I recently read a book that made this view all the more interesting to me, Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman’s Skiff by Rosemary Mahoney. I’ve wanted to read the book since I ran across an article the author published in The Guardian about her experiences rowing a boat down the Nile. I’ve always like memoir-type books and one that included adventure travel sounded all the more interesting.

The book was fascinating. I’ve never been as far up the river as Aswan, and still so many of her experiences were very familiar to me. When she said she wanted to row down the Nile, everyone said no, you’ll never get permission. In true Egyptian fashion, Mahoney didn’t give up at no, she just asked other people and when that didn’t work she went off and did it anyway. It’s a classic example of the way things work in Egypt! (Also, a bad habit that is all too easy to slip into!) And no matter what topic the topic of conversation, the men Mahoney encountered usually managed to turn the topic to sex. That’s another familiar scenario to me. I’ve been in a shop to buy copper pots for my plants and had the merchant start regaling me with tales of his sexual conquests in Hurgada during the days he was a tour guide there. Um…interesting but I just want to buy these pots…

More than a book about rowing, this is a book about people and culture and attempting to understand each other in spite of the wide gaps in experience that have shaped us all. Mahoney was able to interact with local people in a way that few foreigners ever do, and has provided a very thoughtful account of her interactions from the ridiculous to the poignant.

I’ve been thinking about what I want to do on my next get-away lately and reading her book has inspired me to want to step outside my comfort zone and see more. I’m not getting any younger and in the immortal words of the Red Hot Chili Peppers this life is more than just a read through. I haven’t made any firm decisions yet, but I’m close. Stay tuned…

And in that mindset, I have been working on making a few extra items to round out my inventory for an upcoming sale next week. People aren’t always prepared to buy a baby quilt on a whim, but sometimes something smaller like a decorative table runner will catch their eye. So I sat down over the weekend and made this:

(click to enlarge)

I have another similar one in progress that is quilted with red thread and will have a red binding edge. They’re so pretty that even if they don’t sell I won’t be too bothered. That’s the nice thing about making things that you like – you can always keep them

You can also give them as gifts. I started my Christmas shopping ages ago. What about you? Time is flying by – the big day will be here before you know it!

From the NaNoWriMo website:
National Novel Writing Month is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.

Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.

Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It’s all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.

It’s not a bad idea really, setting aside a specified amount of time and demanding a specific output. Quality aside, at least you have something to show for your effort at the end of the month. You can’t revise and edit a blank page after all.

I’m not participating in NaNoWriMo. Every year I find myself kind of seduced by the challenge, but wisely back away. Why set myself up to fail so spectacularly? I am the sort of writer who is lucky to write 50K words in a year, not a month. I feel bad enough when I fail to meet my own modestly set word count goals on a day to day basis.

Part of my problem is discipline – you can’t write if you aren’t sitting down and doing it. Yes, I’m busy. Everyone is busy. Other writers make time. What’s the difference between them and me? Who knows. But at least some of them have contracts to fulfill and deadlines to meet. It’s amazing what those things can do for your discipline. Being accountable only to myself isn’t really much of a stick. What’s the rush? The story is in my head – I pretty much know what is going to happen next. And if I don’t, then what’s the point in sitting down to write? My writing process is often like waiting on the next installment in a serial story. It comes in waves, with lulls in between.

I think that writing 50K words in one gush like that might work better with stories that are heavier on plot. First this happens, then that happens, then watch out! Big climax. Phew – we made it. Most of my stories are very character driven and even though I start out with a premise, the characters tend to reveal themselves as I go along – things happen that I didn’t really plan. I have *tried* to turn off the internal editor and get on with things, to speed things up, usually to no avail. I simply can’t move forward in the story until I feel like the emotional tone of the story up to the point I’ve written is what I mean for it to be. I might only go back and add one sentence or change one word in a scene, but for me that one sentence or word will make all the difference. If I don’t add it when it pops into my head, I will likely forget. (Though from time to time I have an idea of something to add / fix, only to discover I’ve already added it!)

It might take me months longer to finish a story, but on the other hand my first drafts tend to be very clean and require minimal editing. In the grand scheme it’s six of one, half-a-dozen of the other. The important thing is just to keep writing until The End.

I love this sign. The combination of the name and the gigantic portrait of the president is so Soviet Block somehow – I felt sort of disoriented for a moment, as if there should be a hammer and sickle mounted somewhere nearby as well.

I amused myself trying to figure out just what “social solidarity” means? Public morale? I was imaging all sorts of interesting and fun social programs they could institute to keep everyone happy and content. Like line dancing. Or picnics. Maybe trips to the zoo for school children. My friend, who grew up here, said it was more akin to the American welfare department. I suppose that would also contribute to morale, but so far as I can tell it hasn’t led to “social solidarity”.

Maybe they should try the line dancing…

We’ve had a lot of clouds but little real rain – and still we got a rainbow. This beauty appeared outside my window on Friday afternoon and vanished a few moments later. Glad I looked out when I did!

(Click image to enlarge)

In fact it didn’t rain – or if it did, it never reached the ground – and we had a good time at the fair. The children played games and collected their “spooky prize” at the end. My daughter got a jumping rubber bat, but was upset she didn’t get trick chewing gum like her brother. My son kindly traded with her. He got the better end of the deal though since the bat is still jumping but the trick gum has already broken.

