December 2001

One of the things I didn’t tell you about life in Cairo is about the power outages. A good portion of the electricity for Cairo comes from the Aswan dam, located about 800 miles south of Cairo. The Aswan dam serves many other purposes, for example it keeps the Nile River (which flows in a northern direction) from flooding like it used to in pharonic times, and other stuff. The dam as a power source is very stable, and plentiful. However, there are approximately 18 million people living in Cairo and its suburbs, so as you can imagine, the demand for electricity can be overwhelming. Remember talk of rolling blackouts in California last summer because of power shortages? Hell, they’ve been doing that here for years! So usually once a week (or sometimes more) the power shuts off for dozens of blocks in every direction from my apartment.

Inside, we have emergency lights that are powered by a battery, so when the power fails our house remains somewhat lit thanks to these lights. However, the elevator and water pumps quit working. In the summer when power outages happen in the early morning or late afternoon, often times we have no water.

But it’s the elevator that concerns me. My biggest fear of living in Cairo is not getting hit by a car as it should be (although it almost happens on a daily basis where I almost get hit), but is getting stuck in the elevator. the power outages last for several hours sometimes, and the little emergency bell inside is wired to the same power circuit as the elevator (so when the power goes out, the bell doesn’t work). And the walls are made of concrete, so sound doesn’t travel well and the cell phone loses reception. SO, the long and short of it is that if I got stuck in my building’s elevator during a power outage, I would be there for a very long time in the dark trapped.

So why am I bringing this up?! Hehehe… well, I was about to get on the elevator tonight and just before I did, the power died. I was saved, but only by a matter of seconds. If I had gotten on a few seconds earlier, I would have been stuck for the two and a half hours that the power was off tonight… hehehe… it’s funny now, but at the time I was a bit freaked out! But alas, I lived to appreciate not getting stuck in the elevator

Man today was a lazy day!! I woke up at 10 AM to eat breakfast and go to the store with my parents. Then when we got home around 1 PM, I crashed and slept until almost 5 PM, waking up just in time to eat dinner. Do you ever get too much sleep and feel kinda crappy? I think I accidentally let that happen… heheheh… but I rest assured that this will probably be the last time for the next several months that something like that will happen!!

Tonight my dad and I watched Tora Tora Tora. Hehehe… well, I say my dad and I because it started out as a family movie, but my sister got bored and left and my mom fell asleep and then left as well. If you haven’t seen it, it is basically the defining film documenting the attack on Pearl Harbor made back in the early 1970′s. The modern movie added a love plot and several theories on the attack, whereas this movie was based on the testimonials of hundreds of Japanese and American soldiers and politicians. And it was directed and filmed in two pieces… the Japanese component (entirely in Japanese) by a Japanese film crew, and the American piece (by an American crew). Pretty neat, huh? If you enjoy historical documentaries, you would probably like this. And it’s not your average war movie… the attack scene is less than 15 minutes long.

So that was my day… I basically slept and watched a movie with the folks. Tomorrow I’m planning to go to the Kahn with Josh on a little photo expedition. Stay tuned for more details on that.

According to Weather.com, the forecast for Cairo calls for “sand” (no kidding, that’s what it says). That means that there is tons of blowing sand outside and I’m staying in because I value my eyes. It’s the hamseen season (don’t worry about the pronunciation of that word, it requires a deep-throat guttural noise that is hard to translate into text), which means that the winds have shifted to pick up tons of dust off of the western Sahara desert and blow it towards Cairo. There have been times you would think a tornado was coming through the wind was blowing so hard, but alas, it was just a huge dust storm. So, hamseen season begins in early January and is over mid-February or thereabouts.

It’s currently 75 outside right now, but it is supposed to hit 80. I dunno about that, it’s almost a bit too warm for me (remember, I can’t wear shorts in public, so when it goes above 80, I start suffering outside!).

The family and I went out to the step pyramid of Sakkara this afternoon. I haven’t been there since we were here on vacation like 8 years ago. It was like a blast out of my childhood to see it again (well, sort of). It hasn’t changed at all, except that there are fewer people around. So we had this Egyptian guide named Taha (Ta-ha) show us around. He really knew what he was talking about. He said he studied Egyptology, so we jokingly called him Professor or Doctor Taha, and all of his fellow guide buddies started calling him that too. Hehehe… so whenever we passed one of them giving another tour, they said “Hello Dr. Taha!!”.

