So I decided that Cairo isn’t nearly as charming when you’re sick. Yesterday we were out for a walk and all the honking cars weren’t doing anything to improve my mood or my headache. I had some Motrin and we bought a Coke from a corner stand (for my caffeine fix), but you have to drink it there so you can return the glass bottle that has been used by bazillions of people before you. I tried not to think about that as I was putting the bottle to my lips. Ew.
Something crazy that I saw as we were walking up Road 9 (home of McDonald’s, Cilantro, the light bulb store, and many other places that we frequent) was a man and a woman with a newborn baby standing next to a car. I assumed they were together until the man started walking with the newborn baby, but the woman wasn’t walking with them. She was walking so slowly she fell way behind – an entire block behind.
I asked Josh if he thought they were together and he thought so too, except the man never looked back and he was cruising with the baby, stepping in and out of traffic while the woman trudged along, carrying this huge backpack on one shoulder, moving like a pack mule. We were walking behind them both for about 6 blocks and then the man turned to go into a store and when the woman finally reached the storefront, she turned in too. CR-AZY.
I realize I don’t know the whole story for sure, but I would be pretty annoyed if I had just had a baby and I got stuck shuffling along, holding the bag of gear while baby daddy trotted on ahead, holding his pride and joy. It’s just one example of the many strange things we’ve seen in Egypt.
So last night, I had a fever and went to bed with the down jacket, heavy blanket, down comforter, etc and baby and I slept until noon and woke up feeling much better. Yea! And the ultimate boost to my recovery was getting out of bed and finding that Madiha had been here and instead of the house falling to bits while I was sick, it looked better than when I went to bed. [happy sigh]
Baby was pretty happy today too: