Flashback - The Party

Old-Timer Tram

LakeSide Restaurant



MS Sentosa

 

I hope you can all see that I've been pretty busy this year with planning my move, packing, learning Egyptian Arabic, dealing with the many problems that have arisen, and keeping up with what's happening.

In the midst of all this, I had the crazy idea of organising a party just as I was in the middle of moving. And not just any party. It was my 50th birthday and leaving party all rolled into one. 

I don't normally celebrate my birthdays, but this was likely to be the most special numbered birthday I would ever have in my life. It deserved to be memorable. I branded it "Life is a Journey", representing the twists and turns that life takes. Every half hour of the party was to represent a different decade of my life (for simplicity, starting from the 60s and ending in the 00s and then into the future).

Before I really knew what I was doing, I'd somehow made it all as complicated and organisationally-intense as could be. I wanted starters in an old-timer tram, the main meal at a restaurant (with 80s memorabilia, provided by me), and the dessert on a boat. Oh, and then I had the bright idea of hiring a paranormal entertainer to join us on the boat to represent my parapsychology years. So, four different things to organise. On top of that, there was the catering, which had to be organised separately for tram and for the boat. So, let's make that six different things to organise.

I wasn't quite living in reality. Or, rather, the harsh reality was that I was living in Switzerland!

An approved caterer would charge 22 CHF per person for a basic dessert buffet on the boat; an apero with snacks and wine on the old-timer tram was going to cost 38 CHF per person (this is in addition to the rental costs of the transport). Once you multiply these figures by 25, it gets to a fairly hefty sum.

So, eventually, I decided to make the dessert myself - I am quite happy to bake. The boat people agreed and could also provide plates etc.

And then I looked at the costs for the apero on the tram - you could get steak and chips at Rolli's for that amount! Was it really worth it? I was more hesitant here because I'm not really into starters - I don't eat cheese and am not so fond of cold meats. But the Scrooge in me (and the lack of money in my bank account) won. I would somehow do the starters myself as well. I confirmed this with the tram people and asked to hire the necessary plates and glasses.

But the organisational challenge had now swollen to also baking and providing starters (whilst trying to empty my flat), plus transporting the starters to the tram depot and getting the dessert to the boat. And then I also needed to prepare the tram before it left the depot with the starters. I crossed my fingers and prayed it would work out.

Fortunately for me, Geraldine (whose birthday is also on 10th Sept) was visiting me for the week. Consequently, her (possibly) final vacation in Switzerland was spent helping me to get ingredients, prepare the starters and desserts, and transport them to the various locations, rather than going to the spa and a theatre event as originally planned. Moral of the story: be my friend at your own risk.

Of course, my life is never complete without something going wrong. On the day, the tram people informed me that they would not be able to provide the plates and glasses. So, off Geraldine and I rushed to the local supermarket. I need to credit Geraldine here for the joke that we were using plastic glasses, not because they were cheap, but because they were super-trendy in the 70s and so actually I had provided only the very best for my guests.

In the end, we made it! For Geraldine and I, it all started at the tram depot. We had a quick glass of champagne before departing, the old-timer tram lurched forward and stopped. Then lurched forward and stopped. The champagne glasses also slid but managed not to confirm our fears of empty glasses all over the floor before we'd even started. The tram driver called someone over to discuss the tram. It lurched forward and stopped. My heart sank with an image of the tram breaking down before we'd even started. But eventually we were on our way!

For me, at any rate, the evening flew past. I felt we'd hardly started by the time we arrived "home" at Burkliplatz with the boat, but I guess that's also how life is. I must be more than half-way through my life now, but I feel I've hardly begun. Thank you to everyone who came along and who, just by being there, helped to make it happen. And, Muriel, I'm still trying to work out how I can thank you - it just feels impossible to thank you adequately!

I already had my (undiagnosed) frozen shoulder at this time and I've since found out that frozen shoulder is also known as 50's shoulder, so I guess my body has taken Swiss punctuality just a bit too seriously .

I am now 50 years and 19 days old. Next week I am working full-time until Oct 9th, so I will probably take a rest from this blog until then (unless anything dramatic happens, which I hope it won't). My next moving date is Oct 6th to Hye-Youn's and my move to Egypt is Oct 10th. I will no doubt catch up at some point in this timeframe.

Meanwhile, health, wealth and happiness to all!

View from LakeSide Restaurant

 

On the old-timer tram



            

 

 

 





Dan Dent entertains on HMS Sentosa

 

Party Photographs courtesy of Jo McCoubrie



Flashback - Starting to Learn Egyptian Arabic

I started off in life enjoying learning languages. I remember as a child having an ABC poster of basic French words (one word for each letter) and getting them confused with the English. And my original plan at university was to study French and German (it changed to German and Philosophy).

So, I am quite excited at the prospect of learning another language; it's like a return to my roots. Until now, I'd thought I no longer had the energy to start learning something from scratch; it all just felt like too much effort. Now, however, I'm all fired up, inspired no doubt by the fact that I'm actually going to live in the country; also, I'm acutely aware that if I don't want to be completely conned in the Egyptian markets, I will have to have a grasp of the language, whether I like it or not. Language is power.

