Hurghada - Spinneys (again)

High Tide at Sahl Hasheesh

I’m not writing as much these days, because, thankfully, my life has quietened down with no huge traumas. However, I hadn't realised that I'd left it quite so long and will try not to leave it so long next time! Last night we had a power cut for maybe an hour (I must buy some more candles!), but I am feeling quite settled.

Anyway, I thought it was maybe worth writing something more about Spinneys. I know I’ve already written about Spinneys on several occasions, but food is (fortunately) a stable part of my life and I am still learning about how best to shop.

Last time I went, and maybe even the time before, I got a lift from Safi, for which I am hugely grateful. Anyway, it was the day after the anniversary of the 2011 revolution, there had been trouble in Cairo, but to my knowledge no trouble in Hurghada and definitely none in Sahl Hasheesh. However when we got to Spinneys, we were allowed in only one entrance. Having forgotten the significance of the date, Safi, Kathryn and I joked about how random things can be in Egypt and we passed this off as another example of that.

However, due to the anniversary, they’d actually set up a security check for you to go through before you were allowed into the shopping mall and this was why only one entrance could be used. I found this procedure comforting rather than threatening. There were no police, just a scanner and a couple of people checking people in.

I also hadn’t realised that you had your bag scanned before going into Spinneys (as a matter of course) – this is mostly so that you don’t put any shop items into your bag and there’s a bag drop if you have a large bag where you leave it and collect it afterwards. It is actually quite well organised.

Another thing that I hadn’t discovered properly before in Spinneys was the spice section. I’d been a bit scared of it up until now, because I wasn’t too sure how it worked and I was frightened I would be pounced on and asked a question if I went too near it. This time, however, I was in the mood to experiment.

The spice section has large, open tubs of all sorts of spices. The tubs have metal scoops in them and rolls of plastic bags are scattered about the place. I watched other customers (well, specifically a large European-looking guy, since I decided he wouldn’t get the wrong idea if I stared) before daring to enter. As I watched, I understood that you just help yourself to what you want, tie it up in plastic bags, and then get them weighed and labelled at the cheese counter (yes, going to the cheese counter was a bit of a drawback!).

Anyway, it’s great! I went right up to the tubs of spices and had a good nosey around, knowing now I wouldn’t have anyone asking me what I was looking for. I resisted buying something of everything, although the choice was amazing. All the herbs were separate and priced differently, so it was difficult for me to buy mixed herbs, which is what I usually use.

I bought aniseed, just because I’ve never seen it in a supermarket before and quite fancied trying to cook with it. I’m sure my dad would have loved that. The cinnamon was also still partly in stick form and partly crushed (in transit, maybe), so it seemed very fresh. Someone who lives near me always has garlic bread for breakfast and it smells delicious, so I got some garlic powder. Although I had bought some stem ginger, I decided also to take some powdered ginger as back-up because it smelt so good. Unfortunately, I got home to find I already had two jars of powdered ginger! They had some items that I’d never heard of, along with “sausage spices” (obviously not for pork!), and “meat spices”. There was thyme, rosemary, cumin, bay leaves, hibiscus… I will work my way through it in time. But I left without my mixed herbs, which is what I came for!

Having lost a stone since I got here, I now feel able to indulge occasionally in some chocolate. The selection here really isn’t too bad. They have some lovely Cadbury flakes in a small size, which suits me just fine and the same for Twix (they could even be individual ones from the fun size pack). I really like these snack sizes as it just curbs my craving for something sweet without me having to over-indulge in the process.

Strawberries are in season just now and they are delicious, if I feel like having something healthier.

Each time I seem to spend more money and each time I think I won’t need to buy as much on my next visit, but it never works out like that. I guess it takes a while to stock up your food cupboard properly.

I now have a Spinney’s loyalty card, so at least I get reward points. Here, the card works in cycles of maybe 6 months and the more points you get, the greater the selection of “free” preselected goods you can purchase (this time, there’s an electric kettle, a heater [my flat doesn’t need one], a blender, etc; the selection is limited and changes each cycle). I haven’t been through a cycle yet, and at the moment I still don’t have enough points to get anything, but I’m collecting them fast enough!

