FOOD

I’ve been asked about Egyptian food a lot, so let me try to give you some taste of it:

Tasty food, eating, sharing meals and giving food to others all are of major importance in Egypt. The average (Western) European has to get used to quite large parts of oil and meat in the diet and to large amounts of generally everything. And it is very hard to refuse, so be prepared to eat a lot especially when visiting someone!

Continental Europeans will also notice a big difference in breakfast as ful, one of the most typical Egyptian dishes is often served in the mornings. It is best described as a stew of brown beans that re soaked for some hours and then kept simmering overnight with tomatoes, garlic and spices. It is usually served with or inside bread which is round, quite flat, about 20 cm in diameter and comes in a double layer so it can be filled. Most popular fillings apart from ful are Tameya, chicken, salad made from tomatoes, cucumber, green onions and cilantro or a mix of cottage cheese and tomatoes.

Staying with a Christian family during one of their vegan fasting periods I learn not only how to make ful, but also gain some experience in making pickels, mainly of eggplants and peppers that are fried and then stuffed with a very spicy mix of tomatoes, lemon juice, garlic, cilantro, chili powder, salt and cumin. Eggplants, bell peppers and vine leaves are also often stuffed with rice cooked with tomatoes, herbs and spices.

Another national Egyptian dish is also said to originate from Coptic fasting criteria. Koshari is a mix of noodles, rice, lentils, fried onions and hot red sauce. While vegetarianism is not at all common in Egypt vegetarians can definitely survive, especially among Orthodox Christians who eat vegan for one third of the year anyway.

 

Ful pot, fried potatoes, baked vegetables, rice

Some other specials not to be missed when visiting Egypt, in my opinion is Feteer, a kind of flaky pastry containing a lot of butter and served with various salty or sweet fillings. Water melons, several kinds of mango and dates, grapes, bananas, guavas, figs and teen shoki (‘figs with horns’, a fruit from the desert) are sold on every other street corner and after washing or peeling them I never had any bad experience with these very sweet fruits. You also get most of them as juices in the supermarkets or at juice bars along with sugar cane and pomegranate juice, definitely a worth a try!

Egyptians also have a weakness for sweets and sweet drinks, most prominently black tea with fresh mint and quite a lot of sugar. Apart from dates in different shapes and preparations and Arabic and Turkish pastries that are very delicious and really very sweet, cupcakes (I like these) have found their way to Egypt, especially for Ramadan being customized with traditional local toppings and an American company specializing in cinnamon buns meets the local taste. Yesterday Ahmed invited me to a place that as its specialty serves fresh waffles with the chocolate bar of your choice spread on it! Ingenious! Sugar shock and tryptophane boost guaranteed =), decide for yourself if this is Egyptian or I just didn’t run across it anywhere else.

WEEK II and III: Being There

 – I’ve been kept from writing for a while, but I hope to complete an overview of my stay so far this week. –

I got used to the heat (and to wearing long sleeves or at least nothing sleeveless) and the traffic and the new surroundings quite fast, even to not eating or drinking in public, as Ramadan started shortly after my arrival and breaking the fast before sunset is not appreciated.

The structure given to my days and weeks by six hours/day, four days/week of Arabic lessons surely helped that a lot. In my beginners’ courses in Kalimat (Arabic for ‘words’) we are only three to four students, so the lessons are quite intense. Having studied some Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) in Germany a few years ago, however, gave me a little head start and less exhaustion.

One thing I obviously cannot get used to is the southern phenomenon of sudden fall of darkness, a daily source of amazement to me. I make a note to check if the slow dusk will nevertheless surprise me when I am back in Germany.

And in the middle of settled in everyday business and an accepted level of feeling foreign it sometimes hits me quite unexpectedly on my way home from school as the bus crosses the Nile and the Gezira (Arabic for island, in this case THE island in the center of Cairo on which you find Zamalek, a major sporting club, Cairo Tower, the Opera, a metro station, some hotels and banks etc.) on one of the city highways: ‘You’re crossing the longest river in the world just like going to school! You’re actually staying in the freaking biggest city of the whole of Africa!!’

View north from the Marriot hotel in Zamalek: Cairo Tower, Opera House, Gezira Club

My evenings in this first period of my stay I either spend with my host mother and her friends in the club (though not in the corner with a public viewing of the day’s progress of the Mubarak trials), in my host father’s flower shop close to the church they attend or on the balcony, enjoying temperatures below 35 degrees and the possibility to wear sleeveless tops.  Quite often I also help my host mother in the kitchen thus learning how to prepare some Egyptian dishes.

A disruption in my daily routine is caused by another laryngitis (I blame the air conditioning in combination with demanding pronunciation exercises). Having experienced this before I more or less manage to keep my mouth shut for some days, not ideal during a language course, but it even starts to get better before I go to see a doctor who prescribes the expected antibiotics. Not being privately insured in Germany I find myself to expect a conditional connection between receiving medical aid and proving my identity – it does not, of course, work this way in the private practice not far from the language school. As long as I pay the fee I may be anyone, quite a new experience.

Languages

Some quick information about the languages, as there is not just one form of Arabic to study. I take Fus’ha or MSA for three hours in the morning, this is the language used in writing and official contexts. In the afternoon we study Ameya, the Egyptian Colloquial Arabic (ECA) which is used in everyday life and acquired a written form mainly in times of facebook, instant messengers and the like. The good thing is, ECA is much less complicated than MSA and it is understood all over the Arab world due to movies and TV shows produced in Egypt (Egyptians, on the other hand, can hardly understand e.g. Moroccans). The bad thing, at least for me, you cannot practice the spoken language by reading, something that greatly helped me both in learning English and Latvian. Apart from that the learner’s life is complicated by the fact that only text books for young children print the little signs indicating short – in regular print you have to more or less know the words you are reading before you can read them, quite a different story from learning European languages written in Latin or Cyrillic script. I measure my reading abilities by the number of words running across the news bar on TV I can read (without understanding) before they vanish from the screen. After seven weeks in Egypt I now reached a number of two to three, more if I recognize ubiquitous expressions like ‘Israeli embassy’ or ‘Israeli ambassador’. My understanding of spoken language miraculously grows little by little, I can more or less grasp the key points in simple everyday conversations I overhear in the hospital, on the bus or at home, speaking remains the hardest part.

School

All levels of Arabic as a foreign language are taught at Kalimat by an experienced team of teachers. I like the combination of my Fus’ha teacher who is enthusiastic about her language and its grammar, something I have no difficulties relating to, and a more practical approach in Ameya. The students are a mix of diplomats, students of political science, Islamic or religious studies, people taking a gap year at various stages of their education and the occasional crazy scientist. Apart from a high percentage of Germans there are Americans, various Europeans and a girl from China all meeting on the balcony during most breaks. Due to the Ramadan restrictions of eating in public we usually order in traditional Egyptian fast food, mainly ful and tameya (the latter known as Falafel in Europe) – definitely better and also healthier than McDonald’s. The teachers are fasting and prefer to watch the Mubarak trial on TV in the office. Opinions among Egyptians on this matter are much more varied than the outsider might expect. In short they range from ‘they should kill him’ to ‘he is a sick man who deserves respect because of his old age and also the fact that he used to do good things for the country’ – trust in the actual success of the trials, whatever that might be, is limited.

Church In Egypt. Egypt In Church. In Church In Egypt.

I discover a new meaning of the phrase “Thank God, it’s Friday” when I set off to attend the Anglican service of the regular community for the first time. In the first week a class mate and I went to the Sunday service and were told that it is mainly frequented by tourists and some refugees who do not work. The service for the people with a regular working week is held on Fridays because nearly everyone is free then. The Friday community is not mainly British either. Many Americans, some Egyptians and various international expatriates complete the picture. I find the service very similar to the German Lutheran liturgy I am familiar with. The community is very open and I am happy to be welcomed in a group if younger people who for example regularly have lunch together after the service.