I've never self-taught a language before. I started off going to various free websites and YouTube videos - some of which were quite funny. There was one with a guy telling you all the words a certain word could get confused with and by the end I just didn't have a clue. Another one gave all the words with Allah in them, but half-way through she kind of forgot what she had or hadn't said.

In the end, I was completely undecided about what I should learn first. Should I learn to read the Arabic script first or should I start by drilling in a few key phrases? Should I get a hold of the grammar first and hang the words on that, or do I learn everything by heart and pick the grammar up as I go along?

It became clear that I needed a structure more than anything else and so I settled on the old-fashioned approach of using a hard-copy teach-yourself book with accompanying CDs .

I'd completely forgotten how daunting it is to start learning a language where you really have no clue. All I could hear was a strange bunch of sounds that were totally unfamiliar and had no beginning or end. They were all just mashed together. How on earth was I supposed to learn that? Maybe I was getting too old for all this?

The first chapter taught you to say hello, but it wasn't so easy - you can be confronted by good morning, good afternoon, hello and each is followed by a different answer and apparently these were just a few to start off with. The Egyptians have a multitude of ways to greet each other. At the start, so very much was just rote learning, I just couldn't get those sounds sorted out in my head. How on earth was I going to learn this language when even "hello" appeared to be beyond my capacity?

But after the first two chapters, I started really enjoying it. Each chapter presented me with a surprise:

•  Arabic doesn't have the verb "to be", you just say "the table clean"
  (this seemed quite logical when I thought about it, do we really need to clutter our language with a verb as well?)
• Only the numbers 3-10 are followed by the plural - all other numbers are followed by the singular
  (eg, thirteen duck but nine ducks - now how weird is that?)
• Arabic script is written like texting - with the short vowels left out completely
  (and I thought writing "txt msg" was a modern phenomenon)
• The plural forms of the noun generally have to be learnt separately from the singular (eg, shohka is fork and shuwak is forks) and the masculine and feminine forms for colours can be completely different (eg, "black" pertaining to a masculine noun is "iswid" but becomes "soda" when pertaining to a feminine noun)
  (at this point, I thought I may as well give up)
• Arabic is like German and says the number 23 as "three and twenty" (and not as "twenty three" as in English)

All this and I've only reached Chapter 5!

I had hoped to have finished the basic Egyptian course before I left, but, like everything else, it got a bit derailed (to say the least). But one day, I promise you, I will be back on track.

Limbo - Day 9 (And More!)

Max Bill-Platz, Oerlikon

OK. Let's cancel yesterday's post. The ripples aren't receding after all.

I went to the doctor today about my arm which had been hurting and which I couldn't raise very far. I've had it for about 6 weeks now, but I've tried not to let it affect me too much. I did a charity swim with it, I moved house with it (which probably did it no favours as it got worse afterwards), I transported lots of wine and food with it for my party (more on that later, maybe). So, I wasn't really treating it very well, but I couldn't avoid most of it. Anyway, when Yuen heard me reporting back to Rajashree that I felt my arm had got worse with the move, she suggested I get a doctor's appointment.

I acted upon this and, in true Swiss fashion, my doctor's appointment was for 08:45.

After examination, it turned out that I have a frozen shoulder and it will take up to 2 years to heal. Two years!! And my range of movement will probably get worse before it gets better. I mentioned that I was moving to Egypt and I was hoping to do a lot of swimming. Actually, (I didn't say this) being able to go swimming in the open air on a daily basis was a major reason for choosing Egypt and the location of my flat. And guess what the doctor said? Yes, that's right, she was concerned that, although exercise was a good thing, swimming may be too much and may hinder my recovery. Two years without swimming? Aaargh!

I went to Starbucks at Max Bill-Platz to get my head round things and guess what happened? Go on, have a guess...

Let's put things into context first.

I've had lots of miraculously good things happen in the six years that I've been in Switzerland.

When I first arrived, I accidentally left my laptop behind in a café in the main station. I didn't notice for three hours, returned in a panic at around 11pm, and it was still there.

And then there was the afternoon when I left my purse/bag on the tram. A woman travelled over an hour to my flat that evening just to hand it back to me, completely intact.

On another occasion, I left my bag on the tram on the way to the airport and so found myself without a passport for check-in. With Hye-Youn's help (thank you, Hye-Youn!), an announcement was put out on the trams, the bag located, and whisked back to the airport for me (again, completely intact).

Switzerland is not a place where things get stolen. I'm not the only person with stories like these. It's without a doubt a great country!

But today, in Starbucks, my purse got stolen. In Switzerland!

I managed to cancel all my cards. Fortunately, I still had money at Markus's, so I wasn't completely stuck. But if I want a replacement travel card (and I'm only here for another 13 days), it will cost me 30 CHF, if I want a replacement half-tax card giving me half-price travel, that will be another 30 CHF. I've put my bank account on temporary hold, but if I have to make it permanent and want a new card, that will be 40 CHF. And I have to explain to all these people that I have no fixed address.

