Well, the crazy week is just about to come to end!
The semester's done and I've finished my grading ....
KC got here on Wednesday, slightly delayed but in one piece ....
My henna party on Thursday, hosted by some wonderful friends, was a smashing success and I have some beautiful tatoos on my hands and feet ....
Last night's "wedding" reception was lots of fun, went pretty smoothly all things considered. We had about 45 people at the flat, catered. We even had a belly dancer - who's my dance teacher! I've been studying for the past few months as a surprise for KC. And despite my enormous misgivings, I performed in front of everyone and I think it went pretty well. Boy was KC surprised ....
And we're heading off to Kenya tomorrow night! We'll be on safari for about 10 days, returning to Cairo New Year's Eve! We'll be there over Christmas, so if you don't hear from us, assume all's well and we're having a wonderful time!
I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas and New Year!
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Category 3!
I knew it! I'm not just stupid!!!
I've spent the last hour struggling to write a seven-line note to my housekeeper in Arabic. Usually this is the "special request" I use as an exercise with my tutor. But since this semester went haywire, I haven't been having the tutoring sessions. I suppose I could call her and laboriously have her check my spelling over the phone - or worse, I could email her what I want to say and have her email me back. But I figured I'd go the tough route and try it on my own.
And then I found Google Translate. Seems like a miracle, right?
(Cairo denizens are going to anticipate what comes next ...)
... Except everything is translated into foosha! Bloody Modern Standard Arabic, which has completely different words for the things you might actually want to say day-to-day.
A mother of a friend kindly gifted me her English-Arabic dictionary because it actually has Arabic writing, rather than transliteration (like the book AUC gave us). Transliteration is ghastly, because everyone (including me) has their own system, and transliteration doesn't actually work with Arabic very well into English. Everything is so different, the stresses, writing or not writing vowels (still haven't figured this out), different sounds ... gaaaaah. And where is this marvelous gift? Sitting on my desk at work, of course.
I was googling around, trying to find an Aemeya translator (into Egyptian Arabic), when I found this nice description of the dialect. At the bottom of the page it says, "How difficult is it to learn Arabic? Arabic is a Category III language in terms of difficulty for speakers of English."
No shit. Apparently my dreadful accent is (somewhat) mitigated by the astonishing fact that I can make myself pretty well understood here, and I can even read. No small feat. I managed it in about 4 weeks, but the no-vowels deal is a killer. As far as I'm concerned, they're all a's until proven otherwise.
Category III is the hardest category they've got - the other languages in it are Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, and Korean. Japanese has even got a little star next to it, meaning it's even worse than the other ones!
[Sigh] So I'm only category three lazy and dumb.
I've spent the last hour struggling to write a seven-line note to my housekeeper in Arabic. Usually this is the "special request" I use as an exercise with my tutor. But since this semester went haywire, I haven't been having the tutoring sessions. I suppose I could call her and laboriously have her check my spelling over the phone - or worse, I could email her what I want to say and have her email me back. But I figured I'd go the tough route and try it on my own.
And then I found Google Translate. Seems like a miracle, right?
(Cairo denizens are going to anticipate what comes next ...)
... Except everything is translated into foosha! Bloody Modern Standard Arabic, which has completely different words for the things you might actually want to say day-to-day.
A mother of a friend kindly gifted me her English-Arabic dictionary because it actually has Arabic writing, rather than transliteration (like the book AUC gave us). Transliteration is ghastly, because everyone (including me) has their own system, and transliteration doesn't actually work with Arabic very well into English. Everything is so different, the stresses, writing or not writing vowels (still haven't figured this out), different sounds ... gaaaaah. And where is this marvelous gift? Sitting on my desk at work, of course.
I was googling around, trying to find an Aemeya translator (into Egyptian Arabic), when I found this nice description of the dialect. At the bottom of the page it says, "How difficult is it to learn Arabic? Arabic is a Category III language in terms of difficulty for speakers of English."
No shit. Apparently my dreadful accent is (somewhat) mitigated by the astonishing fact that I can make myself pretty well understood here, and I can even read. No small feat. I managed it in about 4 weeks, but the no-vowels deal is a killer. As far as I'm concerned, they're all a's until proven otherwise.
Category III is the hardest category they've got - the other languages in it are Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, and Korean. Japanese has even got a little star next to it, meaning it's even worse than the other ones!