The current series of sermons centers on Exodus. Of course it is not possible to talk about the symbolic meaning with a side glance on history alone when the service actually takes place IN EGYPT, the same name, the same place, though none of us is imprisoned here and Egyptian authorities do not keep us from going home. I remember my visit to Amsterdam and the very informative and engaging permanent exhibition of the Jewish Museum. The room on Jewish thinking and religion invited the visitor to reflect upon some questions themselves and one of them was, “What is your Egypt?”, meaning, of course, what confines you? In my opinion the sermons I hear at All Saints’ find a good balance discussing the meaning Egypt has in the texts without ignoring that this happened to be the country we happen to live in now, but also reflecting upon the positive role Egypt plays in the New Testament, the situation of Christians in Egypt today and the crucial choices to be made right now by the whole people of Egypt.

During the three weeks with my first host family I also attended some Coptic services in the new and magnificent church of Archangel Michael.

I’ve never been to orthodox services before. Even without my host mother’s translations I’d get a vivid impression of yet another part of Christianity with many experiences very different from my background. Men and women sit in different parts of the church, most women wear head scarves, often white lace containing pictures of crosses or Jesus or the Archangel. Different clergymen (in black robes and turbans or caps and with the obligatory waving beard) and some ten to twenty men and boys from the community (dressed in white with red and gold stoles) perform different rituals. Burning incense is swirled, crosses and icons are carried around in a certain manner, hand bells accompany ling chants sung by the assembled community.

Apart from that I learn that Pope Shenouda III. of Alexandria is awarded this year’s Augsburg's Peace Prize!

Being the oldest, but in some ways marginalized religious group in Egypt I find many Christians to hold somewhat ambivalent opinions about the revolution and the period of uncertainty it caused.

The role religion plays in many Egyptians’ lives, it seems to me, does not differ very widely between Muslims and Christians. In conversations I find it deep rooted in people’s thinking and acting and it is also otherwise visible and else. Apart from the ever more prevalent veil and the huge number of both mosques and churches I see spots on men’s foreheads from praying, taxi drivers often put Quran copies in their window and some like to listen to Quran recitations while driving, people decorate their homes and shops with pictures of Jesus, saints, important clergymen and Bible verses or pictures of Mecca and Medina and Quran verses respectively.  Two years ago I found the Muslim creed sprayed onto concrete blocks at the Alexandria shore, now I see it printed on some bus doors. Less obvious are the stamp sized crosses many Christians have tattooed on their hand or forearm.

Coming from a continent that fiercely discusses how banned (which!) religion should be from the public sphere, Egypt certainly appears to be tattooed with religiosity, though what exactly is behind it remains hard to tell. Coming to terms with the diversity (may it be centuries old or a more recent development) instead of members of the powerful majority just ignoring it, on the other hand, will probably be crucial for a peaceful future both in Egypt and Europe.

The Cross-and-Crescent graffiti I see in many places in Cairo could be something I’d like to take home with me as a positive example.

New Everyday Life

Cairo Traffic

Although such a huge city is hardly captured in one word, loud is certainly one that applies at more or less all times of the day to most parts of Cairo. In the yards of many appartment houses it’s the buzzing of air-conditioners, in many other places it’s mainly the traffic. The occasional signs with a crossed out horn seem like an ironic illustration. Although on the whole, the traffic is not quite as loud and chaotic as I remember it from my last visit (maybe I just got used to it), the Northern European visitor will encounter many strange and demanding situations, such as crossing a street. I am surprised to see traffic lights that actually include pedestrians and (probably due to the additional presence of police men) have an effect. Usually one crosses the always busy streets more or less lane by lane (many streets have about three lanes for each direction), holding up one hand to slow an approaching car is also an option, but the main task is to spot a gap in the stream of cars and then walk fast, ready to stop after each lane if necessary. I learned some of this two years ago, but the main street near my language school is a bit too much, four to five lanes of fast cars, I wonder how I will ever make it and if I do, how will I get back? I stand there for several minutes, then an Egyptian woman takes me by the hand and we cross together. (A useful trick in any case, if the street is difficult, watch the locals and free-ride with them.)