My dad decided to take the video camera out for a spin also, so that attracted a lot of attention. He shot this video of a guy on a donkey coming over towards he and I (my sister and mom wandered off somewhere by this point) yelling “Egyptian Cadillac!” of course speaking about the donkey. He wanted to sell us a ride, and then wanted to pose with me for a picture. Hehehe… I’ll get a copy of the video and post it on my website sometime. It also has my sister riding a camel.

Then we drove back through the sticks back to Maadi where we stopped to get my film developed. While we waited we went to this new Chinese restaurant. That was the BEST Chinese food I’ve ever had, honestly! The spring rolls weren’t soggy, the soup was amazing, and I had some pretty good sweet and sour chicken. For dessert the family ordered a big plate of fried bananas and ice cream drizzled in a honey sauce. Mmmm… maybe it’s just because I’ve been eating cafeteria Chinese for several months, but I really do think the food was absolutely amazing!

They are also having a big New Years celebration. The waitress gave us an ad. My parents (who in recent years have taken to going to bed at 10 or 11 PM and watching the ball drop at 7 AM) immediately dismissed it. But I’m trying to talk Josh into going. Since nobody else is here (the rest have sadly left as of this morning), it would be he and I. They have a huge all-you-can-eat buffet of several different hot and cold dishes all for $20. That’s not too bad, especially compared to the $40 we paid last year at Applebee’s.

Christmas in the Emmert house has come and what a day it is!! Let me describe the typical Christmas experience… It’s always a family affair with the four of us and the cats, who help keep the balls of wrapping paper from reaching the garbage bag. It’s also a family tradition to make German Christmas bread, called a stollen (Merriam-Webster defines it as “a sweet yeast bread of German origin containing fruit and nuts”) – good portion of my family heritage is Germanic. Anywho, I got a quart-sized bottle of maple syrup for my parents, so we’re having pancakes for breakfast tomorrow morning

My parents gave me money mostly, and for the first time so did my sister. They explained that I had finally reached the category of being hard to shop for. I guess I can agree with that, because I really don’t have space for a lot of stuff in either the dorm or my suitcase. Bit I did get several things to hang on the wall. One is a big painting of the pyramids, Citadel, and several other aspects unique to Egypt. So I will pack the suitcase full of wall hangings and I can go to town making my dorm room look even less like a prison cell!

I’m going to the gym with Josh in a bit. The training has been really nice, and beneficial. I have just crossed the line into 90 sit ups in two minutes. I only need to be able to do 77 to achieve the 100% level on the APFT, but a little bonus won’t hurt!!

I can’t help but wonder how Michelle’s Christmas is going. I’m sure she and her family are having a blast. To Michelle and all my friends, Merry Christmas!!!

Tonight we had our first reunion at school. Rachna, Josh, Moh, Steve and I decided to stop in for a bit to see if we could find any of our other friends. We showed up about 20 minutes early, and after an hour had passed, we were still the only ones there! We kept saying “Oh, we’ll just give it five more minutes and wait to see if anyone else comes.”

But they did… eventually… I got to see Silvana, Capri, Maggie (all from the class of 2000) and Chris and a few others from my class (2001). I had no clue who the rest were. Many of them were older by several years. It was an interesting experience, and it will also probably be the last reunion I will be able to attend in my life unless I want to make a special trip back to Cairo for it. I will miss the one in the summer of 2002, and maybe also the one in 2003. I heard the Christmas reunions were very rare… but if they have another one next year, I may be able to attend. We’ll have to think about that one…

I went to the Commissary this morning with my Dad and sister to stock up on food. It’s really good to be home for the food!! We must have bought out a good portion of the store with all the bags we brought home. And it will be nice to get into the kitchen again and cook for myself, something that we try to do at RPI but hasn’t always been the best experience (not because we can’t cook, but because Ghetto Chopper carries fifth rate food).

I also bumped into Josh at the commissary. I really missed that kid! He just got back also, and since our parents paid for the plane tickets, they get to keep us in for at least the first couple of nights, but I think Josh and I and some other friends are going to sneak out tomorrow afternoon headed for Tornado!!

Moh stopped by this afternoon also to say hello. We had a good chat! But I have to feel sorry for him and the essay he has to write and submit to his professors in England before the end of the week… but I guess that’s law school in the UK. We Americans just kick back and let our minds liquify during the break.

So why I am I up right now? I slept for about 5 hours, and then I just woke up and can’t sleep… gotta love jet lag!!

Well, I successfully arrived in Cairo about an hour ago. I know what you’re thinking, why am I not with the family? Well, because it’s 4 AM Cairo time, and they pretty much dropped after picking me up at the airport. That’s ok, it gives me a little time to catch up on my e-mail and journal.