Really, just how much can continue to go wrong... whoops, no, you'd better not answer that one...

As for my arm, well I've decided denial is the best policy. I'm sure I have only a mildly frozen shoulder and that actually gentle swimming every day will help. After all, my arm improved after the charity swim. I refuse to believe that I am moving over to Egypt and am not able to swim!

In my next life, I will be an ostrich.

Limbo - Day 8 (Deregistration)

Stadthaus, Zurich

I'm hoping that my fine on the train to Freiburg was my last bit of bad luck (or plain stupidity on my part) for a while.

When I returned "home" that evening (sorry Markus, am I making myself too cosy?), I checked into the private facebook forum for owners. Hurrah! After two weeks, electricity and water had finally been turned back on in El Andalous and twelve workers were busily putting things back to how they should be. The management company had received some payments and were willing to switch the facilities on again (it is still unclear whether the resort company or the management company turned them back on).

Holger, Emil, and Annette are obviously my lucky angels!

I mustn't get complacent though. The management company is still threatening to turn everyone's water and electricity off again at the end of December if they don't continue to receive more payments. We will see. Watch this space!

So, that was just this last weekend. Three days afterwards, my favourite share, Iofina, increased in value by 25%, due to good news. So, my shares are still down, but they are at least starting to look a bit healthier now.

I think it may have been that same Wednesday that the flight ban to Egypt was also lifted. I have in any case now booked my flight for 10th October.

And I didn't get fined yesterday, even though I half-expected it. All very promising!

There was a moment, though, when I thought it would all go horribly wrong again.

It had been in the back of my mind that I needed to deregister as you have to do this before you leave. I was feeling a bit nervous about it, because I wasn't sure whether I should have deregistered before I left my flat or whether it was before I left the country. I didn't like to deregister before leaving my flat, because I didn't know when I was going to be able to get a flight to leave the country and, in addition, I decided only last-minute where I was going to stay. I'm not sure how my life became so complicated! Anyway, I was worried that I should have done it before leaving my flat and that I would get fined for being late (this is Switzerland, after all).

Thankfully, it wasn't an issue when I deregistered, although there was some confusion as to why my request to keep my C permit said I was leaving on 19th September and my deregistration document was claiming I would leave on 10th October. My explanation about my flight being cancelled went down without a problem, though.

The procedure to deregister was more complex than I was expecting with the first visit being to the ground floor counter, followed by a visit to the first floor for the letter of confirmation, which you then took back down to the ground floor. The ground floor counter then took the letter of confirmation hostage while you went over to the tax counter and then, after you were done at the tax counter, you took the resultant tax statement back to the ground floor counter and you got your letter of confirmation back in return.

It turned out that I should have been worrying about the visit to the tax counter rather than about possibly being late in deregistering, but that's life for you, it just doesn't want to be predictable.

I'd been told that all I needed to do was to give a contact name for them to send the tax forms to (I am continuing to work part-time until the end of November and they don't send tax forms outside of Switzerland). Our HR person, Sidsel, said I could give them her name, so I thought I was sorted.

However, the lady at the tax counter informed me that before I left Switzerland I needed to pay 17k CHF to cover all my taxes for the year. To give the woman credit, she did look a bit sorry about what she was saying. I just looked at her, thinking that it was an impossible demand.

I think my face must have spoken for me, because she hurriedly added that maybe that was too much because I wouldn't be earning my normal salary. At this point, I managed to wipe the shocked expression off my face, and reiterated that I would be only part-time and only until end of November, so that therefore my tax wouldn't be that high. In addition, I said (shrieked?) that I had planned to pay 8.5k at the end of September as per their invoice.

To my huge surprise and relief, she nodded and said that was fine and she left it at that! Phew. I did have to sign some kind of letter in duplicate stating that Sidsel was going to take care of all my tax affairs and payments. I'm not sure that this is really what Sidsel intended when she said I could name her, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it....

Anyway, I think my life is undergoing a ripple effect, where you have a huge stone thrown in the water, then some other large ripples ensue, then the quiet waters start to take up more space and the ripples distort less and less. Finally, I am sure, I will end up in clear waters again. Hopefully, they will be the clear waters of Sahl Hasheesh.

Flashback - What Else?

Cargo Tram, Zurich - this is like the Electro Tram, but for bulky goods

I hope by now you are feeling suitably sorry for me.

But things didn't stop there.

Between the time I bought my flat in Egypt and hearing that the water and electricity were to be cut, my shares managed to devalue by 50%!  My shares were supposed to be supplying me with the money to live, so I would either have to die early or starve. However, I'm an optimist by nature, and retained confidence that they would recover and that my star share (Iofina) would still perform as I wished next year. For now, at least, I had some funds. But there's always that doubt looming in the background.

And, somehow, having managed to live for over six years in Switzerland as the epitome of A Good Citizen, I suddenly turned into Switzerland's Most Wanted. Yes, my good record in Switzerland suddenly crumbled.

