London Calling...

So I got to London yesterday on an unusually warm and sunny day (about 28C). Amanda and I had a great afternoon- drinking pimms and catching up. Then last night was the Dave Matthews concert. It was a reasonably small venue- bigger than the Royal or Mac in Victoria, but by no means a stadium. It was an amazing show- he has great energy and stage presence (which may or not have been chemically enhanced...) and played for about 2 hours without a break. Today we went for a run along the thames and through Battersea park. Serendipitously, Angus happened to be in London as well so we met for breakfast. After an afternoon of walking along the river and through borough market we are just taking a break before heading out to meet Kate. Hope you're all having a great weekend! xoxo C

Remember these??

TV Ontario always played this before Saturday AM cartoons in the early '80's...I still remember all the words!



Dad, this one's for you!

Friday Chez Moi

Amanda didn't believe me when I said the prayer sounded like someone was yelling into my window. You should have seen her face the first time she heard it... I think she spilled her drink!

TGIT!

I am realllllly glad this week is over. Lots of stuff going on at work, but one thing we didn't need this week was a H1N1 scare- someone in one of the office towers attached to the hotel had a suspected case of swine flu. The ministry of health was there, which made everyone in the building do two things Egyptians are exceedingly good at- panic and spread rumours.

We were all praying (some of us literally) that it the person didn't have it because when they found it at the American University here the dorms were quarantined for TEN DAYS! I can barely get through 8 hours with some of my co-workers, I can't imagine having to be stuck somewhere with them for that long!!!

Thankfully, the results came back negative. Whew.

So now the weekend is here- I have to go in on Sat for a few hours to hand out contracts but thankfully I have tomrrow off. We're doing a short run in the wadi tomorrow. 9 days till I fly to the UK!

Hope you're all having a great week!

xoxo C

Ahh the old underwear or no underwear (while running) debate...

From the Runners' World daily blog. The comments are the funniest part- lots of controversy...

HOT!

I had a great weekend at the red sea with Nassiba- we spent the majority of the weekend like this <----- Cairo has been over 40C the last few days so even the veiled ladies were in the water (with all their clothes on). It was especially unpleasant to come back to the city.

Despite the heat, Peter and I ended up doing speedwork tonight- the track at the school is being redone so it is U-shaped at the moment and is only about 200m (the google earth pic was taken before the renos, but picture about half of the track being cut off). We did the U 15 times at a steady fast pace, walking across the top of the U between each one and trying to build each 5. It felt like we were building, but I suspect if Peter's garmin hadn't died it would have showed positive split, it was really hot (about 35C) even though we started at 7:30pm- we were both struggling at the end a little- I am trying to forget that he is 58 and I was only barely keeping up with him- let's blame it on my foot!


















I hear the weather is really nice in Victoria this weekend- I hope you're all enjoying it and not melting like me! xoxo C

I'm not 'lovin' it'....

So a few more cases of H1N1 have been discovered and the panic here is getting out of control.

The most recent case was a Mickey D's employee- as soon as that got out, there were email forwards flying back and forth like crazy suggesting a boycott of all fast food outlets. It is really amazing how fast rumours spread here- in Canada it could take about 2 weeks for an email forward to make its way around the country, but here, the population is so large and so concentrated that if an email originates in the morning most people in the country will have seen it by the afternoon. Of course this is effect is amplified in at our hotel because they've all been hired from different companies so by the end of the day we had emails circulating from 4S, Maryit, Hiott, Heltin, and Intorconanantal*. Also, I think hotel people are just naturally more dramatic than other industries and seem to crave attention. Needless to say, not a lot of work was getting done yesterday. After the hamburger conversation of a few days ago, I decided not to waste my breath trying to convince people you couldn't get it from food, and to be honest, I think the average egyptian would greatly benefit from avoiding fast food for a few days.

(*I am purposely misspelling these company names so people don't inadvertanly stumble upon this page while looking for something else- I don't mind people reading who are actually interested, even if I don't know them, but I am always coming across blogs accidentally and though I'm guilty of being one myself sometimes, I don't like looky-loos! Yes, I have changed my privacy settings but I still don't think that blocks google alerts)

Here is one of the emails (I'm still trying to find out what it means to have a "cracking body"):

Dear All,

Please don’t eat anything out of home, today they discovered a swine flu case in MacDonald Maadi (one of the staff), the government closed the branch, and please advice every one you know.

One of my friends is working near by Mac and he confirmed it's true, government closed all fast food restaurants (Gad, 3mo Hosny, Teeka, Pizza Hut, …etc) .

The inflictions show in follow symptoms:

1- High temperate

2- Diarrhea

3- Cracking Body

If you have any of the above inflictions; please goes directly to any of " el7omyat " Hospitals.

(those numbers in the middle of the words represent arabic letters we don't have in english)

So after all this ridiculousness and drama I'm so glad it's finally the weekend- Nassiba and I are off to the red sea in an hour or so- last time we went it was too cold for more than a 20 second dip so I'm looking forward to some swimming today!