Even without having to cross streets can be a challenge. Even Many Egyptians hardly ever use the sidewalk (if there is one), especially in residential areas. And I wonder if there is some unwritten rule against walking on the sidewalk or if they are just not used to it, as quite often there really is none. Thus I usually walk next to the parked cars, which at least saves me from being dripped upon by the air-conditioners hanging somewhere high above. The traffic moves at an arm’s (or finger’s) distance from me, and I soon learn how to actively ignore the taxis on the hunt for the next customer.

Taking a taxi is another thing one should learn soon after arriving in Cairo as it is a very convenient way to reach your destination quite fast and it is not very expensive. The white cabs have a taximeter (check if it works!), so the foreigner doesn’t even need to discuss unreasonable prices in Arabic. However, when taking a taxi one should not only know the address, but also some landmark near one’s destination as taxi drivers in this huge city do not know each and every street. As taxis make up a large proportion of the traffic, drivers can also ask colleagues driving in the neighboring lane for directions if both they and their passenger are lost.

New in my picture of Cairo are the many motorcycles. Usually they hold one or two (mostly young) men, but their capacities are much bigger. Occasionally I see three guys on one bike, the most exotic sight so far were two middle aged men and a goat. And I got quite used to the motorcycle functioning as the family car: A woman – often fully veiled – sitting side-saddle behind the man, a child between them, a baby on her lap. Needless to say no one ever wears helmets – except for the McDonald’s delivery drivers.

Although I do hear of many road accidents I admire the drivers here and would certainly not consider driving myself. At most times and places the somewhat chaotic traffic actually moves, often enough at considerable speed. Probably an example of swarm intelligence… Complaints on the traffic are also collectively shared and it is one of the many things blamed on the former regime that nothing was done to adjust Cairo’s traffic systems to the exploding population figures. A third Metro line is under construction, the two existing lines cover only a fraction of the city, but the modern trains go very frequently and at one Egyptian Pound you can hardly go any cheaper, especially for longer distances. Checking the Metro map one also finds another trace of the revolution. Some downtown stops are named after presidents, Sadat being the crossing point of the two lines. The one that used to be called Mubarak was renamed Ash-Shohaada – The Martyrs – in memory of those who were killed in the revolution that led to Mubarak’s resignation. In some places the maps bearing the old name were replaced, in others the former dictator’s name is blackened or scratched out.

Buses are the means of public transportation that cover most of the city. They also offer an especially good view on the traffic and many more things to be discovered along the streets and a ride costs only 1 to 2 pounds (13 to 25 Euro cents – the latter for example for my one hour 15km ride to school).

Morning rush hour

As there are no schedules or (complete) lists of lines or their destinations at the bus stops, one has to be prepared. Knowing which buses go from where to the chosen destination one patiently waits at the stop for a bus with the right number to show up. Unless people want to get off it only stops when flagged down, so it is important to know the Arabic numbers to recognize the right bus. Once on the bus one has to know when to go up to the front to tell the driver that one wants to get off at the next stop. On the first ride I usually ask someone and then memorize the landmarks right before the stop. A bit more hectic and even cheaper are the microbuses that don’t even have numbers but young conductors shouting out the destination, especially as a woman on my own, but also because of the intensified difficulties of bus riding I usually avoid them.

I don’t know how I would get along on the bus or anywhere if it wasn’t for many extremely helpful Egyptians. If need be people literally go out of their way, for example on some occasions when I was lost although I did know the most important facts to find my way, but the bus wouldn’t turn up or I hadn’t realized that there are several stops at a square. More than once someone I asked for directions or alternative bus numbers would accompany me for a good part of my way that was not necessarily theirs.

Clubs

Cairo also is very full. Not necessarily crowded, but there are not many “gaps” between streets, houses, squares etc. Some people use the green patches in the middle of the main streets and the roundabouts as their park substitute. Everyone who can afford it, however, belongs to a club. These well-tended and guarded compounds often hold sports courts, some lawns and palm trees, areas to sit and order drinks and snacks from the cafeteria, and sometimes even swimming pools or indoor sport facilities. The one my host family belongs to is just around the corner and I spend many evenings there with my host mother and her friends. Children run around playing, teenagers meet their friends or attend sports practice, planes descending to Cairo Airport glide through the hazy dusk.

Before the evening begins...

WEEK I

Getting There

Two weeks (filled with failing chemistry, writing a paper, clearing out my part of the kitchen, going home to my parents, writing applications, meeting old friends in Hamburg, my brother’s birthday and visiting my grandfather) after my last anatomy exam I fly to Cairo for the second time on July 28. After twenty minutes to change planes in Munich, spent on my toes at emigration, I am more or less the only German on the plane. Most of the other passengers are Egyptians going home for the summer and Ramadan. The plane is fully booked and as a nice surprise I receive an upgrade to business class! After some rearrangements an Egyptian dentist who lives in Asia is seated next to me (and explains the peculiarities of business class to me), his wife and daughter who live in the States now sit on the other side of the aisle as all passengers sitting next to the emergency exits have to speak English. Good to know I will be responsible for this door if anything happens…

Getting the Picture

I sleep through much of the flight; most of my view is blocked by the wing anyway, so I only catch glimpses of South Eastern Europe’s mountains and coast line. As we begin the descent I regret not having my camera at hand and thus missing the chance to catch some really nice views of this gigantic city. The lack of pictures illustrating many of my impressions will be a continuing phenomenon on this blog, too. While I don’t perceive Cairo streets as crowded, there are nearly always people around somewhere and taking pictures is not very appreciated, so most of my photos will show architecture, plants and panoramas.

Arrival

Injy picks me up at the airport, I’m very happy to see her again. I don’t feel all that foreign and the heat doesn’t hit me as badly as expected although it’s 20 degrees above Hamburg’s 14 degrees I left behind in the morning. My host family lives quite close to the airport, but as they are still at work, we first head to a nice little bistro in the neighborhood and have some pizza. All along the way I notice a lot of graffiti on walls and sidewalks. They appeared during and after the revolution and range in complexity from trees, lamp posts and walls just covered in the national colors to more symbolic  collages of hopes for the future, the unfolding of the protests and homages to the martyrs. You can have a look at the displays of revolution all over this city of maybe 20 million inhabitants here.

I feel very welcome in my host family and as I’ve been to Cairo before I don’t get the immediate novelty shock. However, after one or two days culture shock does hit.

I’m lying on my bed late at night, unable to sleep, it is far too hot, and everything is foreign, the whole day, everything. I think to myself, what are you doing here, maybe I am too old for this, how many more times am I gonna do this to myself? As my heat experienced health care professional brother had pointed out the importance of taking with me and using a thermometer over and over again, it crosses my mind to check my temperature and I discover it to be 38.3 degrees. That probably explains a part of the exhaustion. Over the next few days I rediscover that although I more or less know how to settle in at a foreign place, it still is work. But also that I reach a first level of comfort quite fast, as I remember thinking less than a week after my arrival, actually this is fun, and yes, I will do that to myself again in more distant places if I get the chance!

Saturday August 20 2011 II - Global Bible Studies On a Satellite

The members of the bible studies’ group I am invited to join take turns in hosting and today we’re heading far out to October as the satellite city 6^th of October is called. One of them has a car, so we meet at his house in the late afternoon and leave Cairo (although officially we don’t) as darkness starts to fall. The highway is not as busy as it could be, the pyramids glide past us in some distance, grey is the desert to both sides of the road, it does look a bit like a moonscape, suitable surroundings for a satellite. 6^th of October was planned and built to relief population stress in Cairo, but somehow it does not seem to work out exactly as planned. While there certainly are some few millions of people living out here, many houses look abandoned in different stages of completion and many of the cloned toy-like houses are empty. 