I am a bit tired and worn out though. We were about 35 minutes late coming in tonight, and I think my two bags were the LAST to come off the plane. It was 2:30 by the time I got out of the airport, 3:15 when I got home. Gotta love the Cairo airport.

I have to say smelling the familiar Cairo grunge really brought a tear to my eye… errr… actually, it was probably a burning reaction to the chemicals in the pollution, but just the same… it’s good to be back and I’m looking forward to seeing all of my family, cats, and friends

I just got back from my little excursion to downtown Amsterdam. I couldn’t have asked for a better day to spend in Amsterdam when it comes to the weather. Yeah, so it’s only 2 degrees C, but the sun was shining. Usually, it’s foggy or misty during the winter here (that is, when it’s not snowing!). So I wandered around and took some pictures, ate fries with fry sauce (ok, so it’s really just mayo, but let me live my fantasy, ok?), checked my e-mail at an internet cafe, and then I decided to come back to the airport to warm up and relax.

I left Albany without incident. I got to the airport around 1 PM, so I had a bit of a wait. Then when I got to Detroit at 6 PM, I had to wait until 10 to get on the plane to Amsterdam. Basically, in both places I found a place to plug the juice in for the beast and I watched a couple of really crappy TV episodes. I also watched the rest of Artificial Intelligence. Remember that was the Haley Osmot movie that was basically a flop? Well, I was bored so I finished the second part. What a hokey ending… basically, he gets trapped underwater in a submarine, and then some aliens come and find him during the next ice age. Seriously, that’s what happens. So basically he’s the only thing on the planet (after 2000 years) that remembers humanity at all, so instead of becoming a real boy like he wanted to, he basically becomes the only-human like thing… uniqueness achieved I guess. Then Teddy retrieves the hair that David (the robot boy) cut from his “mother’s” head and the aliens clone the mother. But then she only lasts for a day, so David makes the most of it. I dunno, it was a bit depressing, but altogether pretty corny. They could have done so much more with that movie!

Last night I flew into Amsterdam on a plane full of the US National Men’s Under 20 Hockey Team. They were headed to a game here in Europe. They started out a bit rowdy, but then their team of doctors (they had a huge entourage!) gave them all sleeping drugs, and they were out like a light It made the rest of the trip very peaceful. Even the baby two rows behind me got some sleep. So that made the day here in Amsterdam much more enjoyable. If I don’t sleep between now (4 PM) and the time I arrive in Cairo (1 AM) I shouldn’t suffer too much from the dreaded jet lag.

I got all of my Christmas shopping done for my family before I left. Actually, I ended up going back and forth between Hannafords (a local grocery store) and Wal-Mart for most of it. I can’t tell you what I bought because I don’t want to ruin the surprise should the fam-damily stumble upon this entry before Christmas.

It looks like they shut down the internet connections at RPI. My computer is no longer online AIM, and web site doesn’t connect. I hope they didn’t cut the power because that will mean a real mess in the fridge! I will be quite upset…

Speaking of RPI, I must say that I’m going to miss the old place! I have really made a home for myself there when it comes to both friends and my dorm room. Don’t misunderstand, I’m really looking forward to going back to Cairo and will totally enjoy myself, but it will also be nice to get back to RPI… let’s put it this way, I’m in no way dreading my return to RPI.

Michelle and I went out to dinner at the Olive Garden to celebrate the end of exams and the end of the semester. It was my first time eating there since I was 8 or 9 years old. You know what an appreciation a 9 year old has for Olive Garden, right? But I really did enjoy myself and being there with Michelle was great. And even when the waitress didn’t bring us silverware to eat our salads until she brought the main courses we still had fun

Then we went out to see Harry Potter. What an amazing movie. Maybe it was the frame of mind, or perhaps the lack of one, due to exams that allowed my imagination to be sparked. It was a bit slow in the beginning, but by the end, even all the little rowdy kids in the theater were quietly sitting on the edge of their seats to see if Harry would survive his encounter with Valdimort.

Then after some packing, I’m on my way to crashing right now. So so so tired!! And I’m getting up at 7 AM to do the Christmas shopping for my family and to take Michelle to the airport. I’m really going to miss her, she’s really great :-/

So thus begins my long journey to Cairo and beyond (well, hopefully the plane will not miss the runway in Cairo, but you never know, my luggage may end up in Tibet or something like that). Merry Christmas to all, and I will write again when I reach Cairo (or maybe from Amsterdam or something, you never know!).