Month: December 2010

So the other day when we were taking the “drive of death,” our eventual destination was Carrefour (pronounced “car – four”), the Egyptian version of Super Wal-Mart. We needed to buy a shower curtain and some other incidentals and figured that it was time to experience Carrefour for ourselves.

We had heard horror stories about how crowded it is and the pushing and shoving that goes on, but we must have gotten lucky because it felt like shopping in a normal Wal-Mart (if you consider that lucky).

Checking out the flat screen TVs. All the electronic items cost more here than they do in America. 

For example, you could buy a Wii here, but it costs 2222 Egyptian Pounds (LE) — about $385 American. Almost twice as much as it would cost at home.  

They had several aisles dedicated to Christmas decorations.

 Caleb liked Egyptian Santa.

Ah, Aquafina. How I love thee.
We found that the only thing that was truly cheap at Carrefour was the bottled water. Normally a bottle this size will run $1.50 – 2.00. Here? Only about 40 cents. (and no extra recycling fee tacked on either.) Even our shower curtain ran about $12 (70 LE) for a thin one that will just last the year.

Now over to the grocery side of the store:

 

Anybody want some cabbage?

Carter was happy to see red lentils (he really does like them!)

mmm . . . spices!
(although buying them out of open containers like that seems a little bit sketchy, especially seeing the way my kids were sticking their noses in each one and smelling them . . .*shudder*)

 

A week ago I spent the day sleeping off our long trip. Today I’m getting up and going to Ninja Training. Really, it’s just self defense class and for exercise, not because I’m worried about my personal safety, but Josh calls it NT and that makes me laugh. I’m a little nervous that I’m going to be way out of my league, fitness wise, but it can’t be any scarier than oh, moving to Egypt.

****************************************************************

The verdict: Ninja Training was really fun. My knuckles are a little bruised and they look like I was working out with Rocky in the meat freezer, but it felt great.

Another crazy busy day in Egypt. While I was at NT, Josh took all the kids to the Etisalat store — a cell phone internet store. Supposedly they parked like all the other Egyptians, which means they double parked and blocked several cars in the process and were in the store for an hour and a 1/2. When I asked, “how do you know that the people you blocked in didn’t have to leave?” Carter replied, “That’s how you gotta do it in Egypt, mom! Just like all the other cars out there!” I’d say he’s adjusting well.

My NT instructor said that once he was blocked in somewhere for 4 hours and all you do is sit there and wait for the owner of the car to show up. Sometimes they “bounce” the car out of the way – a bunch of dudes start pushing down on the bumper and get the car bouncing and then on the upswing they push it sideways until it moves enough so that the other cars can pass. Note to self: find a reliable taxi driver and keep his number on speed dial cause the idea of waiting somewhere for an undetermined amount of time for some yahoo to come back to his car = one crazy mad lady.

I hit the road again in the afternoon when a friend drove me to the commissary. Gotta get back on the horse, right? It was much less stressful — probably because I completely shot every single nerve the day before. To get into the commissary you have to drive up to this unmarked compound where a guard checks your ID, then he allows you to drive into this cage. Then another dude checks your ID again and sweeps your car for bombs. Once it’s determined that you’re not a threat, then you can go buy groceries. Seriously. With that type of security, you’d think they’d be giving them away for free. Unfortunately, they aren’t. However, you can buy bacon and other forbidden pork products. We only ever had bacon for special occasions in the states, but Josh has already made it twice this week. I guess forbidden fruit tastes better.

And for no reason other than because I think they are cute:

 

 

and they’ll be doing as much walking as possible after experiencing my first car ride since arriving in Egypt. I knew it would be chaotic and that no one followed any rules of the road except “me first,” but I was thoroughly traumatized.

I hesitate to share this video because it doesn’t look nearly as crazy as it was in person. Remember, you’re only seeing what is directly in front — not all the crazy people who were practically scraping my passenger door or riding up on our bumper.

how I really felt about it:

I was positive that somebody was going to die: either me, or one of the people strolling across 5 lanes of traffic like they were shopping at a mall. If i were handing out an award for the stupidest human, it would have to go to the dude who was striding across the freeway at night in a long black robe, holding his hand up confidently like that was going to stop all the cars flying by at 35 miles an hour. And the luckiest dude of the day was the one on a scooter who was driving inches from our passenger front fender who almost ran into the car that stopped suddenly in front of him, almost dumping his helmetless body right in the path of our Jeep. *shudder*

I think I might need to take one of my special yellow pills before our next excursion . . . if Josh can convince me to get back in the car. On the bright side, I don’t think I’ll be afraid to fly anymore. 🙂

Any doubt I had over needing a maid was erased this morning when I caught Caleb, who is 6, spitting out his tangerine seeds onto the FLOOR. Really kid? Is that what you learned from me over the past 6 years?

And we were sitting at the kitchen table so it wasn’t like it would have been that hard to pick them out of his mouth and put them on the table or heck, even spit them out onto the table.

As long as I’m hiring a maid, I should probably hire someone to come teach manners and etiquette, cause we’re obviously lacking in that around here too.

My favorite part about this house is the abundance of windows and the balconies that overlook . . . well, just wait and see.

 

 

 

 

 

that’s our little piece of city. Beautiful, isn’t it?

These photos were all taken in and from one of our guest rooms. It’s ready and waiting for you . . .