El Andalous - Still Here (Showers)

All Peaceful Here

Well, surprise, surprise, my trip got cancelled due to the coronavirus. It was already cancelled a few weeks ago, but I wrote last week’s blog in advance, thinking I’d be away at that point, but I wasn’t!

I don’t want to talk too much about the coronavirus as it’s all that I see everywhere (news, facebook, messenger, etc), but I feel I should say something about the state of play here. I think as of today, Egypt reports something like 576 cases and 36 deaths in total, although, as anywhere, it’s hard to know how accurate the figures are. Thankfully, it’s currently way below the 900 deaths a day in Italy or the horrifying increase in cases in the UK.

Hurghada is not allowing people in or out, although they’ve started having empty planes coming in to take tourists back home. The beaches have been closed. We have curfew from 7pm to 6am; the Egyptians are a night people, so those are busy times here. Shops are closed Friday and Saturday. Entertainment (from cafes and restaurants to cinemas and gyms), education centres, mosques, should not be visited at any time. Only essential shopping is allowed and shops close at 5pm.. No social gatherings. In Sahl Hasheesh, entry is open only to residents, services, and deliveries, and visitors of residents when notified in advance. It's like it's own little quarantined area. Let's hope we can keep it virus-free!

So, not so different from the rest of the world really. I’m hoping that Egypt has taken action promptly and so it will not spread so quickly here, but let’s see. There are definitely worse places to be during lock down!

Anyway, it will no doubt get increasingly difficult for me to write my blog as I won’t be out and about. I’m focusing (or trying to focus) on my writing. I’ve decided to start my third novel, as I’m still waiting for teenage feedback on the one that’s almost ready to start submitting to agents; the second novel probably won’t require that much more work and I’d rather refine that once I’ve started submitting the first one. In the mean time, I’d like a third one in first draft version so that I’m not faced at some stage with my only option being a blank sheet.

For my third novel, I’ve decided to try to write a bit more out of my comfort zone and go for a character that’s experiencing things way different from my own life. So, it’s a male 17 year old who is working, into football, has an accident and has his leg amputated. I don’t have much of a plot in my head yet, other than that he will have psychokinetic experiences that reflect the emotions he goes through as he comes to terms with the changes in his life. I’m hoping that ideas will suggest themselves to me as I write. I used this “pantser” methodology for one of my second novel (which was actually my first, originally). It’s exciting to find out what I come up with as I go along; a bit like reading the novel, but I feel nervous that I will discover it's unworkable. But at the moment, my imagination isn’t working, so I’m going with the flow.

It’s been a bit depressing as I'm spending a lot of time in front of my screen thinking I haven’t a clue what to write. For example, just to get my character from the football changing room to the showers took a lot of googling. What I was really wanting to know was whether a male 17 year old guy would put a towel round him to go to the shower, but in the end I had to ask a friend (who said not).

I did come across this interesting thread of guys discussing group showers. Apparently, most young adolescent boys have to use communal showers at school and they are nervous the first few times, but after that find it’s no big deal. The older boys, who are totally used to it, chat quite normally in the shower. Indeed, some said it was the best place after football to catch up and make plans.

To my amusement, they also speculated about whether girls found it embarrassing at first like the boys did (the guys are all worried about others sizing up their appendages). They decided it would be less of a problem for girls because they didn’t have the whole issue about appendages. Whereas, the truth of it is that women are way more body conscious than men, well in the UK, at any rate. 

Feedback on my novel was that I shouldn’t have teenage girls going into communal (unisex) showers at the gym because they just wouldn’t do it. It was so obvious when it was pointed out to me, but I’ve got so used to Continental Europe, where nudity is more normalized, that I’d completely forgotten. Also, girls, who are renowned for being so chatty, don’t generally chat in the showers. And a fair proportion would wear a towel even before going to the communal showers. So, completely different from the men.

Anyway, it was all very interesting, but it was a lot of work just to write “he went to the shower” in my novel. At this rate, it’ll take decades to finish even the first draft!

El Andalous - Hurghada Museum

Me Outside Hurghada Museum

A very exciting development over here was the opening of Hurghada’s first museum. It was badly needed, as tourists come to Egypt wanting to see something of the history. Hurghada may be a beach resort, but it doesn’t mean it has to be a cultural desert.