With this new experience of the herbs section, I am now looking forward to my next shop so that I can try out some more! It’s good to still have that feeling of excitement you get when somewhere is still new to you.

Hurghada - Departure of Holger

Touristic Promenade ....

... vs Sheraton Street

Well, without my daily traumas, my life has become quite quiet – weekdays, I do my stocks and shares in the morning and 90 minutes of learning Egyptian Arabic; in the afternoons I go to the beach and read and swim; in the evenings I check my shares again, watch some TV and work on my novel (“Time Tells”). Weekends are similar, except I work on my novel in the morning because the stock market is closed, and spend a bit longer on the beach.

My life will become even quieter now (maybe!), because Holger, the last of my two visitors, left today. We spent his last evening exploring Sheraton Street. I was very well behaved and didn’t insist that we go to the KFC.

Holger was buying T-shirts for his children, so Esmat suggested we go to Cleopatra (I think that’s the right name!), which is a fixed price shop with reasonable prices. We went to Mamsha/Touristic Promenade earlier in the week, but the fixed price shop there was fairly expensive.

Sheraton Street is a chaotic and busy street where taxis probably comprise two-thirds of the traffic; the taxis honk continually as they tout for business. The shop owners do try to grab your attention to get your custom, but it was worse in Luxor when I was there some years ago now and the hassling was not really too extreme (I thought).

At night, Sheraton Street is full of lights – in the shape of palm trees – and there’s a constant stream of people walking about. This was in contrast to the Touristic Promenade (aka Mamsha), which was quiet, less hassle, had predominantly tourist shops, and was relatively expensive.

Holger has a dodgy knee at the moment (I think I mentioned this before), so he noticed that the pavements were very high; you are continually leaping up and down as you cross the side roads. Walking in the Touristic Promenade/Mamsha was a lot easier – also because it was largely pedestrianized.

To cross Sheraton Street itself, you just need to pick a time when the driver coming towards you looks less likely to run you over than others; generally, I have to say, the drivers are polite and the don’t drive so badly. Having said that, the majority of cars do have dents!

For the Brits who are reading, it was interesting to see that there was a Costa Coffee but no Starbucks. Of course, McDonalds was there as well as KFC – I’ve now seen three KFCs in Hurghada, so I’m obviously living in the right place.

We ate in a place that had a varied menu – Holger had his usual Pizza for fear of getting food poisoning; I had a steak with mushroom sauce. I commented to Holger that they didn’t ask me how I wanted the steak and he reminded me that there would be no choice in Egypt (they do not like blood). There was a variety of fresh fruit juices, so I took a strawberry juice which was the reddest drink I’ve ever had (but very tasty). The steak was 52 LE and the juice something like 15 LE.

Egypt, well, Hurghada at least, has a lot of wild dogs and cats, so there were three cats wandering around in the restaurant area (which was outside; it didn’t feel cold, now I come to think of it, although I was wearing a jacket); the cats didn’t really bother us, though. On the way home after the evening at the Touristic Promenade, Esmat pointed out a fox that was running across the road in Sahl Hasheesh. For some reason, I was quite surprised to see a fox.

Anyway, before we finally settled on the restaurant where we ate, we’d sat down in a more Egyptian-looking café. However, the more we looked at the menu, the more confused we got because we didn’t really know what anything was and the prices were so low that we were scared (well, I was, at any rate) that maybe the items were snacks rather than a proper meal (it was a café rather than a restaurant). No doubt, as I live here longer, I will get to know which places to go to, but at the moment I’m no better than a tourist.

Holger will be home as I write this, so my further explorations will be under different circumstances! I still have a lot to learn.

El Andalous - Hosting of Owners' Meetings

El Andalous Private Beach

I don’t really add much value as a resident. I’m not the person running errands for other people, I don’t argue for our rights with the management, in fact, I don’t really do much at all. However, I am appreciative of all those who put a lot of work into making sure that our community works and push hard to make sure that things get done and to get us a better deal.