[Sigh] So I'm only category three lazy and dumb.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Party planning : wine
So I'm trying to nail down the wine order I want to make for the party on Friday. I'm having a little difficulty ...
... because most Egyptian wine is dreadful. Totally undrinkable. And it's embarrassing for me to offer my guests something I wouldn't drink myself. I mean, check out this wine guide to Egypt. 'Nuff said.
OK, who am I kidding? I would drink it. I do drink it. I do complain, but I still drink. And forunately there are some that aren't quite as awful.
Drinking in Egypt is a little tricky because the government has passed all kinds of laws to encourage the sale of Egyptian booze. There are basically 3 Egyptian beers, two of which are Heineken knock-offs (Stella and Sakkara). The only thing I can say for them is they're cold. And I don't like the 3rd beer (Meister), or a 4th (Luxor) that some of my friends like. Wretchedly disappointing. As for the Egyptian wine, occasionally you get what you pay for, as long as you're not buying from a hotel. The rest of the time they should be paying you to drink the stuff. And don't get me started on the foreign wine situation ... did I ever tell you about the bottle of 2006 Louis Jadot Beaujolais I saw for USD $100 in the Grand Hyatt? That's a bottle we used to buy to have with burgers back home, for not more than $9. The duty-free allowance is 4 bottles per person, which I tend to use up on hard liquor, since I'm not touching the methanol-laced stuff they make here.
I found this hilarious blog with tasting notes from Egyptian wines. Some of my favorite passages are "this wine had a promising nose of paraffin and Nivea cold cream," and "this wine has an antiseptic nose of melting nylon and acetone ... but those are quickly overwhelmed by the taste of black plastic garbage bags which lingers into the finish." Thankfully I wasn't planning to serve any of these wines.
I'm planning to call Drinkie's and have them deliver some red and some white. Any preferences? I was thinking about the Cape Bay red and the Sheherazade white. And does anyone think "champagne" is a good idea?
... because most Egyptian wine is dreadful. Totally undrinkable. And it's embarrassing for me to offer my guests something I wouldn't drink myself. I mean, check out this wine guide to Egypt. 'Nuff said.
OK, who am I kidding? I would drink it. I do drink it. I do complain, but I still drink. And forunately there are some that aren't quite as awful.
Drinking in Egypt is a little tricky because the government has passed all kinds of laws to encourage the sale of Egyptian booze. There are basically 3 Egyptian beers, two of which are Heineken knock-offs (Stella and Sakkara). The only thing I can say for them is they're cold. And I don't like the 3rd beer (Meister), or a 4th (Luxor) that some of my friends like. Wretchedly disappointing. As for the Egyptian wine, occasionally you get what you pay for, as long as you're not buying from a hotel. The rest of the time they should be paying you to drink the stuff. And don't get me started on the foreign wine situation ... did I ever tell you about the bottle of 2006 Louis Jadot Beaujolais I saw for USD $100 in the Grand Hyatt? That's a bottle we used to buy to have with burgers back home, for not more than $9. The duty-free allowance is 4 bottles per person, which I tend to use up on hard liquor, since I'm not touching the methanol-laced stuff they make here.
I found this hilarious blog with tasting notes from Egyptian wines. Some of my favorite passages are "this wine had a promising nose of paraffin and Nivea cold cream," and "this wine has an antiseptic nose of melting nylon and acetone ... but those are quickly overwhelmed by the taste of black plastic garbage bags which lingers into the finish." Thankfully I wasn't planning to serve any of these wines.
I'm planning to call Drinkie's and have them deliver some red and some white. Any preferences? I was thinking about the Cape Bay red and the Sheherazade white. And does anyone think "champagne" is a good idea?
Back blog: Minya
I’m typing this entry on a bus on my way to Alexandria. I’ve realized that I’m on another adventure, and I haven’t even had time to write about the last one! Well, the last big one, anyway. The one involving a long journey.
About a month ago I joined some of my colleagues on a trip up to Minya in Middle Egypt. Quick Egypt lesson – the Nile flows south to north, so “up” the Nile means towards the headwaters, or south. Don’t blame me, I don’t make the rules.
Minya is a town right on the Nile. It’s got some heavy industry, quite a bit of agriculture, and some really spectacular Egyptian ruins. It’s also nearly impossible to get there, due to the ridiculous police presence intended to “protect” foreigners. I’ve already written about our absurd trip down there in my blog on the follies of the convoy system.
