Coded messages and Immaculate conceptions

I have a few wrap-ups to do about Cairo, and an introduction to my new life in Nazareth, Israel. But, I wanted to share a little of my Christian upbringing.

Last night, I drank a bottle of red wine sitting at the place Gabriel came to tell Mary she would bear the son of God. I got tipsy on a bench in front of Mary’s Well with an Irishman. I think everything is going to be okay.

it's all indie-morbid

I deal with stress through photoshop.... I know it doesnt really suit my blog's style or tone, but art if for sharing. Print it out, put it on your fridge. Father's day is coming up, maybe turn it into a card to let daddy know how you feel.

The dance of the seven veils

Last night I lived one of my biggest dreams. I saw skivvy belly-dancing. The Rough Guide outlines a handful of the cheap belly-dancing clubs in Cairo. Their recommendation was Palmyra, promising limited con tactics and a moderate amount of rhythm.

(Photo of the cafe we went to after the club)

Overall the experience was not dodgy enough for my tastes. The “hostesses” left us alone, focusing instead on the big spenders in the front row, no one tried to charge me for using the bathroom and only one person got thrown out for touching the dancers.

The Club was one of those awesomely crap experiences that Cairo excels in. It was by far the best display of sad old men I have seen yet in Cair. They were eating cheese trays displayed in a tinfoil tree, petting street cats and holding hands with the “hostesses.” Every once and a while the sad men would get onstage with a dancer and “shower” her with a few five pound notes, as they pranced around her barely moving, incredibly bored body. It was more about the buxomy cleavage than any kind of dancing.

Onstage was chaos. All the dancers were less than enthusiastic and everything about the place felt like open mic night at the townie bars. The first dancer merely swayed side-to-side, sometimes stopping to blow her nose in a tissue she was carrying. She got a money shower once, earning her 3.75 LE. Nice catch. Another dancer dressed in silver sparkles got two showers, probably netting her twenty pounds and the dancer of the week award.

The hostesses would just wander onstage and start talking to the band in the middle of a song. The audio system was crap, and the MC unintelligible. The only words we could make out were when he would be introducing the audience to other members of the audience.

“This is Ahmed from Boub al louq.” “This is Mike from Pennsylvania.”

Gradually the dancers became more attractive, and the outfits more revealing, but while is failed to meet my sleaze standards, it outmatched my previous Sad Cairo experiences.*

Last night was also a right of passage for Karim. Many young Egyptian men check out a sleazy belly-dancing club as a pack in their teens, our sweet Karim did not. Leave it to us to gutter his tastes up a bit.

All in all I give it a 6/10. Averaging 2/10 for effort, 8/10 for last nights in town points and 5/10 for creepiness.


*Cairo is broken up into districts- Downtown, Islamic Cairo, Coptic Cairo, etc. I figure, Sad Cairo should be a official zone, and all the streets/building/rooms in the city that are filled with sad people entertaining themselves in sad ways should be pinpointed for easier navigation. Sad Cairo is most definitely my favorite place to spend a Sunday night.

And it's a Long Day, Livin’ in Reseda

Living in Cairo has meant countless dinner parties and nights passed with guitar playing, and me belting out the wrong words while everyone around me is three-part harmonizing to sing a-long songs. My first month here, I got it into my head that we needed to sing Tom Petty’s “Free Falling.” It is the first song every college guy who’s teaching himself to play guitar learns because it’s so simple. I thought it would be a breeze.

Dody tried and failed to master the 3-chords, Ziyad had never heard it and couldn’t get the right tempo. We tried for a half hour before we gave up.

My second week here, I was lucky enough to meet Dody and Ziyad. They were the first to take me on adventures, mock me for thinking I wouldn’t let Cairo drama claim me and are counted among the few who really looked out for me. They’ve been the most under-appreciated friends I’ve had here. Friends I took for granted. Friends who I missed out on too often. Ziyad left in fall, and I missed him, Dody is leaving in a few days, and he too will be missed.

I’ve always been shy about telling people how much of an impact they had on me. But I want to tell someone about them, so I’m telling you. I count the two of them amongst the most important discoveries I have made in Cairo. I still ask Dody questions when I need to put things in perspective, and I think about all the long train and bus rides spent trying to explain to Ziyad American dating terms. Knowing them has made me a better person, and for that I am grateful.

Last night was my final dinner party with these friends, we stayed up singing until 4 am, and I swear this time I was hitting the right notes and everything about the night felt like my world felt eight months ago. It was a really good feeling.