I feel I should be putting something in, rather than just benefiting, so I volunteered to help with the weekly newsletter that is now being produced for the owners, since I felt that this was one area where I had the capacity to contribute. The newsletter comes off the back of the owners’ social meeting that is held every Thursday. It’s usually Jac(queline) who does the newsletter; the hosting of the meeting has been shared between Kathryn and Jac.

Anyway, Jac is in the UK for January, so we agreed that I would stand in for her and then maybe we would alternate the weeks of the newsletter so that she got a bit of a rest. Consequently, this year has seen me hosting the meetings and writing the newsletters.

At the first meeting there were six people, including myself. Something must have gone horribly wrong, because on the second meeting, no-one turned up! I sat for an hour with my wine and quavers (that I ate all by myself, with some help from Yasser) and read my “Egyptian Arabic” book. Learning Arabic script isn’t made easier by being told that the letter for the letter “dhaal” is pronounced as ‘d’ or sometimes as ‘z’ but is formally pronounced as ‘th’. Ugh! Sometimes, I get lost before I’ve even started.

I was initially sceptical that we would have news to report every single week, but fortunately things here are progressing and the meetings serve as a good opportunity to exchange information. The first week, we realised that none of us had yet received our maintenance bill for 2014 and I learned that I can get an internet top-up in the shop attached to our building (wifi requires a critical mass of residents before implementation due to cost constraints).

On the week where nobody turned up, I’d spotted some sunbeds down by the pier on my way back from the beach (yes, all of you who are reading in places where it’s cold and grey just now, I am still swimming every day under a blue, sunny sky!). I’d wondered whether, at long last, we had our own private beach, as had apparently been promised 5 years’ ago in some of the purchase contracts. I took the opportunity to ask Yasser about this while I waited and he confirmed that they’d just signed the papers for the beach. This was its first operational day.

So, these are the gentle issues that trickle through my life just now as opposed to the stress of an environment where guidelines, targets, and expectations are in continual flux as you try to keep up. Obviously, at the moment, I’m happy with my decision to change. I’d normally say that I need to be cautious as this is probably still my honeymoon period, but if it were a honeymoon, I may have already been contemplating divorce with all that’s happened. However, as it turns out, I’m content despite all that, so let’s hope this bodes well for the future.

Egypt - End of First Quarter

Undeveloped Area of Sahl Hasheesh

Yes, can you believe it, I’ve now been here three months as of 10th January.

When looking back, I wonder if maybe I’d achieved less in this period than I would have liked, due to having been housebound for at least half of that time. But then, when I revisited that photograph of my arrival day, where all my belongings were strewn over the floor, and my shipped items were still en route, I realised that I had indeed made quite a bit of progress.

Of course, I’ve written a book in this time (‘25 New Year’s Resolutions – For Dogs!’), but in terms of moving in, my flat already looks quite different and I’ve barely started to organise it. Moving the furniture around, adding a new light, purchasing a sofabed, installing and populating a bookcase – all these things have inserted a bit of “me”, even if perhaps a slightly different “me” due to my location. But part of the point of moving is to learn about yourself as you interact in different circumstances. That’s how characters in novels develop as well, and all of our lives, at the end of the day, are our stories for us to develop.

I felt really reluctant to go to bed last night and then I realised it was because I didn’t want yet another day to disappear, another day of my life to be ticked off, meaning that I would have one day less to live. This wasn’t a morbid thought, it was a celebration of how enjoyable every second of life can be. I wondered whether I’d ever felt this that deeply before.

Then, I wondered whether waking up differed now from waking up before. Now, when I wake up, my first thought is whether I want to get up yet or whether I want to sleep a bit longer. Sometimes I sleep. Sometimes, I realise I’m fully awake and I see the light coming through the curtain and I’m curious to open the curtain and to find out whether that blue sky really is there. My foot is pretty much better, but I’m still a little stiff when I first get out of bed. I open the curtain and smile. That’s pretty much how I wake up now.

Before, I would wake up and feel slightly deflated at the thought of having to go to work. Most days, I wished I could have just another 30 minutes’ sleep (I should probably have been going to bed earlier!). Sometimes, I would fantasise about having the morning off. I’d deliberate in bed for a while, which was really the time I needed for my mind and body to wake up properly so that I could get out of bed. As soon as I was in the shower – one of my favourite parts of the day – I’d be back in fine form. That was how I got up then.