We stayed at the Nefertiti Hotel, right on the corniche. Sounds lovely, right? Well, across the corniche was the river … and the Venus Wedding Palace. So all night, both nights, the sounds of Egyptian music and ululating floated through the air, straight into our room. The funny thing is I’d even requested a room in the back of the hotel, but the management insisted that I actually wanted the Nile view. Very little irritates me as much as people telling me what I want. I should’ve made a fuss, but it seemed like a sleepy town at 2:30 am on a Thursday, so I let it go. Thank god for earplugs. Don’t leave home without ‘em.
Far too bright and early the next morning (technically I guess it was the same morning … ugh) we piled back into the bus and set out for Tell El Amarna. Amarna used to be called Akhetaten, back when it was the capital city of Egypt. The 18th Dynasty Pharoah Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten (1352-1336 BC) and revolutionized Egypt’s political, social, and religious systems. In a brash gesture of complete change, Akhenaten grabbed the wealth and power of the priests, destroyed Egypt’s divine pantheon, replaced it with a single god, Aten (the disk of the sun – and of course Akhenaten was the prime intermediary), and build a brand new capital city in the middle of nowhere. His wife was the famous Nefertiti, and his ultimate successor (possibly his son, although not by Nefertiti) was Tutankhamun, whose birth name was Tutankhaten. It’s thought that Tutankhamun’s burial trove was so rich in part to symbolize the return to the established religious and social order after the death of the “heretic” pharaoh Akhenaten.
These names, dates, and stories have swirled through my head from the time I was very little. I wanted to be an Egyptologist when I was young. While I think a lot of kids go through this phase, it was much more pronounced for me. My parents tolerated this for years, until finally my father said to me, “You’ll never make any money as an Egyptologist. Stop wasting your time. Why don’t you think about science?”
Ahem. Because now I’m a rich and famous scientist. Well done, Dad.
The point is, I’ve been thinking about Amarna, Akhenaten, and Tutankhamun for most of my life. I was incredibly excited to be making the trip to Amarna – it was a life trip for me. And after inexplicably changing our nice new bus for a filthy, jagged-metal model to cross the river, we finally arrived at Amarna. This is what I saw:
One and a half reconstructed pillars, a partially-excavated altar, and a whole lot of nothing. Ah, but I neglect our mandatory and oh-so-vigilant personal guard:
I screwed my eyes up to try to summon a vision of past grandeur. It was there, buried in my brain, but hard to overlay the reality.
We headed to the necropolis next, on the east side of the river. We saw some lovely tombs: Meryre I, Ahmose. I don’t have pictures of the inside of any tombs on this trip, because the government (read: Zahi) strictly controls photographic rights. My boss got special permission from Zahi himself to take some digital pictures, and I’m hoping I’ll come into them soon.
To my surprise and excitement, my boss decided to take us to the tomb of Akhenaten, which is back in a wadi set back from a cliff. I admit I’d made a bit of a fuss at breakfast when I found out we weren’t going. It turned out we were able to fit it into the schedule, so off we went. Lonely Planet described the journey as “very bumpy” – clearly things have changed since 2006, because I haven’t seen such beautiful blacktop in a year and a half of living here. I was thrilled to be driving into the remote desert, to find a royal tomb in a deserted wadi.
A busload of Japanese tourists was entering the tomb as we drove up.
I pitched a fit like a sulky child who’s had a toy taken away. We hadn’t seen a single other tourist since we arrived, and we only found the other group 15 km from anything else in the “deserted” wadi?? I started hiking up the wadi, kicking rocks in frustration. My guard flew at me and tried to dissuade me from walking away. A friend joined me as I launched into a tirade in my dreadful Arabic, waving my arms, jabbing my finger at the tourists, and shouting about how I hadn’t come into the desert to look at Japanese people. The guard looked at me, clearly amused, and then waved me up the wadi. There wasn’t far to go, but I was gratified. After the Japanese left, 
we descended into the tomb. Not a lot to see, although I found some really interesting salt crystal formations on the wall. If the water table keeps rising, they’re going to lose the tomb altogether. Somehow we picked up a hitchhiker on the way back. I can imagine neither where the guy was going nor how’d he gotten out that far on his own. At least he held the door on the van as we jounced to a rendezvous with a totally different, dilapidated bus. I kid you not – we stopped in the middle of nowhere and switched buses. God forbid someone misses out on some baksheesh.
