Destination Anywhere!

The "Big D" and Me

I am so sorry to have not blogged in so long. It is not because I have had nothing to say, but rather that I have been truly overwhelmed by both work and domestic life this past year back in America. Call it “culture shock,” but life here is much busier than it was in Europe or the Middle East! And parenting is way more intense (“Where is the wine bar?” we continue to ask, a standard feature in London schools at most parent’s nights, and “Why so many sports so far away?” I wonder as I drive through darkness on a Monday night). What’s more, neither Daniel nor I had worked in the States since the late eighties (gone is my seven-hour time zone advantage when on deadline) and so we were used to being in America for vacation, not work—doing puzzles, not power points at my parent’s lovely home.

Which brings me to our “living” situation.” It could be the basis of a hilarious sitcom titled, “Three-generations, One Roof.” That is to say that we continue to live, one year on, with my parents and my older brother in my folks house in what is best described as a modern version of “The Waltons” (though we are all snoring too loudly to yell “good night” out loud to one another.) We have big plans to change our housing and get out of my parent’s basement (we now call it the “lower level”), but I will not announce anything yet for fear of jinxing it.

The biggest change perhaps--beyond living a twelve-hour plane ride away from relatives and now living only footsteps away-- is that before moving home, I had quite solitary days. Whether in London, Paris, Brussels, or Cairo, the moment the kids were parked at school and Daniel went to work, my world was my own. I would write a while, walk the dog a while, and then write again. My social life was confined to sight-seeing and evening outings with friends so my days were quite productive.

Now, I have twenty-years of casual conversation with my mom to catch up on over coffee each morning. Then, there is the plethora of grocery shopping at places where the choice of products continues to overwhelm me (I used to pick up a chicken, a piece of fish, and a few vegetables daily at the corner or outdoor market, now I spend long afternoons lost at Costco looking for a box of oatmeal). My father, then meanders in around 4 pm from work, pulling out cheese and crackers and chilled bottles of wine for a positively Victorian cocktail hour that begins at 5 pm sharp. Most evenings include dinner for eight to ten, as my sister, or one of my cousin’s stops by. I have become very good and make army-sized quantities of food to feed everyone each night.

Somehow I have still managed to get some work done, despite these distractions. Actually, quite a bit and now I have two monthly columns to write. One on teens for the NYT and one on travel for the IHT (International Herald Tribune.)

But while I have been relishing this time back with my family, I now feel my “repatriation period” is finally over and I am ready to leave the nest a bit more, for at least a few days a week, and branch out on my own into new territory.

Anyone who has been spending time with me this year is tired of my talking so much about Detroit, but I found in the Motor City my new spiritual home. Through the luxury of reporting a few stories for the paper, I have discovered a place that speaks to me on so many levels, though I barely knew it growing up--except through my parent’s stories of shopping at Hudson’s or lunching at the Detroit Athletic Club.

Like many people in my hometown of Ann Arbor, I did not venture out of the safe, leafy zone of this university town very often, except to head north for the summers. Detroit was not even on my radar beyond the occasional meal in Greek Town, or hitting a jazz club back in the early eighties with college friends.

But I did write a travel article on Detroit for the NYT back in 2004 when I happened to be home visiting, and that is what led seven years later to my touring Detroit again. I decided it was time to update that story for the paper last February, which led me to find other stories in the Big D I wanted to report.

Now, I hope to get an apartment there, so I can spend more time continuing to get to know the people who have worked so hard to keep Detroit going against many odds, and hope through publicizing their work to help the city make its way back to the future, which I truly believe will be a very bright one.

The New Egypt

         
  If it came as a shock to family and friends that I decided to go to Cairo last week, it is because I shocked myself with my last-minute decision to visit Egypt. Here is what happened. I was in London, visiting Harriet and working on a story, when I was asked to do a radio interview with Peter Greenberg, a travel journalist, about Egypt and tourism.  Mubarak had just stepped down the day before.