In central Zurich, if you want to get rid of your electrical items, you take them (by foot or by public transport, but not by car or you'll be turned away - I'm not joking here) to the Electro Tram which turns up once a month at a specific tram stop (different tram stops throughout the month).

I really wanted to be a good Swiss citizen, so I  struggled onto the usual tram with my heavy load of electrical items and rode to where the Electro Tram was due. I heaved my rubbish off the tram, looked left, looked right, but no Electro Tram was in sight. I scratched my head, cursed "oh dear!", and wondered what to do.

I was sure the Electro Tram was supposed to be there, so I'd either read my calendar wrong or I'd failed to notice that the Electro Tram didn't come until later in the day. My plan was to go home and find out. If the Electro Tram wasn't due today after all, I would have to come back and collect the items; if the Electro Tram was coming in a few hours' time, I would come back and load my stuff onto the tram at the right time. Consequently, I decided to leave my items temporarily by the recycling centre, while I gathered more information.

I went to get the tram home. But just as I was about to step on the platform, a policewoman rushed up to me and charged me for littering. I wouldn't let her speak. I wouldn't listen. She needed to understand that the Electro Tram should be there and that I planned to come back. In the end she asked me to shut up because she was legally obliged to read me my rights. I could explain everything to her afterwards, she said.

She kindly informed me that I could get a lawyer if I wanted. A lawyer??

Her colleague phoned the rubbish disposal department and found out that indeed the Electro Tram was due that day, but not until the afternoon. I looked expectantly at the policewoman, but she informed me that this didn't matter and she would still have to charge me. She looked at my passport and took down my name, address, date of birth... at this point it dawned on me that this could potentially impact my ability to leave Switzerland.

She explained that although it wasn't a criminal charge, it would have to go to a judge who would decide whether or not to fine me. My head whirred with questions that I couldn't actually ask: "would I have to stay in the country until the judgement was made? what would happen since I was imminently leaving my current address? what should I do since I wouldn't receive the notification at the address I was giving? would my C-permit extension be taken away from me?"

She and her two companions then followed me over to the items I had left by the recycling centre and went through each one to check that it was indeed electrical. She wrote down each thing in her notebook. I was then asked to carry it all home again and bring it back again in the afternoon.

I duly came back with that load later in case they checked up on it somehow, but after that I decided that it was too much hassle to dispose of the electrical items separately and it would be quicker just to put everything in the special collection that I had ordered for 7am on moving day.

On a more minor level, a few weeks later I went to visit Holger, Emil and Annette (hello you three!) in Freiburg in Germany. Stupidly, I'd left a bit late and the queue for tickets in the main station was long, so I just got on the train thinking I would buy a ticket on board rather than risk missing my train.

It turned out you can no longer buy tickets on the train in Switzerland. And so that was another fine. Again, they wanted my address. This time, because I was living at Markus's by now, I gave Markus's address. Unfortunately, they wanted the postcode and I didn't have a clue, so I looked very dodgy (particularly in conjunction with me awaiting a court judgement!). When I couldn't supply the postcode, I asked if I could give my work address instead. Afterwards, I realised that the demand for the fine would not arrive properly at the work address either because they never asked for the workplace name (and there are several companies in the building). I looked on my ticket and emailed the full work address to the authorities. I wanted to pay the fine and clear my name. Although by now it may be too late for that.

I will be leaving Switzerland as a person known to be a Bad Citizen.

Flashback - What Could Go Wrong?

I hope you all noticed the subtle harbinger of doom in my last post - I booked a flight to Hurghada for 19th September and here I am still posting from Switzerland on 24th September. What happened?

First of all, there was an uprising in Egypt, Mursi was removed as President, the military took over, curfews were imposed and a state of emergency introduced. Well, I didn't see that one coming. Not to that extent anyway. I was aware of upcoming elections, I was aware of dissatisfaction with Mursi, when I visited I saw all the queues at petrol stations, and I'd experienced a power cut at the airport. But from what I'd read, the Egyptian people were not really expected to protest enough to change anything.  I believe it took the country and the world by surprise.

At this point, lots of people asked me if I was still going to go. I'd been following the expat bulletin boards and news pretty closely and from what I could gather most of the unrest was in Cairo, some 400-500km away from where I would be. There was a peaceful demonstration in Hurghada, but for the most part, those in Hurghada seemed to be saying it was relatively safe. As for Sahl Hasheesh, it's an international resort, mostly tourists, not very well-known. It has security gates to get in, my block has a security building beside it and security guards inside. Without wishing to tempt fate, I felt that I would be safe (inshallah).

In fact, I was worried about other things - would I get bitten or stung by the fish when I went swimming? How would I order home delivery of KFC if they couldn't speak English and I couldn't speak Arabic? If I swam too far out could I get run over by a boat? These were my nagging doubts, but they weren't enough to put me off my grand plan.

Unfortunately, the world saw things differently from me (I cannot think why!), and the airline cancelled my flight. I spent quite a few hours trying to find someone that would sell me a flight to Hurghada for 19th September and eventually booked with another airline. Perhaps a month later, that flight too was cancelled.