  View towards Cairo

We pass by a vast mosque still under construction, huge petrol stations and shops and more heaps of grey sand put up along the street for some reason unknown. After repeatedly calling our host for directions we arrive at his guarded neighborhood (some young guys sit at the entrance and ask where we’re going) where he turns up in his car to guide us to his house. It has a small green garden and some unoccupied and unfinished neighbors. The Indian meal cooked on the standard Egyptian stove (about 1.3x0.8m) tastes delicious on the spacious terrace with darkness falling and temperature still above 30 degrees. Except for South America all continents and several Christian denominations are present at the table and I really enjoy the exchange of views on Colossians 1 from very different angles. And I don’t really feel very much like “the new one”.

On the way back, the streets in Cairo are extremely busy with people going home after extended Iftar meals and occasional trucks (like a pickup carrying roughly 8000 eggs secured by nothing but egg cartons and two ropes). The day is completed by a short taxi ride back to Zamalek with Arab pop music blasting from the added speakers behind my seat to go along with and slowly whirling traffic all around.

Saturday August 20 2011 I - Zamalek.

Today I changed my location for the first time as my wonderful host family with whom I stayed for the first three weeks will go on vacation tomorrow. I haven’t yet found a place to spend the rest of August at, so I moved into the guest house of All Saints’ Cathedral, the Anglican Church I attend. It is really adorable, but also a bit beyond my budget for ten days, so I decided to come here for three days, enjoy Zamalek (located on an island in the Nile in the middle of Cairo, one of the major city highways runs across it on a flyover with another busy street - 26th of July - below it; one of the best parts of town) and find something else during that time, inshallah.

Injy – what would I do without her? – took me to the island quite early in the morning, streets nearly as empty as on Fridays. A nice and early start for what will not only be, but also feels like my second arrival day.

"Is it the church that doesn't really look like a church?" - "That's the one!"

As the guest house (actually it’s two large flats above each other in an appartment building right across from the church compound) has just been renovated and cleaning is still underway, so I sit in the dining room for some time, drink tea and thoroughly study a map of Cairo, happy to lay hands on one for once. I don’t know how accurate it is, however, it still shows two German embassies and one of the Soviet Union, although the register doesn’t. I chat with the charming land lady and some other guests and move into my light and friendly room shortly after noon. Even the air conditioning doesn’t give me the feeling I’ll soon develop another laryngitis. I get an invitation to join a bible study in the late afternoon, so I got to get moving in order to get some food and orientation. As I walk out of my breezy room and down the stairs I realize that today it is REALLY hot or at least more humid than before, while I learned to more or less ignore the heat over the past few weeks, this combination makes me struggle. Also, as I am not much of a driver myself, I find it difficult to recall the exact paths of the tour round Zamalek Injy gave me in the morning, so I just try to find one useful way I remember from the map and see what else will turn up along it.

View across 26th of July Street towards the church compound.

Mark the graffito.

The church and the guest house are located one street off 26^th of July Street not far from the island's eastern shore. I cross 26^th and enter the street right opposite, passing the pizzeria we often take lunch at after service on the one side and my favorite bookstore on the other. The plan is to walk to the riverside down west and get some food on the way back. My memory of this morning’s tour really is not very coherent, so I’m always happy to spot something I recognize. 

Most of the time I’m just overwhelmed by the heat and the swirl of different buildings and sceneries that quite unpredictably to me pop up at every corner. Beneath the trees that at least give some protection from the sun and I feel a bit like moving through an aquarium, eerie.

