No longer homeless :D

Finally, after more than 3 weeks in Cairo, I have my own place to live!!

I’ll be sharing a sick-ass apartment in Dokki with these 2 American girls from the American University in Cairo and another AIESEC trainee, Nay-Nay, who is relocating from Alexandria to Cairo this weekend!! I’m so excited, Nay-Nay is really cool and I cant wait to be living together! We’re lookin forward to our first grocery shopping outing :P

Our apartment is on the 18th floor, and I think it’s meant to be like a penthouse. It’s the only split-level apartment I have seen in Cairo so far, and its on the top floor. My room itself is MASSIVE, it has its own bathroom and balcony! One side of the balcony overlooks the Nile and from the other end you can somehow see the Pyramids on a clear night (apparently). It’s such a wicked place to chill…Now I wish I was living in Cairo for 6 months not 3! L

The room itself is a little expensive (ok actually it’s very expensive) by Egyptian standards, but by London rent standards it’s a bargain and a half. So I’m trying to console myself with that fact lol. Also, after 3 weeks on a living room floor, I decided, Sod it, it’s time to pimp it out in Cairo!

Will put up some pictures soon as I move in!!

A peculiar thing about Cairo/Egypt. Landlords here are obsessed with making sure they are renting out to tenants of 'good character'. Alot of landlords stipulate in the contract that unrelated men and women cannot share an apartment together, people of the opposite sex cannot stayover or even crash at your place, unless you're related and they keep a check on this through the bowebs (doormen) who report on what's going on. People get their security deposits confiscated or even evicted and so on. I've never seen anything like this in another country. Even in Bangladesh! Alot of the time the landlord is conservative or is worried about what people will say, regarding the kind of people he is leasing his apartment to. Some of the female AIESEC trainees live in a flat together, and at one point the boweb started thinking they were running a whore-house, and began interrogating every single male who tried entering the building. Some have to bribe their bowebs if they want to throw a party. lol!

I finally got my password generator from work, which means I can now work from home, or anywhere with DSL. A huge relief, because now that Luli is on a work-trip to Sweden, its not easy finding somebody to drive me to work. On Sunday I had to go in, so I took a cab which cost me 50 pounds! A normal trip here costs like 5 pounds max! Thats 50p. You dont even get one-way trips to work in London costing 5 quid!

Anyway, things are super messed up at the moment. I actually found a real nice place to live, with Nay-Nay another trainee, but the girls who are living there at the moment are holding out on making a final decision because they want someone to live there for 6months not 2. So, we wait. And wait. To top it all off, the guys I've been crashing with have been evicted from their flat. Yep. So now they are as homeless as me. Cairo is being over-run by homeless AIESEC trainees.

What not to do when getting food delivered in Cairo

Dial phone number of local Egyptian eatery.

Arab man on phone: Salaam
Stupid trainee called Zine who doesn't know a word of Arabic: Hello? Salaam Can I get some delivery?
Arab man: booga wooga?
Zine: Crap. Do you speak English?
Arab man: No. Booga wooga. Hold on.
Arab man #2: Hullo! Yes?
Zine: Hello! Salaam. I would like to order some delivery please. Can I have a fata? With meat.
Arab man: ok, address!
Zine: ok. 94...Mohie El Din
Arab man: 94? booga wooga? Arabic!
Zine: Erm....94. NINE FOUR.
Arab man:94?
Zine: NINETY FOUR. La Arabiya (No arabic!)
Arab man: ok. address
Zine: 94, Mohie El Din Aboul Ezz...door number 2
Arab man: two?
Zine: Yes, two. one, two? Two.
Arab man: Khamsa (5)?
Zine: No! la Khamsa! not 5! two!
Arab man: ok. ok booga wooga booga wooga.

Click. Man hangs up.

Sit around. Worrying whether food is gonna end up coming. Feel like on the brink of starvation. Someone returns home, so write down how to say 94 and 2 in Arabic.

Re-dial number of shop again:

Zine: Hello. I ordered some Fatah 5 mins ago, and I wanted to give you my address again.
Arab man: Booga wooga, fata? meat or chicken?
Zine: *alarmed* No no! Im not ordering again! I just wanna give you my address again! Its me Zine! I called you 5 mins ago!
Arab man: Booga wooga booga wooga booga wooga stupid foreign girl booga wooga

Click.

Sit on couch. Wonder if food will arrive. Or if two portions of food will arrive. Twiddle thumbs. Door bell rings. Yaaaaaaaay!


The above incident was quite frustrating so when the delivery guy asked me if I wanted more fatah tomorrow, and I said yes, and he asked for my number and gave me his, I thought whoopee! He's just made my life easier, a one-stop-call for fatah at my door. But when I came back into the flat, everyone gave me the biggest bollocking, telling me I should never EVER give a random Egyptian guy my phone number, because apparently they think us foreign girls are an easy lay :S According to Kent, he could even start stalking me, and calling me constantly. I promised never to do it again, but I still think the guy just wanted to make our future transactions a bit easier... :S We shall have to wait and see..