And then thirdly, just to make extra sure that I didn't try to go out there any time soon, I had an email from the management company telling us that the resort company had threatened to turn off all water and electricity in the entire block on September 1st, if the management company didn't pay their debts. The management company in turn threatened us, saying it could only pay their debts if the owners paid their maintenance fees. Attached was a list of all non-payers and the amounts owed and it was a huge sum!

I managed to find my way to a private facebook page for owners and the plot thickened. Some owners hadn't paid because they were in the middle of court proceedings against the management company, due to the management company not having done various things that they were contracted to do. Court proceedings of various kinds were planned - one to the attorney general in Cairo to argue that cutting off electricity and water was a violation of human rights for those who had paid, one to allow the owners the right to manage the property themselves, then there was the existing court case against the management company. The management company sent out another message threatening to pull the security guards in the middle of October.

Meanwhile, the water and electricity were indeed turned off. Families, people renting holiday accommodation, owner-residents, all these people had to move out and somehow find temporary accommodation. Only the two security guards remained. The residents organised water to be trucked in from Hurghada to keep the plants alive and bought a generator so that the security guards could see. The pools turned green. My paradise was being destroyed.

At this point, even I had to give up on the idea of going over. However, I'd resigned from my job, handed in my notice on my flat, had organised the cleaners, so I too somehow had to find temporary accommodation. And how do I ship my stuff when I don't know when I'm going to be there myself? But I needed to do something with the items I wanted to ship? It was all a big mess.

For all my worst-case scenario thinking, I never predicted any of these things! How life likes to take a laugh!

Flashback - The Decision

El Andalous - Garden Side and Pool Side

I ended up deciding to buy an apartment at El Andalous in Sahl Hasheesh (don't you just love the name? I'm going to spend the rest of my life living on Hasheesh! I saw an attempt at a back-translation of the name from Russian and it was "Easy Hasheesh". The name alone could keep me creatively occupied for years...).

But I was aware that deciding to buy the property did not yet commit me to pursuing my dream. I could just use it as a holiday home, no need actually to live there... No, no, really, I wasn't scared of committing to it, honest...

Actually, in reality there were lots of decisions to make, not just one. Could I really afford to live my dream (what was the cost of living? what were the tax implications?)? Could I get a visa (was it renewable, what did it permit me to do?)? Would I be happy with Egyptian healthcare (what was it like, what were the costs?)? Would I end up being bored? Was I happy to try to adapt to the culture, the hassling, etc?

This is where the internet comes in handy, my good old faithful friend. Or does it? The whole project, not just the flat-hunting, seemed to be becoming a case of information overload.

I asked the question about cost of living on the expat forums but got wildly different estimates as to what my living expenses would be (I think from around 200 GBP per month to 1800 GBP per month), so I gave up in the end. I don't need to live an extravagant lifestyle and swimming will be free, as will the gym (included in flat purchase). In the end I thought if I settled for something that would afford me a minimal lifestyle in the UK, it would probably be a decent enough lifestyle in Egypt.

The visa rules changed (not radically) as I deliberated and although I really wanted the residency permit to get Egyptian rates for healthcare and hotel stays, it wasn't really practical. I could get a renewable annual tourist visa like the majority of other expats. Some people seemed to think the tourist visa also gave you residency privileges if you were from the UK, but I've never seen that verified. Anyway, I quite liked the idea of calling myself a professional tourist, and surely that's worth something? They say you can't open an Egyptian bank account if you have a tourist visa, but then other people seem to think you still can. It's all very fluid.

Similarly with healthcare - I heard some great stories of the wonderful quality of care in Egypt and others depicted horror scenarios. I guess it would be the same if someone was trying to find out whether the NHS (or even private practices) in the UK provided good service.

I'm not sure whether the internet is the information highway or an information hurdle.

It always was going to be a decision made in the midst of uncertainty and at the end of the day, that's just how life is.

I did go through a "what's the worst that could happen?" scenario. Here are some of my possible predictions:

1. Political uncertainty after the revolution in 2011; elections were due and things could change.
ME: Some people were already uncomfortable with the Sinai region now requiring Egyptian majority holdings in all companies. There was some scaremongering that perhaps privately owned properties would be appropriated, but in the end it seemed that majority opinion was that Egypt needed foreign investment and wouldn't risk scaring foreign investors away.
2. I would go over and find that I just couldn't adapt. Like many other expats, I would end up hating it and just wanting to get out.
ME: It's a risk. I won't know until I try. Worst-case scenario, I always have the right to live in the UK, and I may also have the possibility of going back to Switzerland if I could find a job there/had enough money/income. I can keep the property as a holiday home, so my purchase wouldn't be wasted.
3. It would be too expensive and I would find myself unable to live on what I had. Also, the value of my shares could plummet and then I wouldn't have the money I needed.
ME: I would keep a close eye on what I was spending and if it was really expensive and I couldn't get a job back in Switzerland, I could go back to the UK. I could sell property if I really had to, but  I would probably rather move back to the UK than do that. Perhaps I could get freelance medical writing/editing work if I needed some extra money (my visa would not allow me to work in Egypt unless I set up my own company) and I could set myself up as a freelancer either in Switzerland or the UK, depending on income. There is always a way out.
4. The Govt would appropriate all private property
ME: Not good, obviously, but the Egypt property is paid for and is not being used as living expenses (other than saving me rental costs). I would be seriously unhappy, but I would not be living on the streets if this happened.