        Two minutes into the interview, Greenberg said to me, “Don’t you just want to tell your readers to go to Cairo right now and support the country?”  I answered, in my best good-girl voice, “I would, but there is currently a State Department advisory warning against all non-essential travel to Egypt.” Greenberg then said, without missing a beat, “I think the best time to visit a place is when it has a State Department travel advisory.”  Ten minutes after we finished the interview, I was looking up flights to Cairo.

        It goes without saying that Daniel and I were relieved to not be in Cairo with the children during the revolution, but disappointed as journalists to have missed such a big story by mere months. I suppose that is why he and the kids, and even my parents, encouraged me to go to Egypt, knowing I would be able to both catch up with our dear friends there and try to help the struggling tourism industry by writing an article. 

        In many ways, I flew in at the perfect time. Other than one close friend, who had to leave for Libya the day I arrived, I saw nearly all our best friends, most of whom had barely seen each other during the uprising because of the curfews enforced, the work that had to be done, and forced evacuations.  As a result, I ended up hearing everyone’s “revolution” stories, on the first occasion many had had to share them. Some were terrifying (hearing gunfire outside their windows, seeing looters with AK 47’s breaking into houses next door, being evacuated without pets), while others were hilarious (one suburban friend was evacuated with a huge military convey to a hotel in downtown Cairo only to sneak back home the next day for the bathing suit she forgot.) The one thing, I had not realized is when the U.S. Embassy evacuates its staff and families, they cannot return for thirty days—a big disruption, particularly for those with school-aged children.

          
    Cairo itself seemed wonderfully different. There is this new patriotism and freedom that one can actually feel on the streets.  Not only do you hear minor protests all over the city (an amazing sound as no one was allowed to gather before without fear of arrest), but you also see everyone cleaning up streets. I walked by girls with buckets washing off graffiti and dirty sidewalks, boys painting buildings, bridges and curbs, and people sweeping everywhere.  I had never seen the place looking so clean. Then, as I wrote in my article, there is this new gathering spot of Tahrir Square, which feels like a recreation park now, with people hanging on the grassy sides of the traffic circle selling revolutionary souvenirs, balloons and food, sharing gossip and news. There are even people painting black, red and white stripes (the colors of the Egyptian flag) on people’s faces, as well as on the trunks of bordering trees. And though the military are everywhere, they are smiling at those who pass by, posing for pictures in front of their tanks, and looking stunning in their red wool berets.

        Sadly though, there is also an intense anxiety that was equally palpable everywhere. Ahab, our 24-year old former driver and a recent protestor--like so many people I spoke to of all ages--was extremely optimistic one minute, and then severely depressed the next. There was hardly one conversation I had with those truly invested in the country that did not begin with their hopes and dreams for a democratic, free Egypt, and end with their head in their hands asking, “What is going to become of our country?”

        There is a real fear that the military might not allow a transition to democracy, or that the young will become so impatient they will strike and protest to the point that it paralyzes the country and destroys them economically before they can even hold fair elections. Already the latter has happened. Last Friday, in what has become a regular Friday night demonstration in Tahrir, the police became briefly violent, wanting the protestors to leave at midnight so as not to disrupt life the next day. The protestors, however, vowed to return, not giving up on their demands that the military embrace reform. 

    What is apparent is the pent up anger of the masses is growing as they learn exactly how much Mubarak and his regime stole from them, to say nothing of the people they imprisoned, tortured and killed. What follows this anger is a call for instant action—higher salaries, a voice in government, better working and living conditions, a chance to vote, and even the execution of former leaders. They do not seem to understand that these things take time, that democracy is a process that needs patience. Understandably, the business community is the most worried that if everyone does not calm down the wrong type of government will end up in place simply because no one was willing to wait for the right type, and the country could not function in the meantime.

        So it was a very enlightening and emotional trip. I left feeling a desperate desire to help them rebuild Egypt, but a grave realization that they need, and want, to do this for themselves.  I did not, however, see one anti-Israel or anti- American sign, or feel unsafe as one of the few westerners walking around Cairo. On the contrary, I felt safer there now than I ever did when we lived there, knowing I was not being watched and could write whatever I wanted without fear of reprisals. 