Land is relatively cheap over here, so the museum is on quite a spacious area. There’s a huge entrance (hopefully they’ll add items into that space, such as a museum shop or something), then you walk through a lane in the open air which will be lined with shops (most were not yet open). After this, you enter and there’s a corridor of shops. These were mostly open. There weren’t any cafes or restaurants open yet, which I thought was a bit of a missed opportunity on their side. The museum is on the first floor (ie, the floor above ground floor, for avoidance of doubt).

The museum itself was quite a surprise. I was expecting it to be pretty much just the usual Pharaonic history, going through the various dynasties; instead it took you through life not only during Pharaonic times, but also through the Greco-Roman eras. It covered Christianity and Judaism as well, so it was admirably inclusive. I think my favorite piece was an amazing book, illustrated with such fine detail, it was incredible. Of course, there were amazing items from Pharaonic times, too; it’s so hard to imagine that such detail could be carved all those millennia ago.

I think it’s not quite finished yet, as there were some empty spaces, and not all items had been labeled yet. But it’s still more than worth the visit. Do go!

There was someone making a film of it who was an Egyptologist from the museum – maybe they are going to put that on their facebook site. He was willing to answer any questions, but I don’t think that was why he was there (I think he was there just to do the filming).

We spent about 90 minutes going round. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the marina. It’s not so stressful getting a taxi these days, because they’re obliged to use the metre (but I did have to ask him). We went to Heaven, which is one of my favorite restaurants in Hurghada. I always have steak, but this time I branched out and had duck. It was also very good, even though when it first arrived I thought the duck was just a bread roll and that they’d forgotten the meat. Things don’t always look quite how you expect over here!

This didn’t happen here, but it did in the KFC the other week, and I thought I may as well mention it; in Egypt they quite often say “bon appétit” after you’ve finished your meal rather than before it. It takes me aback each time it happens (and that’s even for me, as a Brit, and Brits don’t say anything before a meal these days; we just get stuck in. Not sure if there are still families that say grace before meals!).

We didn’t bother ordering a taxi back as it seemed more convenient just to hail one, since we knew what the going price should be. The first taxi was a bit dodgy. First of all he didn’t want to use the metre. Then he wanted us to pay upfront (I’m sure that’s a standard scam, so don’t do it!). I foolishly complied and then I think they tried to say I’d paid 20 LE and not 200 LE (I was wanting 100 LE change). I said we’d get out and find the police at which point they gave me my money back, saying they couldn’t do the trip for the fare we wanted.

We went to another taxi, who accepted our suggested fare, but wouldn’t use the metre. I am wondering if the metre doesn’t hold for as far as Sahl Hasheesh. The driver wasn’t any problem and was also not making any fuss about giving us change.

No blog next week as I’m still on a trip round Egypt. I’ll put in a placeholder.

El Andalous - Coronavirus

El Andalous Beach - Flooded

While the world is in turmoil over COVID-19, my life is going on pretty much as usual.

At BestWay (local supermarket in Sahl Hasheesh), the people serving are wearing plastic gloves and the delivery people wear masks. In El Andalous, housekeeping were wearing masks, but they seem to have stopped that now. Maybe they’ll start again as I saw one person in reception wearing one, but he laughed when he saw me looking at him, so perhaps he was just mucking about. That kind of sums up the atmosphere. There’s no sense of panic whatsoever, which is hugely refreshing, in my opinion. They’ve put sterilizing handwash in the toilets in El Andalous.

The airport is being thoroughly cleaned (regularly, one would hope) and passengers are undergoing a health check as they enter the country. The threat is more from tourists than anything else. Other than that, it’s pretty much the same as usual here. There’s no panic buying (although there was a huge queue at etisalat, which is where I get my phone and internet, but that’s fairly usual), people aren’t generally wearing masks, the atmosphere is relaxed. And it’s not as if there are masses of people in Sahl Hasheesh anyway. I’d probably find it quite hard to get within 1m of someone.

It actually feels a bit bizarre when I see all the news about panic buying, establishments closing, flights being cancelled, borders being closed, people asked to stay at home, businesses going down the pan, stockmarket spiraling down, etc. It seems like a world away, as if I’m just watching some kind of horror film. I’m only saying that it seems surreal when you’re looking at it from the outside; I’m not being blasé.

I have been wondering why they don’t just tell everyone who is feeling okay to go in the sauna every day for 30 minutes as a precautionary measure. I looked it up and apparently there’s not enough evidence that the sauna would have the desired effect (as in not enough studies; not that the evidence is controversial), but theoretically it should help as long as it isn’t in your lungs. It’s surely better than lockdown for 14 days just to see if you develop anything and cheaper. I guess the 14-day quarantine must be the better proven strategy.

