Back again

Well, I haven't written in a dog's age, have I?

A few quick updates - everything's going well. My classes are moving forward - how are we only halfway through the semester? Meeting twice a week sure incurs a lot of lesson plans! But at least I think we've gotten over a hump. My students have "figured me out", and now they're doing better about handing their work in on time, putting in effort, etc. A few have dropped, but not quite as many as I'd have thought at the beginning of the semester. Some of my students are even Googling me - and of course, the Mars stuff is coming to the top!

Last weekend I met KC in Barcelona. We had a very nice time - although if the AMERICAN DOLLAR WERE WORTH ANYTHING it would've been even better. Thank you, George Bush. I mean, the CANADIAN dollar has parity. That should bring us shame as a nation. So we spent most of our time eating (pork, liquor, and seafood) and enjoying the architecture in Barcelona. Let's just say, I'm glad to look at Gaudi's designs for OTHER people's houses.

We ate at Ferran Adria's brother's place in Barcelona, and it was great - the Spanish sure know how to make fried food. Needless to say, we didn't go to El Buli - but we apparently missed being in the restaurant with Ferran Adria by only a day! Oh, well. Our lifelong quest for the "best" meal (read: most expensive?) in the world continues.

My journey back to Cairo was a bit hairy - on the Barcelona end, if you can believe that. Bottom line, I didn't manage to bring back the kilos of pork and wine I'd envisioned. I did use my full Egyptian duty-free allowance in Cairo, though. It was intensely weird coming "home" to Cairo. I was glad to be back - the weather was better, everything was cheaper, I had a driver waiting for me - and yet it's the first time I've come "home" here.

I went to a "Halloween" party last night. The Egyptians don't celebrate Halloween, but a few University people had gatherings. The Ams in Cairo call it "Halal0ween." I didn't make it to the costume party, but I did have 4 glasses of wine and a screening of "Young Frankenstein" to make my evening. And pizza! There's a place in Zamalek called Maison Thomas that serves - wait for it - pork products! Coincidentally, I'd been there yesterday afternoon and thought the pizza smelled wonderful, so I was thrilled to discover that's where the party's pizza was coming from. Some of the options are albeit bizarre - blue cheese? chicken "luncheon"? - but we did our best. It was pretty good.


I was in Zamalek to go shopping. I got this cool piece of art from a gallery - an artist had found an old woodblock of a tunisian warrior on a horse and gussied it up a bit. Weird, but cool.

Also in the category of "weird" in Egypt - check out this product label I found at the market:

Perhaps THIS is the source of the poor suffering Egyptian man's sexual frustration? His wife is using anti-horniness cream! Maybe the wives should be using it on the husbands ... it's a Dove facial product meant to, I think, even out skin tone. Then again, Viagra was originally intended to treat a heart problem ....