Flashback to a month ago…
When I was packing, ready to leave Alexandria, I knew I had too much luggage. It always happens. The fact that I couldn’t actually lift one of the bags suggested that it was far too heavy. But anyhoo… these Egyptians are lax about the rules, I’m sure they’ll let me get [...]
In Smouha, on the road from Alex to the Green Plaza mall, next to Barclays Bank, is a building calling itself the Laser Vision Center.
I don’t know what it does, but I would love laser vision.
The water in Egypt is, contrary to warnings, safe to drink. Generally. Over the last few years the Egyptian government, using lots and lots of money from USAID, has pumped the cities’ water supplies full of chemicals, getting rid of most of the really horrible stuff.
So the water is safe. But the chemicals give the [...]
In 6 days I’ll be home in Nottingham. Woo!
I have quite a bit to write about here, most of which I have, in fact, written… but it’s all on my laptop, which I can’t connect to the internets. Typical – should have thought of that first, really. Anyhoo, I’ll do my best to get it [...]
Just a couple of things that happened this week that made me laugh…
Our translation teacher, Dr Ahmed Showki (an absolute legend – he has a street named after him in Alexandria… well, either that or he’s named after the street. I prefer to think it’s the former.) told us to “stop polluting my English with [...]
… coming soon.
Tomorrow, probably.
An Egyptian Tomorrow, that is.
Which means sometime before Christmas.
Insh’allah.
Sorry, did I say Christmas? I meant Easter.
Easter 2009.
bukra, f’il mishmish, as these Arab chappies say. Tomorrow, in the apricot season.
Ooh… I’ve uploaded lots and lots of photos to Flickr.
They’re all from the last month or so – including Luxor and Thebes, a brief return to Cairo, and the Pyramids… and camels!
Pyramid-y Camels on Flickr
Enjoy.
The mobile phone market in Egypt is as big as in any European country, from the looks of things. And the same seems to be true for ringtones.
Our bawaab (appartment chappy) is always trying to get us to listen to his newest tone. We try to ignore him.
But the fun thing is that a lot [...]
I’ve spent much of the last week in Upper Egypt which, confusingly, is in the south of Egypt. As it was Eid on Tuesday (or Wednesday, or Thursday, or thereabouts, anyway), we had a week’s holiday, which was nice. We seem to be spending more time not working than working at the moment… but it [...]
I may have given the impression in previous posts that I am not a fan of Ramadan. This is not quite true. Sure, it’s an inconvenience, but it’s also a fairly unique cultural phenomenon, and I’m really glad to get the opportunity to witness it first hand.
Also, MBC2, one of the TV channels that we [...]