Halloween in Maadi

Our building is hosting a Trick-or-Treating event for the Embassy community on Wednesday.  Last night we decorated the lobby area with decorations our building has collected over the years.  I found the tombstones most entertaining.  Some of them would be hard to 'translate' as the inscriptions apply to being an American government worker in Cairo, so I've only posted the ones that speak to the more general dangers of living in Egypt.  Enjoy and Happy Halloween!  :-) 

(Note- the Corniche is a highway that runs along the Nile river in Cairo)

A Birthday Surprise in Egypt

In my family birthdays were always a Big Deal.  My mother tried hard to make each of our birthdays special and we always looked forward to our special day with excitement.  As this has been ingrained in me, I try to make my husband's birthday as special as I can too.  Being in Egypt has made this a challenge!

There is a brand of ice cream my husband loves that is sold almost exclusively in Texas— Blue Bell ice cream.  Last year I tried to find Blue Bell to have for my husband as a birthday surprise.  I gave up after I found out that I could, indeed, get Blue Bell in Maryland if I paid more that $100 to have it shipped from Texas, or if I bought three gallons of it at once from Outback Steakhouse.

On our first visit to the commissary here in Cairo our sponsor told us about the special ordering program.  If any U.S. commissary sells a product anywhere in the world, the commissary in Cairo can get it too.  It took a while for me to connect the dots, but I realized about a month ago that I could maybe get Blue Bell ice cream here.  I waited until my husband was away to ask about special ordering the ice cream.  It turns out that I could, indeed, get it.

What I didn't remember was that this is Egypt and nothing goes according to plan.  The day arrived for the scheduled special order to come in— happily this was the Wednesday of both my husband's birthday and a commissary shuttle.  I walked into the commissary office to pick up my order and found out that yes, my special order was supposed to be there, but unfortunately that day's plane had been canceled.  I could come tomorrow to get it, and they were very sorry for the delay.  Unfortunately, there is no shuttle on the following day so I had to wait until the Friday shuttle to get the surprise ice cream.

And then Mummy Tummy struck.  Although I was the only one suffering with it, I didn't feel well enough to be left alone for my husband to go to the commissary. This meant waiting until the following Wednesday to get the birthday ice cream.  On Sunday (the first workday of the week) I sent an email to sign up for Wednesday's commissary shuttle.  Wouldn't you know- for some unexplainable reason there was no commissary shuttle scheduled this Wednesday.  Asking why the shuttle was not running this Wednesday when it runs every other Wednesday got me nowhere.

The following Friday I went on the regularly scheduled shuttle to finally pick up the ice cream.  After a lot of sorting through papers and asking around on the part of the office staff, I was finally told that the order had been delayed and would be in the following Wednesday evening.  It would arrive too late for the Wednesday shuttle so we had one more week to wait.

Finally, two and a half weeks after the expected date, the ice cream arrived.  Having received a confirmation phone call the night before, I arrived at the commissary this Friday afternoon to pick it up.  The man went into the back of the store to get it and came back with four half gallon containers of Blue Bell ice cream.  After waiting so long and going through so many obstacles to get it I didn't want to cause any fuss about the quantity that was sent.  So we are now the proud owners of a whole lot of ice cream!  My husband was very happy to have it, but we are thinking we need to have every person we've met so far here to come over for ice cream in order to make even a dent in it. 

Learning Arabic

The Embassy and the greater American expat community all seem to know at least some Egyptian Arabic.  Since it is not at all a necessity here, it is a bit surprising that a group of Americans is at least somewhat multilingual.  Certainly, the sort of person willing to move overseas is also likely to be interested in learning another language.  But the strongest reason for this group of Americans' language facility, I believe, is that the Egyptians themselves are so eager to teach us.

I had only been here a few days when the security guards and janitors in our compound decided that I needed to start learning Arabic.  They began by greeting me in English, but then would immediately tell me how to say the same thing in Arabic.  Every time I walked past two guards in particular, and one janitor, they would quiz me on the proper greetings.  After I had mastered 'Good Day', 'Good Afternoon/Evening', and 'How are you?', the guards began to teach me numbers.  I was expected to know numbers 1-10 after only a couple of days.  Then they started in on weather expressions. All of this was taught with careful attention to pronunciation and gender agreement.  If I got anything wrong I was strongly encouraged to repeat it until I got it right.  Their delighted smiles at my attempts were all the motivation I needed to keep working.

My good friends the shuttle drivers also take every opportunity to teach and to expound upon language learning.  Ahmed laid down the law as to the best way to learn a language without taking a class: "Listen carefully, and watch the eyes and the mouth.  You will be able to figure out what people are saying as long as you keep a close eye and ear on them."  Ayman was of the opinion that radio listening and TV watching were sufficient to learn a foreign language.  I find it hard to imagine that this was all he ever used to learn English, but I didn't feel that it was polite to question his system.

Now I have been in an Arabic classes for three weeks.  When the teacher found out that I already knew the little I had been taught she was pretty excited.  So in addition to learning the set curriculum, which is only listening and speaking, I am also learning to read and write Egyptian Arabic.  She even volunteered to meet for an additional lesson to practice writing with me. (This is extremely difficult by the way- 28 letters, each of which can take up to eight different shapes, and five vowel markers for letters that aren't included in the written words.)

It is only right that we expats try to learn what we can as we are surrounded by Egyptians that have worked hard to learn English.  Even the least motivated, however, can't help but pick up on the Egyptians' great enthusiasm to teach us their language!

How to Have a Good Life

Yesterday I needed to get out of the house for a while so I went down to the CSA club to have lunch at the coffee shop.  I ran into a nice older gentleman there I had met once before.  He is half Egyptian, half Greek, and (as he says) half Christian, half Muslim.  He greeted me enthusiastically and invited me to sit down with him.  One of his good friends had recently died and he seemed to be in a mood to analyze life.  In the course of our two-hour conversation I received a good deal of advice on how to live the best life possible.  Some of it was thought-provoking and some was merely entertaining.  I've recorded the most memorable advice here for your enjoyment.

If you want to have a happy day do the following:

• When you wake up, look at yourself in the mirror and focus on what is beautiful about you.
• Wear your favorite clothes.
• Do two things that you have been putting off.  You will be satisfied and proud of yourself.

Dealing with people who are troubled:

• If someone is bothering you, for instance driving too fast or not listening to your advice, try to understand that they may have trouble in their lives causing them to not pay attention.
• If ladies drive too fast it is probably because they have some trouble they have not gotten out. (I'm not sure why this one only applies to ladies!)
• If you have trouble in your life, the thing to do is to talk it out.  Then you can move on and be happy.  You should never tell someone, 'Don't talk about that'.  Just let them say it so they can be peaceful in their minds.
• Never argue about things.  Either you know more than the other person or you don't.  If they feel they must argue about something that you know more about, you won't be able to convince them through argument anyway.

Waking Up and Going to Sleep

• Meditate in the morning and ask God to be with you and give you strength.
• As you go to sleep at night, think of a happy memory.  You will relax and go to sleep without any pills.

Memories

• Create as many happy memories as you can.  When you are old you will appreciate having them to think over.
• It is always best to have someone to share your happy memories with- then they can have those memories too.  Talk about your memories with someone else so that you both can share them.

Three rules for living a long time:

• Avoid stress.  Don't discuss politics too often, try to forgive yourself for the bad things you may have done.  Remember that you have also done good things.
• Don't own a car.  You are much healthier if you walk everywhere and always take the stairs.
• Drink a little something in the evenings.  Not too much- just a little.