And as a follow up to this entry, please refer to Kent's blog: http://kent.nomadlife.org/2006/11/something-you-probably-shouldnt-do.aspx

So at the moment I look like Quasimodo. A mosquito bit me on my right eye the night before last, and my eyelid swelled up and I couldn’t open it properly. So I took the day off. Lol. Yes any excuse I know.

I feel bad that I haven’t blogged in a while, so I’m gonna spin off a lazy entry.

WORK:
My work situation is very relaxed at the moment. The project I came to do I haven’t even started as yet, because I’ve been waiting for all sorts of programmes and networks to be downloaded onto my work laptop. Now that I do finally have them, I need to be trained by someone to use them. So once I have been trained I can start on my project. Funny thing is, at work there aren’t enough desks to go around, so a lot of people work from home. And if I can get myself access to DSL at home, I could work from home too! My boss only comes in like 2 days a week as well. It’s wicked. It majorly helps because getting to work is a major hassle for me, havin to carpool, and getting stuck in traffic, all in all, makes me grateful to be able to work from home. I gotta say my first week was rough. Wakin up at that early in the morning, sitting in front of a laptop for 8 hours a day (even if I am not working the whole 8 hours) really got to me. All I’m telling myself is, thank god this aint forever. Even though before I always knew I couldn’t do the 9-5pm, office job, at least now I can say, been there, done that, no thank you! Nevertheless I am still appreciating the professional experience, and I’m not regretting this traineeship at all. But lets just say it’s great as a traineeship, and not a lifelong career!

CAIRO:
My 2nd week, I got out a little bit more. Went to Khan El Khalili this big souk here, and the Pyramids (I actually beat some of the long term trainees to that, they still haven’t been!), took the Metro finally (very impressed btw) once accompanied, and once alone.. .yay! Now I can say I have conquered the Cairo metro :P) I’m hardly taking photos, I’m surprised. I think at some point you lose the enthusiasm for snapping shot after shot of things you probably won't look at again. So I take shots of people. Now that, I can do, because a lot of my time spent here in Cairo is spent chilling with other trainees and AIESEC Egyptians. But I do need to get off my ass and see Cairo properly.

FOOD:
The food in Egypt. I gotta admit, I aint too impressed. To be honest: I aint such a big fan of Middle eastern cuisine. Lebanese is most common in London, and really what else have they got besides pita bread and meat. Not that I am denying Helens kebab is the most scrumptious meal I have ever had. Nevertheless I have been surviving on a lot of Egyptian food here mainly because its cheaper than everything else. Fata, Howowshy, Koushury, Mashed Potato in pitta bread, which is my favourite, it costs 1 pound and is so simple yet yummy etc. Its also the one thing I can never remember how to say in Arabic. Life here makes you lazy as hell. Goddamn everything can be delivered to your door, so many a night I get home from work and just order my food home. Fine, fine, I got KFC delivered twice so far. Sorry :P

AIESEC TRAINEESHIPS:
A curious pheonomenon. They are bit like being in university, I’m discovering. Everyone thrown into a pressure cooker of friendships, relationships and gossip mills. People become friends very quickly, becoming dependent on each other very quickly, its just like living in halls. The whole AIESEC thing is a curious thing. I’m slowly trying to figure it out. I joined as an SN, so I was never a full fledged AIESEC member. So I don’t know any of the terms or how this organisation works. All I know is they have some super passionate members. It really is fascinating. Some would call it a cult, some would just call it an amazing network with incredible opportunities. But hey, it got me to Cairo, so I aint complaining. And seriously, my 4th day in Cairo I was walking around downtown and I bumped into 3 AIESECers….that was so cool. How else would one be in a completely new, random city and manage to bump into familiar faces? Only on an AIESEC traineeship… !!!

"Chaotic and polluted, swarming with humanity, and electrifyingly noisy and alive, this not a city for the faint hearted, rather for those who grab life by the horn and hang on for the bumpy ride."

So I’m feelin in a bit of a daze this morning. It’s Wednesday, which effectively is a ‘Thursday’ here in Cairo, meaning tomorrow the weekend starts!! Woohoo!!

I now understand why people look forward to the weekend so much….now that I have done about 5 days of working 9-5pm, sittin in front of a computer the whole day, and generally feelin very uninspired. I haven’t been trained as yet for the project I came here to do, so I’m just doing odds and ends. The working day is tough. My 9-5 schedule isn’t so rigid, its generally dependent on when I can get a ride to and from work, and how bad the traffic is. On my first day at work, we took 2 hours to get home on a road that should take 30mins. So sometimes we leave around 7pm, because it means getting home at the same time, but not being stuck in traffic the entire time.