 Being at the pyramids, surrounded not by tour buses of westerners (I counted only six foreigners), but by hundreds of Egyptian families riding on the backs of camels and horses, sunbathing and climbing on the sides of the monuments,  was a heartwarming sight. Despite their need for visitors to return, for the moment, the Egyptians have their country all to themselves, a necessary respite, as they both celebrate their historic victory and contemplate their future.     

In my Mind I am in Cairo

  
I could not sleep last night.  I was so frustrated by the lack of television coverage in the U.S. about what is happening in Egypt that I had to stay up until 2 a.m. looking at all the images and videos I could find on Facebook. I felt physically ill thinking of those brave protesters in Tahrir (Liberation) Square fighting off rubber bullets and tear gas.

This morning, I woke to the same lack of coverage and instead of working out at the gym, sat in the locker room reading emails from friends and colleagues in Cairo trying to cover this story—a difficult task when the government defends itself by interrupting phone and internet services.

Predictably, I read this morning that the ministry had outlawed any further demonstrations. Of course, they did. But the protesters are back, still fighting, according to friends on Facebook, gathering now outside the journalist's syndicate building.

I know I should feel happy we are safely back in America, but I wish more than anything we were there to support them. This had to happen. It was inevitable.

Living there, the political oppression is as thick as the dust that blankets the crumbling buildings, overgrown trees, potholed streets, abandoned cars, and feral animals that landscape Cairo.  Like heavy snow, it paralyzes the country.  Every corner, or in our case every other building in the embassy rich neighborhood of Zamalek, is guarded by young policemen staring out blankly from worn, wool caps, their hands lightly touching the guns in their holsters.

Take away the top hotels for visiting tourists, the wealthy expatriate neighborhoods, and the upper middle class that flourishes from government contracts, and Cairo is, at its heart, a city of poverty. A place where families seek shelter in graveyard mausoleums and the educated youth cannot find jobs.

While we were living there, friends commented on how cheerful my blog always was about Egypt. Though I lied about nothing I concealed a lot, paranoid about my fuzzy landline which fellow journalists told me was routine wiretapping, and suspicious of the wonderfully friendly man who seemed to watch our every movement from a corner. With one in every four Egyptians said to be an informer, who could blame him if he was one?  It was, after all, a job. 

I watch these protesters from a distance with pride. I only wish I was there to cheer them on in their struggle. Because under all that dust, is a breathtakingly beautiful country that deserves a clean start.

 

 

 

Autumn in Paris, London, Cairo and Michigan!

 
There is nothing stranger than feeling like a foreigner in your own country—like not knowing how much a domestic stamp costs, or having your son ask you what a “dime” and “nickel” are worth the day before he starts school in America. At times, we truly feel like “expatriates” here in the U.S. after twenty years of living abroad, or rather like ET, amazed and curious about our new surroundings, but likely to get into trouble if left alone for too long  during our “repatriation.”

 So much is different—I find myself hypnotized in the cereal aisles of the grocery stores that are so plentiful after Cairo; Shea and I feel positively geriatric walking in the parks as the jogging dog owners fly past us each morning, and at school functions, I have only recently stopped looking for the standard wine bar.  

         Though I moved here in late August, my life in Michigan did not really begin until a few weeks ago when I returned from a two-week trip to London, Paris and Cairo—call it my “Victory Tour,” if you will. I only wish I had taken the train to Brussels for a “moules/frites” lunch just so I could say I had visited all my previous overseas homes in one go.

        The Victory Tour was, however, amazing. Just what I needed in terms of closure after such an abrupt move, even though I do not anticipate my life abroad is in anyway over, just on hold temporarily (we still have our house in London, last I checked). And a big part of that Victory Tour was sending my eldest off to college—never was a girl more deserving of an immediate future that does not involve moving for a few years than Harriet.