We tried and nailed "Free falling," I guess that's as good of a sign as an it's time to leave.

I made modern day macaroni art

I used to superimpose sexy Bond quotes on photos of my friends for fun. As today's lesson in unproductiveness, I turned last night's dream into a pathetic amount of time spent with Photoshop.

In search of Mohammad

This is Gerardo Cavazos.



He arrived a few weeks after me, approached me at a party and drunkenly asked, “Who are you?” I gave him my name and country, but he wanted to take it existential. “No. WHO are yooou?” Drunkenly repeat. Every time I see him. For 3 weeks. “Who are YOU?”

Well dear Gerardo, screw me, I bet the state department really wants to know about you. Its just a matter of time before you cross their borders to become my illegal maid.

True things I know about Gerardo:
1. He was born in a Mexican city with a cement factory
2. He has pet names for his nanny
3. I never understand a damn thing he’s saying
4. Constantly is requesting for people to shower with him, offers soap
5. While dancing shoots uses his hands as pretend guns, shooting into the air like a cowboy. It’s beautiful.
6. Shares my love of Rilo Kiley, and will have to fight me to sleep with her
7. Every Egyptian company that has employed him immediately financially implodes.

Which leads me to believe:

8. Gerardo is involved in high-level embezzlement, CIA-like precision recon work
9. He can afford to buy me lunch every now and again. Cheapskate

The final true fact:

10. Gerardo is a total dude. And I will miss him.

As many readers may have noticed I am a girl, and for some reason Gerardo thought I would know what girls like. This led us on a trek to Khan Ah Khalili, the very touristy market in the middle of Islamic Cairo yesterday.

At the bar the night before, Gerardo tried to buy the chair he was sitting on. Horeyiah’s waiters intelligently refused to sell. The chairs are pretty cool, but they are the standard wood chair at every coffee shop in the city. Still a business needs chairs, I wouldn’t let it go without a fight either. The one Gerardo wanted had the seat with pyramids on it, and his little burrito-filled heart would break if he didn’t have it.

And so, the quest for Mohammad began.

The street leading to Khan Ah Khalili is filled with cookwares and furniture. The waiters had told us to look there. Within ten minutes we had found and purchased a Cleopatra seat, but Gerardo wanted the Pyramids. We were told to go down a dark alley to find more designs.

What followed was a treasure hunt that Cairo alone could provide. We walked around the Wood Beveling District (oh it exists) holding the Cleopatra Seat and asking “Where? “Where?” over and over again. Everyone kept directing us to “Mohammad”* but, just like with the real prophet, no one had a clear idea on his life and whereabouts.

At one store Mohammad was an easy third street on the right, turn left then left again.
At the place that sells doors, Mohammad was one right and an ala tuul (straight ahead).

Everywhere we went it went like this:
Gerardo, pointing at the seat “This, Where? Where?” (Arabic) “I want Pyramids!” (English)
Egyptian man: “Rapid-fire Arabic, Mohammad, Rapid-fire Arabic, left-right-right-left” (Wild but entirely unhelpful hand directions)



(A dedicated explorer)

Eventually we found a man who seemed to think he could help. Gerardo began speaking foreigner-using-limited-language-to-explain-a-complex-want Arabic. It looked like we were getting results.

The man started scribbling on scrap paper. I assumed it would be a map, but instead, he was taking our order. Gerardo had just accidentally bargained the price of four pounds per piece for this man to do something, What? We don’t know. Eventually the man got a better idea of what we wanted, wrote something in Arabic on a piece of paper and sent us off.


( Chair found during search, that is made in typical chair style. Note: Lacks Pyramids.)

We added the paper into our routine of asking, pointing and wandering, but had no idea what it said. Eventually I also drew the pyramids on another sheet of paper because we realized we didn’t know if “pyramids” was pyramids in Arabic.

After about two hours we found the man who made the designs on seat covers. MOHAMMAD! He could offer us flowers and Nefertiti, but no Pyramids.



(Looking for a cheap Kofta and Kebab place for lunch, it seems our friendship centers around heartbreakingly fruitless searches)

At Khan Khalili I convinced Gerardo his girlfriend would go crazy with lust if he bought her a rug made out of rabbit pelts as a souvenir. I’ll make sure to post the angry e-mails from her when they start rolling in.



*Mohammad is the name of every 1 out of 3 Arabs. Don’t believe me? Go to your nearest Egyptian embassy, scream out Mohammad and watch the staff stampede.