So, basically, in the end, it seemed that as long as I was sensible, I would always have a way out. It was just a question of whether I wanted to take the risk. But I'd always had it in my head that I would like to do something like this some day (admittedly, I'd never really imagined it to be Egypt, but I had now warmed to the idea, and in any case I'd recently had a yearning to try a completely different culture). It was just a matter of taking that leap. After all, what could really go wrong?

I handed in my notice and booked a flight to Hurghada for September 19th.

Flashback - Flat-hunting

Captain's Inn, El Gouna

Was the driver really telling the truth? Were properties affordable in Egypt? Those were my first two questions.

I really cannot remember how I came to switch my search from Sharm El Sheikh to Hurghada. I mean, I'd never even ever been to Hurghada before, so it was a pretty strange decision.

Maybe it was because property prices were cheaper in Hurghada? Although my initial searches confirmed what the driver had said of property in Sharm El Sheikh, I found that the more things I wanted the property to have, the higher the prices naturally became (this is also my experience elsewhere, of course!). Alternatively, I may have been put off Sharm El Sheikh when I read about the new laws not allowing businesses unless they had an Egyptian majority stake and stories on the internet that the area was not so safe for foreigners with the Bedouins taking more control. I may also have decided that I would prefer to be by a larger city where there would be more to do and more going on. I'm really not sure whether it was for all or any of these reasons, but somehow, in the end, I settled my property search on Hurghada.

Two or three months later, after quite a bit of research, I went to Hurghada on a scouting mission. I stayed in Captain's Inn in El Gouna. I was curious to see El Gouna as I'd heard many good things about it, even though I knew that property-wise it would be out of my price range.

It was an emotional journey. My first day (with Agent 1 and Agent 2) was spent looking at properties that were not yet completed in an upcoming area (El Ahyaa). I felt completely out of my depth. I had no way of judging whether the ongoing builds were good or not (I'm not a builder, in case you don't know!), I couldn't really picture what the flats would be like when finished and furnished, I had promises that the whole area would be completed in a few years' time, but a promise is not a guarantee. My emotions went from enthusiasm at its location near the sea, the proximity of a local bus stop and small local shops, to feeling overwhelmed by my own lack of knowledge, feeling a bit depressed at the unfinished nature of everything around me, and realising just how much I would have to adapt. I began to wonder whether this new life was really for me at all.

In the evening I met up with someone I'd met on one of the expat forums who was a rental agent. She tried to persuade me that it would be best to rent (as many people do indeed advise) and this would enable me to live in El Gouna, which she said would be the best place to live as it has its own facilities, its own expat community, guarantees for no hassling etc. She recommended not to stay somewhere which wasn't yet fully developed as in your everyday life, you want to be able to just pop out for a coffee etc rather than to have to get the bus and travel miles to do so. It was a fair point.

The next day (with Agent 3) was looking at more upmarket properties that were complete and in developed areas (on the whole). I'd already decided by the end of Day 1 that I should focus on completed projects only. It's the advice given everywhere on the forums, because a building can be 90% complete and still never actually get finished. Or you can move in and pay maintenance only to find they never do complete the pool, for instance.

By the end of Day 2, I was feeling more upbeat. The properties and areas were nice, places felt safe and friendly. It all seemed do-able. However, none of the apartments was close to public transport, so living expenses would be higher due to the need to get taxis and haggle (another daunting prospect). The property prices were also higher than I had originally really intended spending. Such is the way of property hunting, of course. You pay for what you get, and you always want what looks better.

Meanwhile, I'd found a promising flat in El Gouna online, so I phoned up to see if I could view it. This was a bit naïve of me in retrospect, since before I knew it, I was being whisked round in a car to view six different properties accompanied by two men and a woman who I didn't even know. In the end, all the properties in my price range were too dilapidated to be attractive (I was too tired to think of taking on a property to be renovated) and the one that looked nice on the internet also needed quite a bit of work.

By this stage, my head was aching with having had so much information stuffed into it in such a short time. All I wanted now was a day's rest. But it was not to be. Agent 1 phoned me again to say that they would like to spend another day showing me round properties. I was really hoping for a day off, but my time was limited and it seemed foolish not to keep an open mind and to see all that I could.

The upshot was that the next morning, the poor driver had a very grumpy customer sitting in the back of his car. He showed me one unfinished (thus unsuitable) property by the sea at a ridiculous price that they wanted me to negotiate over and then several in the town (which I had originally said I didn't want to see, but then thought I should keep an open mind).

 On the way back, he asked me if I wanted a tour of Hurghada and I replied that I just wanted to get back, but he still pointed out various things on the way.