Next on the itinerary was Tuna El Gebel, the necropolis of ancient Hermopolis. We visited a few tombs here – Petosiris (350 BC), an interesting example of the synthesis of Greek and Egyptian art, and Isadora, a mummy-containing tomb of a woman who drowned herself in the Nile (150 AD). Far and away most interesting were the vast underground galleries containing mummified ibises and baboons. Very very creepy and very very cool.
We dashed over to Hermopolis, trying to beat the sunset. There’s nothing much left at Hermopolis; they’ve made a little statuary park, kind of like Memphis outside Cairo. Far and away the main attraction is the two colossal statues of baboons with mutilated genitalia:
I’m not used to being a tourist in Egypt. One of my standard Arabic expressions of disgust involves a contemptuous assertion that I’m not a tourist. So it was extremely odd for me, seeing small children running along the side of the road, waving at our bus. Even adults would come out of stores and homes to stare, and then wave, as we squeezed through the tiny Middle Egyptian streets. The kids up above were waiting for us in Hermopolis, wanting to shout and wave and have their pictures taken. It felt like something out of a movie, where the oh-so-philanthropic white people help the less-fortunate brownies, blackies, or yellows.
Day 3 was our last day in Middle Egypt. We started by driving out to Beni Hassan, a spectacular set of tombs cut into the cliff face up above the river. Visiting the site was a hassle – baksheesh, “security”, blah blah – they wonder why more people don’t come?? We toured four tombs: Kheti, Baqet, Khnumhotep, and Amenemhat. Each tomb was a rectangular space covered floor to ceiling with exquisite painted scenes. The paintings in Khnumhotep’s tomb were so outstanding, I insisted that the guards reopen the tomb after we’d finished all four so we could look at the images again. It was a biologist's paradise; across the top of the left wall, a virtual catalog of local desert animals paraded below the ceiling. Hunting dogs, deer, leopards, hedgehogs, rabbits – I was blown away. One of the more famous paintings in Egypt is there too, a tree filled with birds drawn so realistically that you can differentiate between the male and female of the species! On our return entry, my boss took my flashlight and closely examined a depiction close to the door. He found what he was looking for: a scene of monkeys picking figs from trees and giving them to their human handlers. Truly spectacular all around.
Lining the road to Beni Hassan are literally thousands of Christian mud tombs, each capped with a perfect dome. They pack the land from the edge of the cultivated land to the steepest incline of the cliff face. I’ve never seen anything like it.
Our last stop was a bonus: a strange site called Kom Al-Ahmar, the Red Hill. It’s by the side of the Beni Hassan road. The site has the remains of a pyramid – rather anticlimactic, considering the country. I guess I’ve become something of a pyramid connoisseur – Egypt, Israel, Peru, Mexico. Strange.
Kom Al-Ahmar earns its name from the stupefying amount of broken potsherds on the ground. The reddish ceramic makes the ground appear rusted. The site is a set of tombs and burial areas that have been used for millennia. To our surprise, we were allowed to climb the hill and visit one of the tombs (Nefersekheru) – which, of course, was itself anticlimactic after the splendor of Beni Hassan. Cool nonetheless.
Then finally we were homeward bound, although a few unexpectedly lovely sights still awaited us on the drive home. Despite her massive flaws, Egypt is blessed with the remarkable ability to take my breath away.
About a month ago I joined some of my colleagues on a trip up to Minya in Middle Egypt. Quick Egypt lesson – the Nile flows south to north, so “up” the Nile means towards the headwaters, or south. Don’t blame me, I don’t make the rules.
Minya is a town right on the Nile. It’s got some heavy industry, quite a bit of agriculture, and some really spectacular Egyptian ruins. It’s also nearly impossible to get there, due to the ridiculous police presence intended to “protect” foreigners. I’ve already written about our absurd trip down there in my blog on the follies of the convoy system.
