Latest news and happenings from North Africa

We we had some pretty dramatic and exciting weather. Unlike the dramatic and exciting weather we used to get in New Orleans which entailed sticking wife, family, kids, tortoises, valuables in the mininvan and heading off in a different direction, this dramatic and exciting weather would be described in the UK as "a spot of rain". As we have not seen any since we have been here the kids and wife found it all very exciting. P on the other hand found it exciting in anothr sense because he had to travel to work on the now slippery ring of death......

We had our first visitors this week, Becca and Co. turned up to "do" Cairo before heading south and then onto the Sinai. Like the 3 kings in the Christmas Story they came bearing gifts, Wine (9 bottles, Australian Chardonnay), 2 bottle of Sarsons Vinegar and 4 bottles of Branston Pickle. After having to the airport twice (long story, moral being never travel with a Canadian) they seem to have a good time with Ahmed Da Driver and Ahmed Da Egyptologist doing the museum, pyramids, coptic Cairo, club etc etc. Ahmed dropped them off at Giza station and the last we heard off them was a text message saying they were on a train presumably heading down to Aswan. Good luck guys, it was nice having you!

T visited the Care and Rehabilitation Society home (http://www.cr-home.org/) and met the lady in charge and the kids who use the place. It has 51 kids mainly with Down or Palsy or similar, some day visitors other stay the whole time. Cathy, my old bosses wife, raised money for them and we now have a large wad of cash which they are going to buy a new kitchen with. T is now full into production of Card Touche cards, the profits of which will go here. Any donations or orders for Cards from Mrs T gladly recieved!

Its halloween and Mrst T spent a wihle trawling round the streets of Maadi for round pumpkins, the egyptians seem to specialise in mishappen ones. Frankly I like the natural ghost ones!

We now have a date for moving in, next Wednesday. Now just have to coordinate container and workplans and move in - simples.

Introducing Card Touche

In an amazing pun / spin / variation on the Egyptian word Cartouche (the label in Heiroglyphics proclaiming the name of the owner of the building) we are proud to annouce the birth a bouncing baby card making enterprise called Card Touche.

Mrs T, although without her copious stash of card making bits and bobs that are on there way, has assembled sufficient material to start her handmade card making business. Forget the Dragons Den, she has been out hawking hers wares and already has a opportunity to sell some at the CSA in Maadi. She has also managed to get a table at the Shell Christmas Bazaar arranged, so its all hands to the pump (well just Mrs Ts) making cards with little Rudolfs and Snowmen on etc. See pics of this seasons collection.

Bless her she is going to give whatever profit she malke to a local charity. She has not decided which one yetm but is off to a local orphanage tommorrow with a visitor, so that may be a possibility........

In other news, may get the keys to the house tommorrow.......

Football and the World Cup

Football has started again following the closure of the CAC school. Js team won again (9-1) and Ts were robbed, winning 3-1 with 2 mins to go and having 2 penalties given against them ending 3-3. The old ABF mums touchline team would be proud of her as Mrs T was told by one of the opposition Egyptians to be quite as she was making too much noise. Might be a time to call in Mrs H, Mrs S to treble team him! He has obviously never been to Lisse on a Sat morning....

J was lucky enough to go to the U20 World Cup quarter final in the Cairo Stadium between Germany and Brazil. Our neighbours and Js friend are german and they got him a ticket. Must admit I would have liked to have gone, but as Germany lost 2-1 in extra time, its perhaps best i didnt as I would have be unable to control my "gloat mode" (not that much as England went out to Uzbekistan!!). J said th highlight was when he and Julian ended up on the big screen!

Know your enemy.

After three weeks now of driving in Egypt I am starting to get an appreciation of the my fellow road users, or as I like to think of them, "the opposition". As Sun Tzu said in the Art of War, know your enemy....here are some snippets Im now begining to understanding.....

Water - Egyptian drivers are like cats, they avoid water at all costs. At first sight of any H2O on the road, as we have not seen a drop of rain since we have arrived these occurances are normally from impromtu glorious roadside fountains displays - burst water pipes. In unison hazard lights go on, brakes rapidly applied and traffic will crawl past left and right of the puddle, very very slooooowly. This caution can be explained with the equation

D + H2O + BT + GiTs = Lots of rotation and choas

Where

D=dirty oil stained road

H2O = thin film of water

BT = Bald tyres

GiTs = Grining idiotic Taxi driverS

Even small puddles are approached in the same way as the crocodile hunter approaches a spitting viper....the reason being the small puddle may actually be deeper than the pit of Hades and probably already contains several ex-auto suspensions.

Microbuses - Living life on the edge of society, children of oblivion, not caring about tommorrow as tommorrow may never come, the grim reaper runs scared from them, these people know no fear, F E A R are not in their alphabet. The microbus driver. In some ways you have to admire them and their poor horror-struck passengers, they drive with abandon through gaps smaller than the width of their vans testing the laws of physics more than the Hadron Collider, and judging by the side panels of their buses they have generated a few Higgs bosons in their time. Avoid at all costs.

Pedestrians - For someone stepping out in front of a 1974 vintage Fiat 126 travelling at its top speed of 45mph the average Egyptian pedestrian demonstrates a lot of faith in his fellow human being behind the wheel. Particularly as the last time anyone looked at the brakes was in 1974. The most impressive thing about egyptians is not the pyramids but the way they cross the road with such a causal nochalent saunter. The non-Cairennes, not used to this traffic, usually take the "Usain Bolt" in a hurry approach - stopping mid cross has a 100% fatality rate.

Lanes - white lines are too conformist for the egyptian drivers more freeform thinking. The concept of slow lane and fast lane is not valid in this respect. All the lanes are fast lanes, with random slow vehicles moving between them with Brownian motion, whilst pedestrians run across the flow like herds of migrating wilderbeest taking their chance against the Crocs at a particularly wide river crossing. The "inside" slow lane is used for changing tires, or more commonly staring at whole wheel that has just detached from the axle.

Packing - as impressive as anything is the egyptian skill of packing the contents of one of those Chinese Super container ships onto the back of a Suzuki Jimmy, reaching vertical heights that would not be out of place in Manhatten. How do you transport a mattress across town with a moped nothing a single bungee cord can't fix- no problem- and your very own crash mat to boot. Only visual evidence can convey the things we see, I shall be getting a camera for these wonderful sights and putting it in the car. Its hard to explain in words how two guys in a small pick up carry a lorry bonnet on the roof by hanging out either side and driving along whilst fighting against the updraft. Of course packing does not always go to plan in Egyptland and its not uncommon to go round a corner and find a slick of runner beans, tomatoes, bricks, cement, loahfers, baskets.

Sure Ill have other snippets - and now I have the camera in the car Ill have the evidence to prove it!!

House visit photos

Some random photos from the house visit yesterday.............

Haircuts and Houses

The biggest challenge a girl can have when relocating to a north africa/middle eastern metropolis is not housing, or road traffic or jippy bellies its finding a hairdresser she can trust. T took up the recommendation from a well coiffed friend and visited mohummed adbul karim el mohammedani, aka "Jimmy" in Maadi. Jimmy came highly recommended, been in business for 30yrs, spoke good english and was a friendly little chap by all accounts so T took the plunge. Colour and a cut was deemed a success and not radically different as the boys did not say the statutory "your new hair looks nice mum" which they have been taught to do like Pavlovs dogs when T arrives home with new "do". P was particularly impressed, more by the fact it cost approx 17,50 english pounds, a major saving on the Dutch prices.

This morning we finally visited the house we are moving into for a look see to check on progress (not much) and to see what/how much furniture we are going to need. House was pretty much as we remember it, nice wooden floors plenty of space (too much), great garden where the boys are already planning the fun amenities also Banana tree including bananas. Should be ready 1st November, which in Egypt means anything from 1st November to Christmas, but in all likelyhood looking at the week after the 1st, Inshallah.

Now when we went to school, the trips we looked forward to were to places like Colchester Zoo, Eastern Farm Park, Lowestoft and if we were lucky London. Young T has brought home the list of the proposed trips this year and they are: Skiing Switzerland, West End London, Trekking in Uganda and surf and Safari in Kenya!! Blimey, he is seeing where his mates are going but looks likely he will be off to Nairobi in Feb - lucky little.........