Hope you're all doing well.

xoxo C

A creature was stirring...

A lot of new buildings have pest issues, which are typically resolved once everything is sealed up and pest-control companies are employed etc etc. Although the floor with our offices is (mostly) finished, we are still working in a building that's still under construction with big open walls and holes everywhere, so once in a while we get a little visitor. Today a couple of mice found their way onto our floor- just teeny little ones. Well you would have thought that someone had let loose a bunch of scorpions or a great white shark the way people were carrying on- it was crazy. The women were screaming and crying (actually crying from fright- real tears and everything) and holding each other, even some of the men were looking a little pale. It was ridiculous- I don't mean to be insensitive, but their country is full of garbage!! There are street cats and wild dogs on every corner and they're worried about a tiny little mouse? The foreigners were just shaking our heads looking at each other- I think egyptian children need to be forced to join scouts and guides so they don't turn into such scaredy-cat adults. Really!

Also, they thought I was crazy when I begged them not to kill the mouse if they did catch it. Thankfully he was too fast!

Off to the track for a short, hot workout, hope you're all doing well!

xoxo C

Hamburger flu

Well swine flu, sorry, H1N1 influenza, has finally reached Egypt. Actually it came last week- a 12 year old girl coming back from the states was caught at the airport with a high temperature and kept in hopsital and it was confirmed the next day.

(Total aside: On the way back from copenhagen, when I got off the plane in cairo I had to fill out a card with my address and answer a few questions- was I feeling sick/feverish etc- then I handed the card to a guy with a mask and had to go through another line where, I thought, they took a picture of me, I remember laughing to myself because after we handed in the cards the line up got totally out of order and wondered how they would ever manage to match the pictures up with the cards. Anyway apparently egypt is ahead of the times and what I thought was a camera was actually a scanner that measured if you had a temperature or not. This was the machine that caught the little girl with the fever that was actually swine flu. I know this is an unprecedented move, but I would like to officially apologize to Egypt for laughing. (Just this once though- most of the time it's warranted).

Anyway, so yesterday two more cases were confirmed at the american university in Cairo and today 5 more cases were found. They have closed the campus for a week and the dorm where the students live have been put under quarantine. Anyway at lunch today this was a topic of conversation and a funny discussion ensued:

Mohamed #1: Hey did you hear about those new cases of swine flu at AUC?
Mohamed #2: yeah, they were americans right?
Mohamed #3: yeah they were
Mohamed #1: Did they say how they got it?
Mohamed #1: I think Obama brought it.
Mohamed #2: yeah he probably did
Mohamed #3: well americans are always eating hamburgers
Mohamed #2; yeah that's how they got it, from eating ham
Me: um, okay, I don't think Obama brought it, and anyway, mohmaed, you know hamburgers don't have ham in them right?
Mohamed #1: yes they do, it's in the name- HAMburgers
Me: No they're named after the place in Germany, Hamburg, they're beef. And anyway, you can't get swine flu from eating pork. Those student probably touched a doorknob or shook someone's hand. The best thing we can do to protect ourselves is just wash our hands frequently
Mohamed #2: I don't know.....I think it's those americans and their hamburgers

No matter what I said, I couldn't convince them....but how could I when their own government ordered the slaughter of every single pig in the country?

This is a funny example, and they were joking about Obama (actually the response to his speech here was very good- some people say he reminds them of their much-loved late president Anwar Sadat who was assassinated in the early 80's) but it's easy to see how fear and ignorance can quickly turn to hate and prejudice. That goes for the North American media as well.. they do a pretty good job at sensationalizing things and generating fear.. I think the best thing we can do in any situation is go in with an open mind and try to learn as much about both sides as possible. Okay I'll put the soapbox away now.

So I don't want to get too excited yet, but I think my foot is almost 100% healed. I ran on Sunday about 30 mins at the track and it was fine and the tonight Peter and I did about 45 mins, with the last 20 mins at a pretty quick pace and no pain at all. Not in my foot anyway, my lungs were hurting a bit- it's been warm lately and was still about 32C at 7:30pm when we were running. It takes a lot out of you. I turned even redder than usual and was getting some strange looks at the grocery store afterward- I think people thought I was really sunburned.

Okay I'm off to find some food, but hope you're all doing well! Also, a special 'shout-out' to Mum and Dad who are hiking in Utah! Hope you're having a great holiday and staying hydrated.

xoxo C

Definitely no Twister at this party...

It was a great night- the party was hosted by Nabil, one of the runners- it was a hot night (still 30C as we drove home at 1am) so the whole thing was outside. Chefs BBQ'd burgers, hotdogs and corn on the cob; and for dessert- ice cream in waffle cones cones. yum!