We stayed at the Nefertiti Hotel, right on the corniche. Sounds lovely, right? Well, across the corniche was the river … and the Venus Wedding Palace. So all night, both nights, the sounds of Egyptian music and ululating floated through the air, straight into our room. The funny thing is I’d even requested a room in the back of the hotel, but the management insisted that I actually wanted the Nile view. Very little irritates me as much as people telling me what I want. I should’ve made a fuss, but it seemed like a sleepy town at 2:30 am on a Thursday, so I let it go. Thank god for earplugs. Don’t leave home without ‘em.
Far too bright and early the next morning (technically I guess it was the same morning … ugh) we piled back into the bus and set out for Tell El Amarna. Amarna used to be called Akhetaten, back when it was the capital city of Egypt. The 18th Dynasty Pharoah Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten (1352-1336 BC) and revolutionized Egypt’s political, social, and religious systems. In a brash gesture of complete change, Akhenaten grabbed the wealth and power of the priests, destroyed Egypt’s divine pantheon, replaced it with a single god, Aten (the disk of the sun – and of course Akhenaten was the prime intermediary), and build a brand new capital city in the middle of nowhere. His wife was the famous Nefertiti, and his ultimate successor (possibly his son, although not by Nefertiti) was Tutankhamun, whose birth name was Tutankhaten. It’s thought that Tutankhamun’s burial trove was so rich in part to symbolize the return to the established religious and social order after the death of the “heretic” pharaoh Akhenaten.
These names, dates, and stories have swirled through my head from the time I was very little. I wanted to be an Egyptologist when I was young. While I think a lot of kids go through this phase, it was much more pronounced for me. My parents tolerated this for years, until finally my father said to me, “You’ll never make any money as an Egyptologist. Stop wasting your time. Why don’t you think about science?”
Ahem. Because now I’m a rich and famous scientist. Well done, Dad.
The point is, I’ve been thinking about Amarna, Akhenaten, and Tutankhamun for most of my life. I was incredibly excited to be making the trip to Amarna – it was a life trip for me. And after inexplicably changing our nice new bus for a filthy, jagged-metal model to cross the river, we finally arrived at Amarna. This is what I saw:
One and a half reconstructed pillars, a partially-excavated altar, and a whole lot of nothing. Ah, but I neglect our mandatory and oh-so-vigilant personal guard:
I screwed my eyes up to try to summon a vision of past grandeur. It was there, buried in my brain, but hard to overlay the reality.
We headed to the necropolis next, on the east side of the river. We saw some lovely tombs: Meryre I, Ahmose. I don’t have pictures of the inside of any tombs on this trip, because the government (read: Zahi) strictly controls photographic rights. My boss got special permission from Zahi himself to take some digital pictures, and I’m hoping I’ll come into them soon.
To my surprise and excitement, my boss decided to take us to the tomb of Akhenaten, which is back in a wadi set back from a cliff. I admit I’d made a bit of a fuss at breakfast when I found out we weren’t going. It turned out we were able to fit it into the schedule, so off we went. Lonely Planet described the journey as “very bumpy” – clearly things have changed since 2006, because I haven’t seen such beautiful blacktop in a year and a half of living here. I was thrilled to be driving into the remote desert, to find a royal tomb in a deserted wadi.
A busload of Japanese tourists was entering the tomb as we drove up.
Next on the itinerary was Tuna El Gebel, the necropolis of ancient Hermopolis. We visited a few tombs here – Petosiris (350 BC), an interesting example of the synthesis of Greek and Egyptian art, and Isadora, a mummy-containing tomb of a woman who drowned herself in the Nile (150 AD). Far and away most interesting were the vast underground galleries containing mummified ibises and baboons. Very very creepy and very very cool.
We dashed over to Hermopolis, trying to beat the sunset. There’s nothing much left at Hermopolis; they’ve made a little statuary park, kind of like Memphis outside Cairo. Far and away the main attraction is the two colossal statues of baboons with mutilated genitalia:
Day 3 was our last day in Middle Egypt. We started by driving out to Beni Hassan, a spectacular set of tombs cut into the cliff face up above the river. Visiting the site was a hassle – baksheesh, “security”, blah blah – they wonder why more people don’t come?? We toured four tombs: Kheti, Baqet, Khnumhotep, and Amenemhat. Each tomb was a rectangular space covered floor to ceiling with exquisite painted scenes. The paintings in Khnumhotep’s tomb were so outstanding, I insisted that the guards reopen the tomb after we’d finished all four so we could look at the images again. It was a biologist's paradise; across the top of the left wall, a virtual catalog of local desert animals paraded below the ceiling. Hunting dogs, deer, leopards, hedgehogs, rabbits – I was blown away. One of the more famous paintings in Egypt is there too, a tree filled with birds drawn so realistically that you can differentiate between the male and female of the species! On our return entry, my boss took my flashlight and closely examined a depiction close to the door. He found what he was looking for: a scene of monkeys picking figs from trees and giving them to their human handlers. Truly spectacular all around.Our last stop was a bonus: a strange site called Kom Al-Ahmar, the Red Hill. It’s by the side of the Beni Hassan road. The site has the remains of a pyramid – rather anticlimactic, considering the country. I guess I’ve become something of a pyramid connoisseur – Egypt, Israel, Peru, Mexico. Strange.
Kom Al-Ahmar earns its name from the stupefying amount of broken potsherds on the ground. The reddish ceramic makes the ground appear rusted. The site is a set of tombs and burial areas that have been used for millennia. To our surprise, we were allowed to climb the hill and visit one of the tombs (Nefersekheru) – which, of course, was itself anticlimactic after the splendor of Beni Hassan. Cool nonetheless.
Then finally we were homeward bound, although a few unexpectedly lovely sights still awaited us on the drive home. Despite her massive flaws, Egypt is blessed with the remarkable ability to take my breath away.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Small trip
Tomorrow morning I'm heading up to Alexandria for 2 nights. I've been to Alex before, but we're heading to a few other places too - Rosetta, Abuqir, Burg Al-Arab, Abu Mena - so I signed up. I try to never say no to any travel opportunity. Especially any free ones.
I'm hoping to take my computer along and back blog a few of the stories I've been meaning to tell, like my trip to Minya.
And then it's back to Cairo : end-of-semester, party-planning, final-exam-grading, grade-grubbing, finally-seeing-my-partner-after-4-months mayhem. And that's before leaving for Kenya. And Siwa. And India.
And speaking of India, I got a new kitten! He was a wedding gift from the woman who gave me India. His name is Zanzibar, he's 9 weeks old, he's adorable and loving, and India's been trying to assassinate him for the past 3 days.
Should've named him Pakistan ....
I'm hoping to take my computer along and back blog a few of the stories I've been meaning to tell, like my trip to Minya.
And then it's back to Cairo : end-of-semester, party-planning, final-exam-grading, grade-grubbing, finally-seeing-my-partner-after-4-months mayhem. And that's before leaving for Kenya. And Siwa. And India.
And speaking of India, I got a new kitten! He was a wedding gift from the woman who gave me India. His name is Zanzibar, he's 9 weeks old, he's adorable and loving, and India's been trying to assassinate him for the past 3 days.
Should've named him Pakistan ....
Bloody Monday
The streets of Cairo ran with blood today. Literally.
Today is Eid Al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice. The holiday commemorates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son on God's command. At the last minute, God stayed Abraham's hand and provided a sheep instead.
In the Islamic tradition, Abraham (Ibrahim) was asked to sacrifice his eldest son, Ishmael. The Arabs believe they are descended from Ishmael. Of course, as a Christian, I was taught that God asked for Isaac, Abraham's favorite son - and the progenitor of the Hebrews.
You see the difference, I imagine. God forbid it was actually the same son, and both the Hebrews and the Arabs are descended from the same person. But I digress.
Practically speaking, the holiday is celebrated by early morning prayers and a mass slaughter of domesticated animals. Sheep, cows, goats, camels - whatever you can afford to sacrifice. The best part, I think, is the tradition of sharing the meat - with family, friends, and the poor.
This time last year I was in Germany, so I missed witnessing the leadup to the holiday as well as the celebration itself. This year, I saw the whole deal.
About 5 days ago, I started noticing an abnormally large number of sheep on the streets of Cairo. You notice I don't say, "I saw sheep in Cairo." This would not be unusual at all. But seeing the sheep, twenty or thirty deep, all up and down the Corniche, was different - and so was seeing the sheep and the cows in my ritzy ex-pat neighborhood. Oh, and some of the sheep were painted green.
I had to curb the urge to shout from my taxi window, "What are you doing?? Don't just stand there! Run!! Fling yourselves into the Nile!! Anything!! But don't just take it!!"
I guess that's why they call 'em sheep.