Here, the bigger news has been the weather. It’s been fairly hot for the time of year (so hopefully that’s also killing the virus), but we had sandstorms, rain, high winds and electricity cuts. The wind is always really dramatic through the palm trees; their branches wave about like cheerleaders’ pom poms. The sea came up really high and covered one of the piers. The water – not sure if it was rain or sea or a bit of both – went past the beach area and onto the grass just before the beach. The sand, of course, just dumped itself all over my furniture. I cleaned, but by the time I had someone over in the afternoon, she was already able to draw me a diagram on the accumulated sand on the table. There were a couple of power cuts in the evening, but after I’d eaten, so it wasn’t too bad (just a bit eerie, with the wind). In Sahl Hasheesh, we got off lightly compared with Cairo. And compared with all the floods in the UK. So, I guess I’m saying that compared with the rest of the world, my big news and woes are miniscule.

Today, the storms seem to have gone. It was a beautiful day by the beach, the water was calm, and I got too hot reading as I lay in the sun, so that was me rid of any virus, I reckon, even if the two Brits I welcomed with a hug were carrying it. I am feeling blessed!

El Andalous - Back to Writing

Lofty Thoughts!

I’m really into my writing at the moment. When I first returned to Egypt, I was so busy and felt a bit frustrated that I wasn’t able to get down to any of the things I’d planned to do (learn Arabic, write, read). So maybe because I’d felt deprived, I was all the more keen when I finally settled and had time.

I’m finding writing pretty similar to swimming. I know all the theory about what I’m supposed to do, but do I actually do it? The answer, of course, is No. What’s stopping me? I have no idea.

But at least I know it’s not just me. I was reading this person’s blog who runs a writing course. She was saying how she kept on telling one of her students to be specific in her descriptions – so, for example, rather than just write “car”, use “Volkswagen Beetle” – but this student for some reason just couldn’t do it. Time and time again, she’d write “car” or “food” or “tree”.

Everyone’s a bit blind to their own mistakes, of course. In Space Shapes (or maybe the title will be Where the Magic Lies, or maybe it’ll change again…), my main character has several instances where she thinks she knows what someone else is thinking, but she’s wrong. In a similar, but different, fashion, I was convinced that (apart from one character where overuse of names is deliberate), my characters were only using each other’s names where they’d usually be used. But two of my beta-readers thought I was over doing it. When I looked again, with different eyes, I realized they were right. And this was despite the fact that I’d already gone through the manuscript and “corrected” some of this overuse before I gave it to them. I’d obviously not been quite objective enough with myself when I did so to see the errors properly.

The manuscript is out with some test readers, too, at the moment (ie, teenagers, since it’s a young adult [YA] book). I’m a bit petrified, of course, since if they don’t like it, that’s the book down the pan. But the more I read online, the more I think the whole young adult genre is a bit of a mess. For a start, I find it strange that an age range should be regarded as a genre, but let’s forget that.

I’ve read at least two strings of conversation where adults have been complaining about the explicitness of some of the YA books that are out there. I saw a quote from one book and I was shocked! There were even teenagers contributing to the thread and complaining about the number of books portraying them as having sex and drugs the whole time. One person claimed that pervs hung around the YA section of the bookstore, because it was like porn and they needn’t hang round the porn section. A few were requesting that books be classified according to content (a bit like films, I guess).

Of course, there are plenty of YA books not like this at all, but I suppose the problem for parents is knowing which ones they would regard as okay for their children to read. It’s a personal matter, of course, as to how much you feel you still need to “protect” your children once they’re at YA age.

On top of this, I had a few friends asking if their <13 year olds could act as test readers (I’d stated that my book had no sex or violence). I agreed, interested to see how they’d find it (they have been the quickest to read and provide feedback, all my late teens are very busy and seem to be delaying). I got positive feedback from them.

But that raises a whole load of other questions. There’s no way my book would be classified as middle grade. But children mature at different times and reading capacity differs widely too. So, if a ten year old can understand YA literature with no problem, what happens if a ten year old starts browsing the YA section and the more explicit books? Am I being too prudish?