To my surprise, this cheered me up considerably - he showed me the mosque that had taken four years to build, the Touristic Route, and then drove me past what may have been the marina with a breathtaking view over a dazzling sea of various hues of blue. My heart rose and seeing the people peacefully doing their shopping at their own pace, the signs of life in the various bits of the city, which I now realised was huge, and remembering that everyone I had had dealings with had been very friendly and with a good sense of humour, I suddenly realised that it would be very exciting to make a life here and that just perhaps I could even feel I would belong.

Flashback - The Dream Sprouts

Picture: The grounds of the Savoy Hotel, Sharm El Sheikh (c) The Savoy Hotel

So, why am I moving and what's this all about?

Like many people, but maybe more obsessively than most, I've had this dream for many years now of not having to work and focusing instead on my own thing. In my case, this "thing" is to write books - humour, novels, non-fiction... and I have a whole host of ideas. I don't expect to make money from my writing (although it would be nice); it's just something I want to do. In addition to this, I would like to spend more time researching stocks and shares (a relatively new hobby). And then I would love to be somewhere hot where I could swim in the sea all year round. A little bit of travel here and there also wouldn't hurt. And if I wasn't working, I could spend more time keeping in contact with my friends. So much to do, and so little time!

So, that's the dream.

I spent Christmas last year (2012) in Sharm El Sheikh. I was worried that the sea wouldn't be very warm and I wouldn't get to do any swimming. As it turned out, the water was a reasonable temperature (I would guess around 23 degrees) and the temperature was pleasant (maybe around 26 degrees); the sun always shone and I had to push fish gently out of the way while I swam. Father Christmas arrived by speedboat, but a little late, so the children had to be taken up and down the beach to look for him. I guess it's hard for Father Christmas to find his way around when there aren't any chimneys.

I was living in Switzerland, so my booking had been with a Swiss company and the travel back to the airport was with Swiss people. There must have been only around six of us, at a guess. They were all chatting and I was just sitting there quietly, only half-listening. All of a sudden I realised that they were talking about buying property, a favourite topic of mine, so I started to focus.

One of the Swiss people must have just mentioned that they were thinking of buying a property in Switzerland. The driver, Egyptian, but who spoke very good German, asked them why they would buy property in Switzerland when they could buy a property in Sharm El Sheikh for very little money. I'm not sure whether it was the topic of buying property or the "for very little money" that got my initial attention.

The Swiss guy confidently proclaimed that Swiss property was of very high quality and he would be assured of a good build if he bought in Switzerland. The driver countered this by claiming that many buildings in Switzerland had been built by Egyptians and that Egyptian builds were of excellent quality. On further questioning, the driver conceded that property by the sea front was more expensive, but mentioned that it was still cheaper than in Switzerland and that many people from Switzerland, Germany, the UK, bought two properties and lived in one and then rented out the other so that they could live off the rental income. "They are just in their flats all day, they don't have to work, they just sit back and do what they want. It's a nice life, isn't it? The apartments, they have everything, it's like living in a hotel."

My heart flipped as it whispered to me "Is this possible, could I do this?" My thoughts sped round my head urging "Stop it, Fiona, stop it! Don't be foolish. Stop listening. Think about something else".  My heart responded with despondency "But I'm not going to be able to stop thinking about this now, I just know it, I can't undo what I've heard". My head understood that in this my heart was right.

And that's how the idea sprouted in my head to leave my job, buy somewhere to live in Egypt,  and live my dream.

Flashback - Moving Day

Yes, this blog isn't in chronological order I'm going to start with my most recent memories first and then fill in the background as to what my search in life is, so if you don't know, I'm afraid you'll have to wait!

I am now feeling at home in Markus's flat. The internet is working, the TV is working (still no idea if it is as it is supposed to be), so for those who don't know what it's like to move house when you are in Switzerland, well, you can hear my experience....

First of all, you need to know that the Swiss are fond of early starts. For me, anything before 9am is early and to be honest, I find even 9am a bit of a struggle sometimes.

I decided to ask the council to pick up my rubbish. I'll tell you about the fiasco with my electrical stuff in another post, but the end result is that I gave up doing it separately and thought I would just pay the council to collect all my rubbish at once (yes, you heard that correctly, you pay for your rubbish to be collected). You put everything outside and it costs around 89 CHF I think for the first 15 minutes that it takes them to throw the rubbish onto the lorry and then around 129 CHF for every subsequent 15 minutes. At first this seemed extortionate, but compared to all the other expenses, it ended up seeming very reasonable (this is what living in Switzerland does for you).

Anyway, they said I should have the rubbish out by 7am. Yes, 7am!! I kind of thought they probably meant they would come any time after 7am and just wanted to be sure that the stuff was there. However, since the cleaners were coming at 7.30 am (yes, 7.30am!!), I was in any case up early and had put everything outside the night before (many thanks to Zak and Shukri for helping me with this!).

I'd planned to take a photo of all that stuff waiting to be collected and put it on facebook to get people to guess whether or not it would take more than 15 minutes for the men to load as it was a shocking number of things that I was throwing out (I felt like a spoilt Westerner who doesn't know the value of money). However, as I went down to take the photo, I spotted a man running away with my coffee table (it had been in the rain all night), so I turned and sped upstairs, not wanting to put him off (I was pleased that someone could use it). I thought about taking a photo from my flat, but then the rubbish men arrived, punctually at 7am! Yes, 7am! Really!