There was a wide range of costumes-everything from hippy to disco to Austin Powers style femmebot... I think everyone was a bit confused by the twist theme. The dancefloor was set up by the pool and during one of the songs it started pouring with rain, a welcome respite from the heat so everyone just kept dancing- it only lasted for a few mintues anyway. Today I slept late and have been trying to stay cool- I think a trip to the red sea is in order next weekend. Hope you're all well. xoxo C

Let's twist again...

Yes I know, this is my 3rd post in less than 24 hours.... it's because Julie, my only friend in Cairo, is in Virginia for 8 whole weeks, so instead of spending time with her I am having one-sided conversations with you, my virtual friends...

That's not true actually, I have lots of great friends from the running group still here- last night we had pizza on a felucca and tonight we're off to Nabil's house for a "Twist Party"- at first we all thought it was a Twist-er party, (as in: left foot blue, right hand yellow) but apparently not... (with so many different languages in the group, misunderstandings and mistranslations like this happen ALOT!)- we actually have to dress in costumes from the era of 'The Twist'- the early 60's dance phenomenon...it should be a fun night!

So this morning we did a really cool run- Joe, a Maadi Runners Alumnus who is now living in Islamabad and also happens to love history, is here for a couple of weeks, so using this book he designed a slow run through Maadi with stops along the way to tell us about some of the old buildings and houses in our neighbourhood. It was a great tour- he knew so much and I discovered some things that had been right under my nose this whole time but usually I don't notice because of the traffic and chaos that consume the streets every other time but early friday morning. Even more exciting (for me) than the history lesson was the fact that I ran/walked for over an hour and my foot didn't hurt!!!! I was definitely aware of it, but I wouldn't call it pain-- I am going to rest it tomorrow and maybe try another short run on Sunday. I'm SO glad- the last few days have been torture!

So thrice-daily blog posts aside, I think I am becoming a bit of a 'social media' junkie...this morning I asked if anyone else had seen pictures of Lance Armstrong's new baby- when nobody had and they asked me how I knew, I said- "oh, I follow him on twitter". Then later on someone else asked when I was going to email my Copenhagen pictures to the group-- my exasperated reply "Nobody does that any more, aren't you on Facebook, Flickr, Snapfish, picasa, photobucket or Yfrog?" There is definitely a time and a place for such uber-connectedness- case in point: the english guy who knocked himself out while running and tweeting, but it seems like these technologies aren't going anywhere anytime soon so I guess we'd better get used to them, and better yet, embrace them...

The other thing that's getting more sophisticated apparently, are socks- I got this pair in Copenhagen and you actually have to make sure you put them on the correct feet! I haven't run in them yet, but I'm sure if I'd had them during the race I would have knocked that 45 min off my time, easy!

Why, yes, that IS me you saw with the British Ambassador in the Egyptian society magazine (from the fundraising gala a few weeks ago).


Okay, that's all for now, have a great friday, I'll see you here again soon, if I don't, tweet, IM, SMS, wall post or poke you in the meantime ;) xoxo C

Felucca pics

Now taking applications...

Since they're closing all the streets for Obama, we had to leave work early before our route home was closed- I am home about 3 hours earlier than normal and my housekeeper is still here- it's weird sitting here when she's working away, cleaning, but I know I would just annoy her if I tried to help- (plus, she has to earn her $3/hour!)

So, something funny...we got to work at 6am today (also to avoid the Obama traffic) so I thought I'd take the time to sort out a stack of applications I'd been ignoring for a while-- in doing so, I discovered that our Engineering department has been interiviewing candidates for the position of "hand job team teader"! I think the postion is acutally the guy who is in charge of the handymen or people who do odd jobs and fix stuff around the hotel, but I'm not totally sure...regardless, I think I'll have to talk to our chief engineer about changing that job title- STAT! It was a funny start to the day though!

So I've gone for 11 days with no exercise at all and it's been terrible- my foot is feeling almost completely better, so I'm going to try a slow short run tomorrow morning and see how it goes. Tonight a sunset felucca ride with some of the runners in honour of a running group alumni who is in Cairo for a visit.

In both April and May I took a week's holiday (Crete and Copenhagen) and it would appear that June will be no different! At the end of the month I'm going to the UK for a week! I'll stop in London for a few days to see Kate and Amanda and then I'll head up to Leeds to see Mum and Dad and my aunt and uncle for the remainder of the week- I've started the countdown already!

Okay, off to supervise the domestic help ;) Hope you're all doing well,

xoxo C

Tweet tweet

Some of the other hotels have been using Twitter as a recruitment tool lately, so I thought I'd give it a try with a personal account first. I'm not sure I really get the concept- it's like updating your status on facebook but waaaaaay more frequently-- I'm not sure who would actually be interested in knowing what I'm doing every second of the day, but some people seem to really be into it.

I almost went running tonight but I thought it would be better to rest for one or two more days, but I am SO bored- especially since I only get 4 english tv channels.

Obama is coming to Cairo on Thursday, everyone is excited- I am not, because I won't see him anyway and the traffic will be terrible.

Hope you're all doing well!

C