The old American colony.....

We visited the school a few days ago for teacher-parent evening and found some work that young J did displayed on the wall whilst waiting for our appointment with the teacher. Forget exactly what the question was, something about what ancient civilisaitons did/made and what we can see of that today. J right made the comparison with our old colony the US - they all think the way the English do, not the other way round!

Reminds me of when we lived in the states and the kids had made turkeys from hand prints for thanksgiving in PreK and the teachers had wirtten on what the kids had told them they were thankful for. The american kids all had "I am thankful for momma / my grandpaw / little brother / god / my family and friends / our troops protecting us" where as J was pretty honest writing "I am thankful for Chips and football".

On me head son.

Young T is playing a footy tournament again this week. Even though he is not the tallest, or the fastest he makes up for it by reading the game well, is brave and he can header a ball as good as anyone and so is first line of defence for the team. Like his dad, and granddad before him he is becoming an accomplished, solid defender.

A couple of images from Heliopolis

A couple more photos from my wanderings to get a sandwich at lunch in Heliopolis where the office is situated. The architecture of Cairo is generally large claustraphobic apartment blocks - as you would expect in a city of 19 million. They may not look much in Heliopolis but this neighbourhood is relatively up market. They are not as uninspiring as the Stalinst-designed ones in Tripoli but they are pretty no descript compared to some of the beautiful Islamic building in the old town or the Ottoman building in the centre near Tahir Square. Two local favourites though that buck this trend.

Firstly there is a strange building called the Barons Palace (Ill find out more about this and take some photos one day for the blog) which looks like a Vietnamese temple or whatsitcalled, Ankha Wat in Cambodia (I think). What is doing in Cairo is beyond me.

Secondly there is a squat building on the way to the sandwich shop that looks like a mock tudor house in the suburbs on some leafy Suburban setting in north London. The Tudor look seems a little strange in Cairo - but hey whatever takes your fancy.

Saw this car for sale buy the side of the road, fairly typical of the standard of vehicle my fellow drivers are assulting me with. Comes (in)complete with most back lights, paintwork could need touching up, the front tires are looking a little on the bald side of slick, but it does have aircon on the dash board. Yours for 5000EGP.

Arabic to English, English to Arabic

Having had arabic lessons for a few weeks now we can appreciate how difficult it is for arabic speakers to translate arabic script to english (if its anything as hard as english to arabic!). Major accomplishments this week include reading Cairo Airport and Bridge on the arabic road signs......

small steps.

We had to chuckle however at this kids menu we saw the other day......kids thought it hilarious.

Weekend sports

Its been a busier weekend than most in the T family. young J is involved in a multisport intercountry school event over in 6th October City and spent Thursday over there playing football -scoring a wonder goal by his own account (now verified by reliable watching mum). They came a creditable 4th. Friday (1st day weekend) he was off doing triple jump and relays. At the same time Young T was involved in a rugby tournament that we did get to see as it was just over the road at one of the Egyptian schools. Theres not many rugby teams in Cairo (1, in fact, the one he is in) and in Egypt not a whole lot more (Alexandria, and one of the schools). Therefore they played one game against proper opposition and then split into three and had some more games. T was very impressive playing scrum-fly-prop-hooker-front or back row blindside wing (you can see Im not a rugby person, and during rugby games I get to know how Mrs T feels during a game of cricket or American Football, "whys he doing that?" and "what's the ref blown for this time?" and "why do they keep stopping?"). He did really well, first time we saw him playing properly and from an unbiased father-like point of view he was one of the best on the pitch as he understands positions and drawing men before passing (something he noted the french kids not doing!). Inbetween all this we (Mrs T, P and T) played the nine hole and P got up at the crack of dawn and played the fantastic championship 18 hole golf course (I got my value for money shall we say! took a few more shots than normal, but had some good holes as well). Young T is playing football for the school today in a tournament and J is off to the awards ceremony and dinner disco for the competiton. As for me and Mrs T theres a sofa and a TV remote control with our names on it. Roll on work - I need a rest!

Hud Hud

To be honest there is not a great variety of bird life around. You see the odd raptor and migrating flocks of eagles, but the common garden birds are low in variety. The garden is full of house sparrow, the odd Black headed bulbul and numerous grey wagtails but you have to look pretty close to see anything else common (we this is the desert after all). That is except the bird the Egyptian call the Hudhud, or we call the Hoopoe. This colourful little chap is pretty common, often seen using its long curved beak rooting around in the grass. I had the camera handy a couple of weeks ago and got some photos...........

To Alex

Whilst young T got to go "Safari N Surf" (sounds like a meal combo I had once) young J and his class mates got to go to Alex just up the road. Alexandria is the second city in Egypt, on the coast, about 4 hours of white-knuckle driving away. The school go there as part of the Roman and Greek inquiry they are doing, so they visited well preserved sites around the city. They also visited the famous Library which even J, who is not known for his love of books, found very impressive. The best part of the trip was not the 1st Century city or the light house or the Greco-roman catacombs but the pool at the hotel - ahh! Education. Here are some photos from the trip, not bad for a young un'........

The Med fishermen in Alex, and the citadel

A couple of shots inside the citadel - Id be happy with these.....

Excavating old style and the old Roman spa

Excavations and the Alexandria lighthouse

The Roman Ampitheatre and Pompeiis column

The famous Alexandria library

Wonderful Architecture

Delivery from Dumyat.....

Well finally the handmade, custom-ordered, family T designed furniture from Ahmed the Furniture maker in Dumyat has arrived (see previous post called Deep Down in the Delta). The English-Arabic translation was pretty spot on and Mrs T is very pleased with it, good quality, good price and we now have places to sit, lounge, put things on and in and in the case of the kids to work on. J was home when the truck pulled up and so managed to take a couple of photos of their "interesting" packing before it was unloaded. Had a few dings which is not to be expected from a 3 hour journey in the back of a pick-up along the Dumiyat-Cairo Agricultural Road but, like the scratches and dents to the cars, they add character to the one off pieces. Heres a few photos of some of the pieces........

Wadi Bashin' Again.....

In Oman we would often take the 4WD and go "Wadi Bashing" - driving off road, or on poor roads in the dry valleys and interior of the country. Yesterday we did our first Wadi in Egypt, Wadi Degla. We did not have to drive far, Wadi Delga is 5 mins away from Maadi on the edge of Cairo and is a natural park, meaning a 5LE entrance fee. The road was poor in places, a reflection of the latest rain the country had whilst we were in Lebanon but with our 3L pajero that did not stop us! Nor a few Egyptians in their toyota corollas. We went to a leaving party and so had a picnic and the kids could roam around in herds clambering over rocks and generally doing what boys do, exploring and climbing. Its a very nice, uncrowded place and you really do not get a sense that over the hill is a metropolis of 19million people.

Video from the Wadi Edge.....