Even before today, I could do the math. Step 1 : Sheep piled up outside the butcher (sorry for the fuzzy image, I was trying to walk and snap this picture)
Step 2 : Well, take a look ....
I didn't hear anything this morning, for which I was profoundly grateful. You're not supposed to kill the animals in front of each other, but, well, we're talking about a lot of animals. And amateur butchers. I even managed to avoid walking past the butcher shop by getting into a taxi right in front of my building. But we still drove past, and I watched an adult cow in its death throes, thrashing in the middle of the street.
Then I arrived at my destination. I walked around the corner, and was met by the sight of men in rubber boots and gaiters, sluicing blood and gore out of the driveway and down into the gutter.
I hitched my pant legs up (it's a celebration, a celebration), stepped over the four inches of running blood, and walked into the foyer. I probably added a few bloody footprints to the trail of gore leading into the building. I rounded the corner to walk up the stairs to the elevator.
I found three men, a stream of blood down the stairs, a bunch of tarps, and a cow's head.
"Eid mubarak," I mumbled.
The men gesticulated at me, no doubt returning my greeting, then waved me toward the elevator with a chorus of "It-faddali"s. I went on my way - and left my shoes in the hall.
In a sense, I guess it might be a good thing to make people slaughter their own meat once in awhile. You know, to reaffirm the notion that this was actually, a living, breathing animal, that suffers for my pleasure.
I had salad for lunch.
Today is Eid Al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice. The holiday commemorates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son on God's command. At the last minute, God stayed Abraham's hand and provided a sheep instead.
In the Islamic tradition, Abraham (Ibrahim) was asked to sacrifice his eldest son, Ishmael. The Arabs believe they are descended from Ishmael. Of course, as a Christian, I was taught that God asked for Isaac, Abraham's favorite son - and the progenitor of the Hebrews.
You see the difference, I imagine. God forbid it was actually the same son, and both the Hebrews and the Arabs are descended from the same person. But I digress.
Practically speaking, the holiday is celebrated by early morning prayers and a mass slaughter of domesticated animals. Sheep, cows, goats, camels - whatever you can afford to sacrifice. The best part, I think, is the tradition of sharing the meat - with family, friends, and the poor.
This time last year I was in Germany, so I missed witnessing the leadup to the holiday as well as the celebration itself. This year, I saw the whole deal.
About 5 days ago, I started noticing an abnormally large number of sheep on the streets of Cairo. You notice I don't say, "I saw sheep in Cairo." This would not be unusual at all. But seeing the sheep, twenty or thirty deep, all up and down the Corniche, was different - and so was seeing the sheep and the cows in my ritzy ex-pat neighborhood. Oh, and some of the sheep were painted green.
I had to curb the urge to shout from my taxi window, "What are you doing?? Don't just stand there! Run!! Fling yourselves into the Nile!! Anything!! But don't just take it!!"
I guess that's why they call 'em sheep.
Even before today, I could do the math. Step 1 : Sheep piled up outside the butcher (sorry for the fuzzy image, I was trying to walk and snap this picture)
Step 2 : Well, take a look ....
I didn't hear anything this morning, for which I was profoundly grateful. You're not supposed to kill the animals in front of each other, but, well, we're talking about a lot of animals. And amateur butchers. I even managed to avoid walking past the butcher shop by getting into a taxi right in front of my building. But we still drove past, and I watched an adult cow in its death throes, thrashing in the middle of the street.
Then I arrived at my destination. I walked around the corner, and was met by the sight of men in rubber boots and gaiters, sluicing blood and gore out of the driveway and down into the gutter.
I hitched my pant legs up (it's a celebration, a celebration), stepped over the four inches of running blood, and walked into the foyer. I probably added a few bloody footprints to the trail of gore leading into the building. I rounded the corner to walk up the stairs to the elevator.
I found three men, a stream of blood down the stairs, a bunch of tarps, and a cow's head.
"Eid mubarak," I mumbled.
The men gesticulated at me, no doubt returning my greeting, then waved me toward the elevator with a chorus of "It-faddali"s. I went on my way - and left my shoes in the hall.
In a sense, I guess it might be a good thing to make people slaughter their own meat once in awhile. You know, to reaffirm the notion that this was actually, a living, breathing animal, that suffers for my pleasure.
I had salad for lunch.
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