This also made me agonise over the use of expletives in my book. I only have one very mild swear word, but I’m not sure I’d have used it if I thought my readership might be as young as 10 years old. Then I saw a teacher saying she wouldn’t put anything on her summer reading list that had swear words; she was excluding a very well-reviewed YA novel because it had a total of four swear words (very mild ones). I was surprised, but it’s enough to make me remove the only one I have. Some might criticize my book now for being unrealistically “clean”. But at least one literary agent I saw was looking for “clean teen” submissions.

Anyway, it’s an interesting journey, and it’s easier to rant about the publishing industry needing to adapt itself rather than to focus on my own mistakes. I’m sure I’ll get enough pointers on my errors from my test readers (thank you so much in advance, if you happen to be reading!!).

El Andalous - Off to the Dermatologist

Eczema Patch

I lead a quiet life and these days, I don’t even go into Hurghada that much. I’m happy to sit and write, have a swim and a read of my book, watch a bit of TV/learn Arabic/write/read (select one). This means that going to Hurghada becomes a major event in my week (or even month).

I’d recently started to have an itchy area on the left of my scalp, above my ear. At first I thought it was a mosquito bite. Then I thought the mosquito had bitten me yet again. Then I came to realize that it must be something else.

You can self-prescribe over here in Egypt, so I went to the pharmacist next door to ask his advice. He suggested a cream as a temporary measure but stressed I should see the doctor. Ugh, really?

Fortunately, I know a wonderful doctor in our block who is a really charming man. He’s always commenting on my swimming and we usually exchange a few jokes when we see each other. I decided to ask him and sent him a message along with a photo.

Taking the photo wasn’t so easy because at first I forgot which side of the phone was the viewer. As a result, I took a few photos and was a bit puzzled at how my perspective was always completely out. But I got there in the end.

Unfortunately, my doctor friend said it was beyond his expertise and recommended a dermatologist, asking me to let him know how it went. Pressure. I couldn’t really ignore his advice if he was asking for feedback.

The first trauma is having to phone a stranger. I hate phoning, but I hate phoning strangers even more, and even more than that, I hate phoning Egyptian strangers who I might not understand and they might not understand me.

It probably took me a week to pluck up the courage to phone. Fortunately, the dermatologist was very pleasant and clear. I asked him where his practice was and I could hear him hesitating. This is Egypt. They don’t have proper addresses. He explained it was in El Nasr Street, on the opposite side from Spinneys above somewhere that I couldn’t catch, and on the third floor. He rephrased it as another supermarket that was opposite Spinneys. OK, fine. I knew roughly where that Spinneys was and I’d have to work it out from there.

I got a taxi – I’m also not fond of getting taxis either although it’s far less stress than it was when I first came here. Taxis are now legally obliged to use their meters and I order it via WhatsApp anyway. The stressful (but also good) bit is that it means lots of contact – a message to say what the car will be, then one to say when it will come, then a call to say it’s there early, and then sometimes a call afterwards with a short survey on whether the driver was good and the fare reasonable.

I asked to be dropped opposite Spinneys, but he dropped me outside. No worries. I’ m a big girl now. I can cross the street. It’s still horrible dashing across the road with cars racing in your direction, and although I don’t act cool (I still run), I’m fairly okay these days about stepping out in the traffic. I went up to Abu Ashara (another supermarket on the other side), although I would have thought I’d have understood Abu Ashara on the phone as I’m familiar with it. But who knows? I’m not confident about my ability to understand anything on the phone.

But then I noticed that nowhere had three floors. I got to wondering whether opposite Spinneys meant opposite Spinneys to the left, as there was a medical centre there. Maybe something had got a bit lost in translation. I crossed the road again, went up to the building and the medical centre was on the third floor. This was promising! Alas, it wasn’t right.

After wandering around a bit more, I eventually saw a building on the opposite side with several floors and lots of notice boards plastered across it. Beneath it was a large shop of some kind. I read the notices from the other side of the road. I’m very proud to say that I was able to read the Arabic and locate a notice among them that gave the name of my doctor. There was no European lettering, only Arabic. Gold star for me.

I crossed the road yet again and wandered round the building, trying to find the entrance. Eventually I got there, walked up to the third floor, and my doctor finally found me as I was wandering down the corridor, trying to locate the correct door.

The appointment was short and my diagnosis was a simple form of eczema, so nothing at all really. The consultation cost 200 LE.

My taxi had waited since he didn’t have change so it would be easier to pay for the return journey rather than the single. He didn’t charge me for waiting, so I was happy with that. But that lack of change is also typical. Why do taxi drivers never have small money? Venturing into town is always such an Egyptian experience.