I also haven’t found a place to live. It ain’t easy finding a place to live here. You don’t really have a system like gumtree or anything. It’s either going to check the AUC boards to find flyers, or finding a broker to show you places….which hasn’t been so successful. Everything is either too expensive or too depressing. Or they want somebody staying longer than 3 months. Or the location is too inconvenient for me to get to work. Sigh.

And I finally experienced the joys of Egyptian timing the other day. Our broker told us to meet him at 2.15pm. At 2.45, he arrives, and tells us the guy who HE is hookin up with aint gonna be here till 3.30pm. So we go wait in the flat. At 3.30pm, the other guy calls and says he will come at 4pm. We wait more. At 4pm, we head out on to the main road to meet this dude. We stand in the dusty, polluted street for 30mins, and he doesn’t arrive….at something like 4.45pm, he comes, and he shows us an apartment. But the commission he charges us is like 1 months rent for me.

I suppose I shouldn’t be so surprised. In Dhaka, the ‘timing’ culture is similar. Nobody makes plans too ahead of time. You kinda go along with it and see what works out. People are always doin things at the spur of the moment, which creates a very laid back culture. As they say, InshaAllah…..What a contrast from London. Over there, people are booked up like 2 weeks in advance. If you don’t let people know the plans for the evening, they will get PISSED OFF. People need to know what the ‘plans’ are for every minute of the day. I’m not sure yet which culture I prefer. London is more stressful though, that’s for sure.

I just read my entry, and realized how much I am moaning. Goddamn, is this culture shock?! LOL.

The Nile

Mysterious Flood,--that through the silent sands Hast wandered, century on century, Watering the length of great Egyptian lands, Which were not, but for thee. - Bayard Taylor, To the Nile

So I'm in the taxi, heading downtown to meet some AUC AIESECers. About two minutes into crossing a bridge, I realise I am beholding the ancient, much-talked about, millenia of history filled River Nile. And why has it taken me two long minutes to realise this? Because it looks like the bloody Thames, that's why!

I apologise for my naivete, but I think I expected the banks to be slightly more isolated, not strained between hotels, big yachts, and TGI Fridays. Hell, I think I expected to see a baby Moses floating by on a straw basket! Quite the disappointment, clearly...but nevertheless the weekend ensued with a lot of time spent on this river.

Friday night, I attended a typical boat party, and literally danced under the stars as the dj spun tracks from the roof of the boat...but Saturday night allowed a much more intimate brush with the Nile, with a group of us renting a feluka, a small sail boat, available for private hire for an hour or so. The captain of our feluka looked straight out of a Mauritanian desert, albeit the fake rolex watch on his wrist, and he sat there serenely guiding the boat, listening to us singing the Nile deaf and generally having a good time as we drifted down the river.

Definitely not an experience you can buy on the Thames on any given day...

cabbing it in cairo

Day two in Cairo. Preparing myself to go on my first solo taxi ride across town. I do not know the language. I do not know the directions. I do not know how to even pronounce my destination.

Kent emails me a letter he drafted advising all newcomers to Cairo on the etiquettes’ of getting about in taxis here.

1. Flag taxi down.
2. Tell him your destination in pitifully pronounced Arabic. Do NOT mention the fare.
3. Wait for him to repeat what you just said with a 'you goddamn foreigners butcher my language' look on his face. [and reality followed theory to the T, in my case]
4. Get in the cab, hang on for dear life.
5. Get out of cab at destination. Pay him without negotiation.But Kent clearly failed to mention one small detail, catching me off guard when the following happened:

I am riding in the backseat of a Cairo taxi. I see people standing by the road waiting for other taxis. They glance at me sitting at the back, then they shout at my taxi driver telling him where they want to go. I think to myself, “what a bunch of idiots. Can they not see me in the backseat?!” This happens several times. I start thinking Caireans are a little thick. Then, all of a sudden, my taxi stops, and a random Egyptian woman off the streets hops into the front seat?! And I’m sitting up looking around startled, wandering, “Did anybody else just see that?!”.

So yeah it turns out they take multiple passengers here. That would be Number #6 on the list. On my return journey, same thing happened, except this time, I invaded the taxi of another young girl, who very calmly got out and let me in to sit next to her. She didn’t seem as perplexed as I felt, so I figured this was normal. Thankfully the first time a male passenger didn’t get in, or I would’ve shouted bloody murder!!!

In fact i realised, my taxi driver kept slowing down each and every time someone else tried flagging him down, in order to hear what destination they were headed for…. Convincing me the traffic in Cairo isn’t caused by too many cars, rather by taxi drivers trying to maximize on their profits on each journey!