Of course, I would have achieved more with my flat had I been on two feet the entire time, but then I’d experienced different things instead. I’d really have hoped never to have had to learn about the hospital system here, but breaking my foot gave me an initial view and I understand much better now what it’s like for those who break a limb!

I wonder whether I would have established myself socially so well within these first three months had I not broken that foot. I may have kept to myself and never really spoken to anyone. Now, many people know me who may otherwise not have – including most of the shopkeepers in Sahl Hasheesh who even now find the foot to be a topic of conversation.

I can’t really find anything positive to say about the rodents, other than that I will have more sympathy with others in future if I hear people complaining about them. But it was an adventure, I guess, and added colour to my moving process.

It’s been an eventful three months and, I hardly dare say it, because last time I said something similar, I promptly broke my foot the very next day, but I have to say that things are now, finally, going smoothly. Well, for the last two weeks at any rate and for that I’m extremely grateful. So far, it’s the longest period I’ve had without anything major going wrong!

Hurghada - Second Furniture Purchase (Sofabed)

My Bed With Funky Blanket

After lots of missed calls either way, Safi and I finally managed to connect and I invited her round for a coffee one morning. She’s a very rewarding person to shop with, because she’s always super enthusiastic about what you’ve bought. Consequently, she came into my flat, saw the bookcase and was immediately complimentary.

We sat out on my balcony and had coffee and shortbread and chatted for a few hours. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the hostess with the mostess, because, as is typical, as soon as I asked her round, my coffee machine broke. Consequently, she had to bring her own coffee while I finished off the dregs of the coffee that had fused two sets of extension cords before I managed to get all the water to filter through. Nevertheless, the coffee and chat was a pleasant start to the day and I’m starting to feel like a lady who lunches!

By the end of it, Safi had kindly offered to take me round the shops again, since she was going in anyway to get some draught excluder. We arranged to meet at 10am in our foyer the next day.

This time, I was determined to make the most of my opportunity. Also, I now knew roughly what was in the shops and had since looked again in Senzo Mall and had a better idea of what was available and where.

We went to the Mona Centre first for the draught excluder. This time, I made up my mind to buy anything if I needed it. As a result I ended up with a laundry basket (which I suspect was quite expensive), some trays to organise my bathroom items (cleaning stuff, first aid, shower and hair gels etc, personal and dental hygiene), and one replacement extension cord. It came to 420 LE, which I found expensive, but the trays were much nicer than I’d seen in Spinneys, as was the laundry basket, and these were one-off costs.

Safi then drove to the shop (In and Out), located further down on the opposite side of the same street, where we both thought the sofabed was located – we had to do a rather alarming turn in a dual carriageway to get there, but that’s the Egyptian road system for you.

We went in, only to find that the sofabed wasn’t in that shop (so it was just as well I didn’t ask Esmat’s cousin to stop there!). So, ironically, we ended up going in and out of In And Out.

Convinced that the sofabed was in a shop in this general area, we walked a few shops along and spotted the sofabed in the window of Cairo Furniture Centre. We rattled the door, but it was locked! Again, this is Egypt, where everything opens late. Safi went into a lighting shop a few doors along to ask if they knew when the shop would re-open; they guessed in about one hour. I said that it was OK and that I would get a taxi another time to collect it.

Meanwhile, the shop owner, not wishing to miss a trick, offered to open up his other shop next door, which had a lot of lighting in it, for us to look round. We agreed to take a look – I was happy to do so, because I needed a new lampshade for my lounge area (I can’t read in my lounge at the moment because my current light is so dull) and was also looking for a standard lamp.

The selection was a bit overwhelming. Like many Egyptian shops, it was a fairly disorderly collection of items all piled into (and hanging from the ceiling as this was a light shop) a small space – for any Dundonians reading, it reminds me a bit of a stall in Den’s Road Market or, for everyone else, something like what you’d imagine an old-fashioned antique / curiosity shop to be like.