And I couldn't take a photo any more because it was 5 men to remove the rubbish, so clearly they could do it in 15 minutes. I was pleased, but astonished!

At 7.30am, on the dot, the cleaners arrived. It's just me in a 2-bedroomed flat and I had 3 cleaners for  5 hours! If you live anywhere other than Switzerland, you will think this is completely mad. They take cleaning very seriously in Switzerland, particularly if you are about to leave a flat. It has to be spotless. The tiniest thing has to be dismantled and cleaned to its core. You don't have to get cleaners in to do it, but most people do, because otherwise you run the risk of losing your entire deposit, which in my case is around 5k CHF. The cleaning cost was 700 CHF which was actually a good price (did I really say that?). So, now you can see why the 89 CHF for rubbish disposal felt like a bargain.

At 9am, the removal people arrived, while the cleaners were in mid-flow. As usual, the removal people complained that my boxes of books were too heavy and decided to repack them. I looked on worriedly as they happily put what appeared to me to be very little in each box, when my allowance was only 3 cubic metres. I became more and more convinced that they were doing this deliberately to increase the volume and therefore the amount for the moving costs, but to my huge relief they assured me that it would not come to more than 3 cubic metres.

The next day I had my flat inspection. In the UK, an agent would probably glance round the rooms and say "yes, that's fine" and that would be it. I usually get praised for leaving things in good condition. In Switzerland, they took 1.5 hours to check every detail. You just sit there in your empty flat while they come to you every now and then to explain that x, y or z will incur you another 20 CHF fine. I would like to know whether these people work on commission! Anyway, it didn't go down very well at the end when I finally announced that I'd lost my spare key (in Switzerland, the keys are coded, so if you try to get a copy, you aren't allowed - trust me, I tried this). He happily said that my insurance would probably pay. Since I decided not to have house insurance I am now wondering exactly what this means - on the form it was just noted that I would pay100% of the cost. He told me I shouldn't leave the country. I hope he was joking.

It's all quite mental if you're not used to this system. Oh, and I tried getting a charity shop - the Brockenhaus - to collect some of my stuff, but they were fully booked until the end of September. And even then they are apparently quite fussy about what they will take and they charge you if you want them to remove anything else. The council collection also had to be booked at least a week in advance. So organisation is also key here in Switzerland. I think living and working in Switzerland should itself be seen as some kind of stellar qualification for any future employment!

Limbo - Day 1

Yesterday, I moved into Markus's flat near Limmatplatz in Zurich. It's strange staying somewhere new in your home city.  Although I've passed through Limmatplatz several times over the six years that I've lived in Zurich, I feel like I've moved to a completely different place.

Even the smallest things surprise. My first task this morning was to buy milk and orange juice from Migros. When I entered Migros, I thought I would be stepping straight into the supermarket, but I saw no supermarket, just the Migros cafe and a host of other shops. Once I'd reoriented my thoughts, I realised that the supermarket was downstairs. I peeped down the escalator (which wasn't working) and to my astonishment, the shop's metal grid was still three-quarters of the way down blocking the entrance. I'm not sure whether it was it being closed that surprised me or the realisation that I had actually got up that early.

I passed the time by going to the café across the road (imaginatively named Caffetteria am Limmatplatz), read part of a newspaper, and enjoyed the sensation that at last I had a day where I could relax and that at least challenges such as this one at Migros would be relatively small.

Markus had explained to me how to work the television the day before yesterday, but I'm still confused as to exactly what possessed the inventors of television to think it is a good idea to have two sets of remote controls (I'm still not sure how it works - one for the set box and one for the TV? But I'm not sure which one does what).  My own TV also had two sets of controls and even though I knew how to use them, every time I turned on the TV, I would think how completely counterintuitive it was. The reason I'm mentioning this is that coping with technology in any unknown surrounding is a challenge (I don't think it's just me).

I was actually quite pleased with myself last night because I got the required channel fairly quickly, once I'd worked out that the TV kept saying "no signal" because the door to the unit housing the set box was closed and the remote control signal couldn't penetrate the door. I can see why "geeks" like technology as I got a completely inordinate sense of being a genius for having worked this out .

Indeed, with that success I got a bit too cocky and I decided to try to fathom out how to record something. My idea was to record and delete the programmes I wanted to see, so that when I left Markus's home, his TV would be just the same as when he'd handed its care over to me.

Unfortunately, as soon as I went into the "record" menu, the TV got stuck on Channel 4. I switched the TV off, the set box off, the TV and the set box off. I pressed random buttons on the two remote controls like a demented monkey trying to break a code that would release food, but each time all I got was Channel 4. After 20 minutes, I somehow got it working again, but I fear that maybe I've now got it constantly recording Channel 4.  If you're reading Markus, and you get home to all your programmes having been deleted due to me having unwittingly recorded Channel 4 for the entire duration of my stay, I'm sorry!!