Tee with the Ladies

Spent a great morning with 3 friends and a very very very patient golf pro, Steve, on the Kattameya golf course range as we have all started the beginner course. We all surpised ourselves but whacking a few straight, it was fun. Afterward we were so pleased with our efforts we all popped into the club for coffees and a post-lesson cake and chat. A couple of days later the boys took me up the golf range and the general feeling was that Ps money was well spent subsidising my expat wife lifestyle!

Happy 6th of October

Happy 6th of October everyone! We are celebrating Egypts re-crossing of the Suez and starting the 6th October or Yom Kippur war taking back the Sinai (following the Six Day war). In fact we are really celebrating a day off school and a day off work. Hurrah!

Frog Safari

The boys have been going on nightly frog hunts around the resort. As dusk falls the grassy areas become home to some rather large Egyptian amphibians (probably Egyptian toads, well thats what we think they are according to Wikipedia). Last night I went out with the Chief Toad-Hunter, J, bravely armed only with a torch to take a tour of his domain. He has an impressive knowledge of where to find them and if he has seen them before. Heres the photos we took.

Bumped by the Government...

This week I was needed in Damascus for a short notice meeting with one of the government organisations. I got my visa in record time (and record expense) and set off for Syria. Unfortunately the booking at my usual hangout, the 5* Four Seasons, probably the best hotel i have stayed in, was ripped up as the Government requsitioned the rooms so I was moved down the street to the Dedeman, still a 5* but one of those with a little faded glory and 5* in an middle eastern "trying-very-hard-but-not-quite-getting-there" sort of way.

Not too worry, I was upgraded to the excutive floor "away from the poolside as the singer and Belly dancer will be performing till 3am". Now the transliteration of the arabic and western alphabets alway causes some lovely spelling issues. The photo advert for the said perfomance was for a rather trashy looking "Billy Dancer". Was that billy or should it be belly? I was intrigued. She was wearing what looked like some (rather loose!) demin dungarees. Perhaps this was the perfect match a fusion of the ancient art of Middle Eastern Belly Dancing and Hill-Billy Line Dancing? Perhaps Joumanah belly dances to Billy Ray Cyrus's Achey Breaky Heart?? Or perhaps it was just a typo. I'll never know as I was exhausted and so exited staged left to my executive room.

After the days work and meetings we went out into a part of the Souk I have not been before for a meal. I tried to remember the direction was I will take the family there when they join me in a visit. Right of the big mosque, down the spice souk, turn left through the gold souk, right again through the underwear and sock souk and left along the main road with the arches that leads to the antique souk and its off a side street - simples. Resturant was fanstastic, very much like all the other ones I have been to in Damascus, a beautiful old house, built around a courtyard with fountain. Food as always in Syria was great, simple lebanese style mezza, Tabouleh, Babbaganoush, Houmous, Shish Tawook etc, and loads of glorious fresh bread all washed down with fresh lemon uice with mint. As much as you can eat for about the equivalent of 10 us dollars (6 quid). Unfortunately I did not have the camera so have a photo from dragonameyer from tripadvisor where the resturant is rated very highly, and i have to agree..

We came back a different was through the souk. I'll have to remember this way to as we passed a shop that seemed to sell only stuffed Hyenas and wolverine-like things.....didn't think I would be able to get one on as hand luggage! You don't see that every day. We also passed the old railway station and had a quick look round, nice atmospheric building with beautiful wooden ticket booths and numerous pictures of the president staring down (The Syrians are keen on putting on photos of El Presidente, not so much the Egyptians as you only see a few of a rather young looking Mubarak, but no one beats the Libyans, with 1001 different, clearly photoshoped Gaddaffi, glorious poses staring proudly into the distance). The only thing missing with the station is the occurence of trains, apparently they no longer stop here - you have to get a bus to an out of town locations. The only train in site is an old loco from East Germany rusting slowly outside - those east germany really knew how to build'em.

Next time I bring the family, this really is an interesting place!