Anyway, it was worth the shopkeeper’s while and we must have made his day. I bought myself a chandelier-type lampshade (very popular style here in Egypt) and another crystal table lamp in the shape of leaves and flowers. My lampshade reminded me of my grandmother (mother’s side – oh, did I say before, in Arabic, they have a different word for uncle on your father’s side to the word for uncle on your mother’s side, how complicated is that?). My grandmother used to have a chandelier and my mother always used to comment how I was like her in that I liked things that sparkle. I now look at the lampshade and wonder if it is really a bit too old-fashioned, but too late now!

By the time we exited the lighting shop, the shop with my sofabed in it had opened, so the shopkeeper opening up his lighting shop for us had some advantage for us (well, for me, at any rate!) as well.

I made the guy in the furniture shop demonstrate how to operate the sofabed several times and tried it out myself, since I didn’t want to buy a sofabed and then find I couldn’t put it up/down. Again, they didn’t do delivery, but they organised someone to do it for me and we agreed a time of 3pm.

Off we then went to Senzo Mall, where I bought a replacement coffee machine. At first, I couldn’t find any filter coffee and for a horrible moment I thought I’d bought a coffee machine in a country that didn’t sell ground coffee (I’ve been using coffee from the UK until now). However, I’m sure they’ve had it on previous occasions, so it must just not be in stock just now. In Egypt, supermarket shopping can be a bit hit and miss as to what is available on any particular day, so you need to buy what you need when you see it.

In the end, I found something that looked like ground coffee. There were packs of the same brand in all different colours and most of them said “with extra cardamom and other spices”, which wasn’t what I wanted. The blue one didn’t say that, but it also didn’t say anything about it being pure coffee either, so I wasn’t sure whether it had spices but just not “extra” spices. I bought it anyway. All I can say is that it tastes a bit strange.

We got home and I waited for 3pm and the furniture didn’t arrive. At 4pm, I got a bit nervous, so I looked to see if my receipt had a phone number. It was in Arabic, but I was able to transliterate the numbers OK, except for not being able to make out from the small letters whether one number was a 2 or a 3. I dialled, but got no reply.

After 30 minutes, I decided I should try again. I’m sure there must be a facility on my phone somewhere where you can see the number you last dialled. I pressed an icon to see if that was it and to my horror the phone started ringing. I was in too much of a panic to notice who the call was from or even to register that it was someone calling me and not me them. It completely freaked me out and I frantically tried to work out how to cut the call. The red thing didn’t seem to want to swipe. Anyway, somehow it all stopped but I was too stressed after that to do anything. Did I tell you that I hate mobile phones?

At 5pm, the furniture still hadn’t arrived. I know this is Egypt (TIE, as Safi would say), but by now I was starting to worry a little, so I plucked up the courage to pick up my phone again and re-dial the number for the shop. This time, someone answered, but it was a woman with a screaming child in the background, so obviously I’d plumped for 2 when it should have been 3. I had no idea what to say to her and after saying “Cairo Furniture Store?” hoping she would say “Sorry, wrong number” and finding that she just kept on saying “Hello” instead, I just said “Sorry” and hung up, feeling sure that she wouldn’t have understood a word I said. I tell you, phones are a complete nightmare.

Shortly afterwards, though, the sofabed arrived, so in the end all was well, and I am now writing this blog in the new library area of my lounge.

El Andalous - First Dinner Guests

Il Gusto

A bit like when I organised my party, I was also a bit rash in deciding to invite my first dinner guests round. As you know, Holger is over for a month and now Snejana and Dmitri are here for ten days, so it seemed like a good opportunity, and a manageable number, for hosting my first dinner.

I’d forgotten, though, somehow, that I am in Egypt and it’s not really so easy. For a start, I didn’t have a dining table and chairs, well, not proper ones at any rate. Still, it was a good kick in the backside for me finally to clean thoroughly my glass table that lives on the balcony and to bring it inside, along with the four chairs; of course, this left my balcony devoid of any furniture at all.

The “dining” chairs are quite large and lean slightly back, so aren’t really ideal for sitting up at a table. It was also difficult to know where to place the chairs so that they didn’t block space around them; in the end the fourth chair had to be brought manually to the table and taken away afterwards for there to be enough room to move about.

