, opened the bonnet, and shook his head, approached the young Samaritan and said something in a language unknown. As the Samaritan approached the car the arab made the sign of a telephone, to call for help. Obligingly the young Samaritan willingly gave the stranded arab his cell phone to call for aid, for that is what Samaritans do. Whilst the Samaritan was distracted the arab, along with his dying car, bonnet still up, and the cell phone in hand disappeared into the distance......

What is the moral of this story?.......

A quick update.....

We are currently "camped", if you can camp in a 4 bedroom villa, at our transit accomodation Safwa Resort. And pretty nice it is too. Two great things we like about the place: 1. Its not the Intercon. 2. It has a fabulous pool just outside the door. Pool is literally massive. There are lots of people who stay here permanently who have kids, but is there something about Egypt that attracts girls. Luckily J has a male mate here so they can both show off doing mad things in the

pool impressing the hoards of admiring fans.


Life continues to settled down to some normality and normality in this househoold means football. Both boys started training tonight. They are playing at Cairo Youth Soccer (its football, americans!), the standard looks moderate-low, but we shall see.

In other news P managed to get his Syrian visa so if off to Damascus later. We booked an Eid (post Ramadan holiday) trip to Sharm al Sheikh to swim with the fishes and we purchased a used 4wd Pajero from our friend who used to live here. More on all these later......

A Gumbo of images

A few random images from the last couple of weeks

Spices - thats a kilo of chilli for 2 pound 20p.....and this is in an expensive shop, down the souk you can buy buckets of the stuff!

The pool at the club (spot the boys), its a tough life!!!

Golf lessons with the PGA coach James at the club

The Brawl at the Stall

First there was the Rumble in the Jungle, followed by the Thriller in Manilla, and now the latest of the great fights of the last few decades, where we had a ringside seat, the Brawl at the Stall….let me explain.

Saturday am we took our newest, favourite, ever faithful friend Mr GPS down to the Khan al Khalili, the main sprawling and warren-like Souq in Cairo just to get a taste and feel for the place.

We started at one of the many mosques and just sauntered down one of the main drags past the more touristy shops selling, pyramids, Cleopatras, Shisa pipes, pyramids, obelisks, Tutenkamuns, pyramids, belly dancing outfits, and even pyramids. Much “Come, no cost for looking” and “Hello where you from” banter from the shop keepers but we are becoming hardened to their little tricks and did not find it too bad at all really. Further down was much more local feel, a fantastic mélange of shouting, bartering, pushing, men with carts, kids selling hankies, cats, rubbish, spices etc etc. The most exciting part was seeing a fight between two of the market traders in what appeared to be the sock section – now christened the Brawl at the Stall. A few of the other stall holders broke it up, the tourist police who were standing next to us had no intention of getting their lovely lilywhite uniforms dirty.

On the way back young T took the plunge into the complex financial transactions that dominate the shopping experience in Egypt. He selected his prey – a nice “Yasser Arafat” checked scarf, and went into complex transactional sparring with the shop owner, Dad had to step in early from the corner and give some sound financial advice when young T was pitching too high. At the right moment he then employed his masterstroke….the age-old “aint’ bovverd and going to walk out of the shop to the next” technique which worked a treat and they settled on 10 egyptian pounds (about 1.10 sterling, 1.50 US dollars). Shop keeper and young PLO fashionista both left happy.

Breaking news.........

We have finally signed for a house!!! Now don’t get toooooo excited, until we are sitting in said house with associated roof space over our collected noggins we won’t count our chickens, its not quite over and dusted, as this is Egypt. However it should not go wrong now. Moving in end Oct.

Villa is in Kattameya, neighbours with someone who apparently has “a bit of stroke” as they say, so incidents of power /water cuts should be quickly sorted. It is the property we liked so much we stretched the budget for. Plenty of room for visitors, games rooms, football/badminton in the garden, banana tree, we counted at least 3 bathrooms and his n hers kitchens (I kid you not). Rooms pretty big. Think you could fit our Witnesham home into the study. Wifey is already planning furniture purchases.

Other things are falling into place fast. We have now moved from Intercon to a lovely villa in a small area close to the school and Kattameya in New Cairo. Villa is great, has an awesome pool and we are pretty settled in there already. Now have internet access (intermittently) and satellite TV, Xbox360 plugged in and working.

T has his first day at school. Seems to be going well, a few English and European kids along with the majority super-rich Egyptians. More on this later……. But looking good.

Have our first visitor – friend who did work in Egypt and is moving to Tripoli. Friend was welcomed into house as 1) he has a good condition Pajero for sale, 2) he brought 2 bottles of Chardonnay.

TTFN.