When my daughter brought it to me for repair I got a good look at the label:

Not sure which is worse, the outside of the package or the inner warning label:



Don’t joke the sickman indeed. The translator for this was the sick one. I love the image of the tiny lips along with “no entrance”. I am fairly surprised the party organizers didn’t notice the label before distributing it to small children however. The children haven’t caught on but not all parents have a sick sense of humor like mine!

The gum is proving difficult to repair so I may just quietly dispose of it…

One of the funniest signs I’ve seen recently was in the bathroom of a tour bus. On the back of the door there was a sign advising “No Crunching On Toilet”. I interpreted that to mean “No Crouching”, which is what you would do on a non-Western toilet since it is essentially a hole in the ground (What do you call a non-Western toilet? An Eastern toilet?) I regret not having taken a picture of that sign now, but you know – it just didn’t occur to me to bring my camera into the bathroom with me. And just think what the other passengers would have thought if I’d come out, retrieved my camera, and gone back in again!

You can’t see it in the picture but the English writing under the Arabic on the bag she’s carrying says “Step into Fashion”.

Pictures like these are why I should always carry my camera with me!

But what are the odds that the day I send my child to school wearing velvet it rains in Cairo!? Fortunately it was a short, isolated shower but still!

I admit I kind of lost it yesterday afternoon. I had just spent an hour or so fussing with getting the feather on the hat just right when my daughter comes home and announces that I need to make cookies or sandwiches for her to bring in to share with her class for their Tudor banquet. Um, no – I think not! The teachers sent home a note a week ago about the big day but never mentioned that we would need to contribute food. Daughter then had a fit because they told the class that if they didn’t contribute that they would be last in line to choose food as well.

Ok, I get the reason the teacher told the class that, to encourage them all to participate, but come on – they could have given us a bit of notice. A few extra words on the note that came home last week would have sufficed. I felt like sending in a stale loaf of coarse bread and a bit of dried meat. Maybe something from this menu:

FIRST COURSE
Miniature pastries filled either with cod liver or beef marrow
Eels in a thick spicy puree
Loach in a cold green sauce flavored with spices and sage
Saltwater fish

SECOND COURSE
Capon pasties and crisps
Bream and eel pasties
Blang Mange

THIRD COURSE
Frumenty
Venison
Lampreys with hot sauce
Roast bream and darioles
Sturgeon

I think the cod liver stuffed pastries might have expressed my displeasure quite well. Instead her father went out and bought her some chocolate cookies.

I’m not out of the woods with costumes yet since the children have their Halloween fair at the end of the week but I can guarantee you that I will be giving that minimal effort! Especially since the little ingrate didn’t even want to wear the Tudor hat once she got to school!

Cairo is the first place I’ve lived abroad where they do actually have home mail delivery – though I’ve never figured out exactly what their system is. I’ve had large packages delivered to my doorstep with the carrier only too happy to collect the import duty (and tip!) – sometimes coming back multiple times in one day if I’m not home the first time they try to make delivery. Other times they simply leave a package notice in my box for something small like an envelope containing a CD of photos as they did this week.

I’ve been to the post office here once before – to pick up a different CD of photos. Not sure why they make such a fuss about discs, but they do. The post office is only about a twenty minute walk away, but I might as well have been in a different city, the atmosphere of the street changes so dramatically as you cross over an invisible barrier from expat-land to local Cairo. I was the *only* Westerner on the street and though no one around me made any special fuss, I felt fairly conspicuous in a way that I don’t often feel this close to my neighborhood.

The post office set-up has changed a little since I was last there but I waved my pink notice and found the window where I needed to be – manned by the same woman as was there the last time I visited, three years ago. I showed her my notice and she asked me who I was since my husband’s name was on the notice. She then asked to see my passport. Huh? Once she asked me, I vaguely remembered that nearly every time I have been to the post office I am asked to produce my passport which always strikes me as ridiculous since I didn’t even need my passport to get into the US Embassy when I went to meet my friend for dinner earlier in the week.

Needless to say, I didn’t have my passport handy. She asked for another ID. I gave her an old driver’s license I still have from my time in the United Arab Emirates. What? It’s not yet expired and better yet, has some Arabic writing on it. Funnier still, she accepted it immediately. (Note: That is the real reason I never remember to bring my passport – because I can get away with giving them my gym membership card and still get what I came for)

The duty on the CD came to 7 Egyptian pounds, 85 piastres. Three years ago when I went to claim the CD, the duty was 7 pounds and when I gave her a 10 pound note and she claimed she had no change. Right. Lack of change is a national epidemic apparently. This time the duty was slightly higher, but one thing you have to know about Egyptian money is that though the amount for a transaction could be any amount, usually the cashier will either round up or down to the nearest .25 piastre. One Egyptian pound is only worth about US$0.18 so they don’t produce small coinage anymore, the only current notes / coins being quarter and half a pound increments.

I thought I would be clever this time around so I gave her seven pounds and seventy-five piastres in notes and I dug what I thought was an old 10-piastre coin out of my purse. My triumph was short-lived though because it turns out it wasn’t an Egyptian coin afterall! She wasn’t the sort to round down so I ended up giving her eight pounds. No small coins means no change this time either!

I did at least get the package. And an even greater appreciation of the overall efficiency of the US postal system