In the light of this, I’ve decided that my study area/spare bedroom will also be a dining room; my study table (when I get one) can double up as a dining table. I just love multi-functional spaces! The only problem will be locating the furniture and getting it to my flat… no doubt a future blog on that one!

I decided on roast chicken for the meal – relatively easy, assuming that potatoes were available in Spinneys (which they weren’t last time). Starters was planned to be carrot and ginger soup, also relatively easy, especially now that all my cooking equipment had arrived. However, I ran out of time (how is this possible when I'm not even working??) to prepare a dessert.

At the time, I looked in Spinneys and thought about baking a cake, but decided I needed to experiment with the flour here first (I also found the flour in Switzerland puzzling with so many different varieties). I contemplated ice cream and chocolate sauce (basically a Coupe Denmark), but wasn’t sure what the chocolate sauce was like here. Also, I had not yet located the ice cream. I wondered about a banana split, but then thought Holger may freak out at having fruit over here. Moreover, at the time I was shopping, Esmat’s cousin was outside waiting for me and he was, I felt, rather stressed, so I didn’t have the time to deliberate as much as I would have liked. In the end, in my indecision, I completely forgot to get anything at all.

I’d also forgotten that my cooker was a bit idiosyncratic as I’ve adapted to it for cooking for myself, but hadn’t thought that there would be extra demand on it when cooking for more people. First of all, I forgot to switch it on (how more basic can you get than that?) because in my head I was originally going to switch it on when people arrived. However, Snejana and Dmitri were delayed due to Esmat cancelling his taxi service because his father was in a coma in hospital (which just shows us that we often moan about trivial things when we should be happy and grateful for what we have when we can). Meanwhile, I forgot to rethink my timing of putting the chicken on and foolishly continued to wait for them to arrive before starting it.

Then I forgot that the fuse goes each time that I cook something on the hob at the same time as having something in the oven. Consequently, even though I turned the oven on, for a while, it still wasn’t cooking due to the fuse going. This repeated itself at various points in the evening. I think my guests were near starvation level by the time it was ready.

For dessert, I made do with coffee and chocolates, but I’d failed to notice that I was running out of coffee; it was just something I assumed I had. In the end, the rest of the coffee bag was just enough for the four of us, but it was a close thing!

Nevertheless, it was rewarding for me to see my flat in “hostess” mode and all furnished (of sorts). I enjoyed the company and the chat; it made me miss having all my old friends around me, realising that this was just a one-off fleeting visit from those present. However, I’m sure I’ll fully establish myself here in good time. All the food went, which is either a good sign (they all liked it) or a bad sign (they all left still hungry). I will need to practice making some desserts for a future occasion!

Hurghada - First Furniture Purchase (Bookcase)

Sahl Hasheesh - Present (Green) and Future (To Be Built)

Despite saying that I’m settling in, I’m actually still very new. Now that I am back on two feet, I’ve turned myself to organising my flat a bit better. I’d already halved my lounge space and brought all my lounge furniture closer to the balcony doors; I was pretty pleased with this as it made the designated lounge area cosier and gave me some room for a library that would double up as a spare bedroom.

However, moving all my furniture down towards the balcony doors made my flat look empty, further emphasised by the presence of boxes of books and pictures dotted around the flat, waiting to be opened. My flat looked more like a temporary shelter than a home.

I needed to get a bookcase so that I could unpack some of those boxes and a sofabed so that I could sit in my library area. After looking at my boxes and contemplating what I’d seen when out with Safi, I made up my mind as to what I thought would fit best.

I initially hoped that maybe Safi could take me back to buy the items I desired. However, the more I thought about it, the more I realised I should really be more independent and take my courage in both hands and handle it all myself. I had already had more assistance than I could possibly have dreamed of and I was in danger of becoming too dependent on others. In normal circumstances, I would have expected to have done everything on my own, so surely I could take it from here?

I decided to get Esmat to take me to the places for the bookshelf and sofabed, perhaps stay in that area for an hour or so while I located the shops and sorted things out, plus maybe look at some other stuff. After that, I would go to Senzo Mall to do some more food shopping. I had a plan!