The architecture is a mix of beautiful older villas and townhouses and multistory apartment houses of younger age. I recall my Arabic teacher telling us how both Zamalek and Mohandeseen used to be really nice neighborhoods with gardens, nice houses and no buildings higher than three floors in “the old days” that ended in the 70s when due to lack of housing most of the old architecture was destroyed and replaced. Every now and then I pass by an embassy in one of the remaining villas, some surprisingly big for a small country and all of them well guarded and polished while most other buildings wear layers of Cairo dust varying in thickness. Small galleries of jewelry, fashion or photo designers are interspersed with fancy cupcake bakeries, cafés of varying size, sushi and Italian restaurants and the typical Egyptian one room supermarket that sells packed food and drinks, some fruit, phone credit and a mix of other things you might need. Some buildings look more reserved, but display big signs of lawyers’ offices or the practice of a doctor with an American degree. Some large villas host more expensive schools and the presence of many expatriates in the area is made obvious by mostly bilingual shop signs and places like the “American Baby Club”. As everywhere in Cairo some walls are covered in revolution graffiti, though I don’t run across the really great ones I saw from the car in the morning. As streets get smaller the expensive stores get fewer, but every now and then one still shows up unexpectedly. Garages, more groceries and small Egyptian cafés dominate. Benches are piled up against walls, waiting to be used for open air Iftar meals in the evening. Some streets are decorated with lights, one mosque reminds me of a summery Christmas tree with colorful fairy lights spread to the surrounding trees and houses. One more thing that strikes me as an unusual sight: People – men and boys, that is – ride bicycles here! And what bikes, enough to make any German hippie student envious. Eventually I reach the Nile and walk along the promenade, separated from the actual shore by clubs and some fancy cafés with air-conditioned terraces! (Unintendedly I walk through the hot air coming out of the ac, but actually even hot wind is a relief today). The broad street next to me is not very busy except for occasional taxis whom I have to wave off and I start to think I somehow changed my direction and am walking somewhere else, but then the buildings grow bigger again and hotels appear and then, there she is, Umm Kulthoum and the hotel named after her and right next to it the 24/7 café I’m writing my first posts in.

Statue of Umm Kulthoum - THE Arab singer of the 20th century

I'll write some more about her later.

I recheck the surroundings of the location to fix this landmark on my internal map of Zamalek and take some other way back through the aquarium, now mainly looking for a supermarket, ideally one of those Injy recommended.  The heat has really worn me down and the still unpredictable mix of Zamalek which I’m sure to enjoy later on gives me an intense feeling of foreignness. Hadn’t had that for a long time. Another peak of diversity I encounter is the flashy State Ministry for Antiquities, very white (how do they keep it this clean?), very modern, an impressive ancient Egyptian art work next to the front door.

Eventually I run into the Alfa Market, I enter tentatively, by now that mentally exhausted I’m not sure if I’ll manage to shop at a super market, though I know this is one I don’t even have to speak at, let alone Arabic. The miscellaneous Western European brands only intensify my confusion. The shop is very clean and tidy, not too big (actually it’s a bit of a maze, I have to circle two times till I understand where things are) and intensely decorated for Ramadan with nearly every surface covered with cloth of a different colorful traditional pattern and small fanuz-lamps all over the ceiling. There are hardly any Egyptian customers around. In the nuts and sweets corner I overhear a woman talking to her little son in American English, “Sweetie, do you want any of these? Oh, sorry, no, we don’t have a nut cracker at home yet, you see, choose one without shells, you can choose one of these!” Expat life mystifies me, especially when children travel along. The more I think about it the more I am convinced that I couldn’t do this. Raising my children outside my own society, more or less outside any society as diplomats are supposed not to integrate is something I would probably choose to avoid. Unlike living geographically outside my home society myself, the idea feels to me like uprooting my children, but that is probably due to the fact that I lived in the same house for the first twenty years of my life… I know there are other ways of forming a home, but I’ve discovered this concept to feel stranger to me than any foreign way I’ve seen in its own place. Probably I am not much of a nomad after all. Walking back to the guest house I feel comforted by the huge DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) sign at the main street.