But the plan was stuffed from the very beginning. Sometimes, I wonder if there’s any point in making plans at all. It’s not as if anything ever actually runs to plan, so they are there just to mock you, really, and who wants to spend their life being mocked?

Anyway, I phoned Esmat and unfortunately he was in hospital sitting with his father who had been taken ill. I felt awful for phoning at this difficult time, but Esmat sent me his cousin in a taxi to take me instead. I didn’t bother going into the details of what I wanted with Esmat; I would leave that to discuss with his cousin rather than burden him further.

The cousin arrived but didn’t speak as good English as Esmat, although this did give me the opportunity to try out my small vocabulary of Arabic, which he seemed to enjoy (needless to say, his English was better than my Arabic).

He didn’t know the place I wanted to go, but we went to the street and looked out for it. I was a bit surprised at how long the road was; it wasn’t going to be the easy walking from shop to shop that I’d originally anticipated. I deliberated in my head as to whether I should get him to drive me further down the road later so that I could shop in that area as well, but decided to leave mentioning this until after I’d finished my first task, which was to buy the bookcase. Otherwise, it would be too complicated and would most likely get lost in translation.

Anyway, the cousin spotted the store before I did. He parked outside the shop – as usual in Egypt, getting there wasn’t so straight forward; he had to drive back and back again in a kind of zig-zag to park by the shop. Inwardly, I prayed that this was indeed the shop selling the required bookcase.

I initially asked the driver to stay for an hour, but he looked at me in such a state of shock that I backtracked down to ten minutes, while I just went in and bought the bookcase. Still, he appeared uncertain and said he would have to phone and confirm that this was all OK with Esmat, which he did.

I went into the shop and dithered for a while over the bookcase, but feeling a bit pressurised by the waiting taxi, I just went ahead and didn’t even think to bargain (the price was on the item). As an aside, I asked if they delivered, having just assumed that they would, and was shocked to find that they didn’t.

After some discussion over what options were open to me (the shopkeepers were all very friendly and pleasant and willing to help), I asked the driver if we could tie the bookcase to the top of the taxi roof. Again, he looked a bit shell-shocked, but agreed. In the end, five men gathered round the taxi, trying their best to fix the bookshelf to the rack on the taxi roof. I was now starting to feel as if I was really living the Egyptian life!

As they finished, the shopkeeper waved my money in the air and beckoned me to come back in. My heart sank as I expected an argument about whether I’d paid the right money, but to my surprise, he claimed I had given them too much money and handed some back. I felt a mixture of confusion, gratitude, relief, and scepticism! In retrospect, I should have been more grateful!

I asked Esmat’s cousin if he could drop me off at Senzo Mall and, again, he looked rather stressed and said he would have to check with Esmat. He got this OK’d by Esmat.

I deliberated as we drove past more shops as to whether to ask him to stop off for my sofabed, but I wasn’t entirely sure which shop it was (just the general location) or how long it would take me to find it, and decided I would have a problem if the next shop didn’t deliver either. So, in the end, I left it, especially since it would stress out my taxi driver further anyway. However, it left me feeling a bit dissatisfied with myself, because I wasn’t exactly fulfilling my plan and I would now have to do a separate journey. But trying for the sofabed on the same day was now getting to be too stressful.

We got to Senzo Mall and I asked the driver if he could come back in 2 hours. Again, he looked distressed, asked me what he should do with my bookcase on top of the roof, and said he would have to liaise with Esmat, who was still presumably in hospital at his father’s bedside. I felt so guilty!

Again, Esmat gave the OK and the cousin just waited in car park while I did my shopping (and had a KFC). And from there, eventually, I arrived home. Esmat’s cousin looked delighted when I paid him for the journey, so at least I felt that, despite everything, it all ended on good terms. I suspect it may have started out as a favour to Esmat and then became his actual job.

The bookcase fitted into its allocated position nicely, I’m happy to say, and was just about big enough for all my books. Now it’s in, I’ve decided I need a table as well, so I’m going to have to fathom out how to do all of this a bit better! For once, I missed Switzerland!