Leaving Harriet in front of Ramsey Hall, her run-down but perfectly situated dorm at University College London (right off Charlotte Street near Fitzroy Square), was anything but sad (though she looks a bit stunned in this photo as I was about to leave and she knew no one there.) I hardly felt I was “abandoning” her in a city I know she loves even more than her summer camp, surrounded by a flurry of our best female (and male) friends all ready to be her second and third mothers if she needs them. To say Harriet is thriving would be an understatement. She has already found a close group of similarly raised global nomads, and could not have chosen a more perfect place to study. And the fact that she is learning Arabic in London makes us feel like we have left her as a sort of place holder for the rest of us in two continents. Not only will she be a regular dinner guest at our friend’s homes in England, she is learning a language none of us ever mastered in Cairo so when we next visit Egypt she will be able to finally tell us what all those mystery billboards say.

        The weekend before Harriet started college we headed to Paris on the Eurostar to attend the wedding of our dear friends, Anne and Bob. Anne’s daughter, Caitlin, is a good friend of Harriet’s and as Anne is also my editor at the International Herald Tribune, we both had fun meeting all their friends.  They were married in ten minutes at the Town Hall that morning, as one does in Paris, all the brides and grooms lined up like race horses for a very specifically timed event, but the reception that night was anything but rushed. It was held in a small historic home located in the Bois de Bologne with a sweeping back terrace onto a manicured lawn. It felt like a movie set with a living room fire roaring, glasses of champagne flowing, and a meal in the dining room I can still taste—huge chunks of fois gras with chutney and amazing lobster ravioli, all washed down with wines from a the vineyard owned by the family proprietors of the house. Their wedding cake was an amazing rainbow tower of those little macaroon cookies, famous from La Duree.

        The rest of the weekend, Harriet and I walked around our old neighborhood in the 7^th arrondissement, arm-in-arm (French style), visiting her old childhood haunts in the Champs de Mars (the playground she loved, the carousel, the puppet theater), stopping to meet up with friends in cafes and bistros, and generally taking in the beauty of Paris—a memorable mother/daughter weekend before parting from one another for the first time in a very long time—sniff, sniff.

         I then headed to Cairo to say a huge, “Hello,” to Daniel, whom I had not seen in a couple of months, and a heartfelt, “Goodbye” to Egypt. My dog walking friends threw a lovely lunch for me, Daniel and I had a final party in our amazing flat overlooking the Nile, we took a last swim together at the Gezira Club, bobbing in the water with the old Egyptian men, but mostly just walked my favorite streets, as I tried to memorize every detail possible about my brief life there. We then spent three amazing days in Alexandria walking on the Corniche overlooking the Mediterranean, relaxing in rooftop bars, and taking in the sights….mostly the new library and the old turn-of-the-century cafes.

 Probably the hardest part of leaving was saying, “so long” to Samir, our lovely doorman, and Ahab, my great young translator and driver. I know I will see them again one day, but it won’t be the same, of course, as seeing them daily, though Ahab is now my Facebook friend.

        Upon my return, I was immediately in awe of the magnificence of Michigan’s autumn. I am now known for stopping the car suddenly on the many country roads around my parent’s house just to observe a certain neon red tree, burnt orange bush, or canopy of color overhead. This irritates the drivers behind me, as well as the children, but I am unable to restrain myself. In London, autumn was something you might miss if you blinked. Some years were better than others, like wine, but if it was a particularly rainy season it would be over quite quickly. One day the leaves would suddenly turn from a dull green to a soggy beige and tumble off the trees like wet sponges. Kicking piles of crunchy leaves was never a big activity in England, where they would stick to your shoes like wet toilet paper, but here it could be an Olympic sport, with huge rust-colored piles everywhere, in my cultural confusion they look like mini-pyramids.

I must admit, I am attempting to make up for my children’s lost American childhood by forcing Florence and Charles to pose in pumpkin patches and at cider mills like toddlers—rather embarrassing for them but they are politely complying! The good news is, they are more than willing to dress up this Halloween, a whole new holiday for us since we last experienced it as the entire nation now turns into a spooky theme park (we are off to a friend’s party Sunday night in a quintessential “trick or treating” neighborhood with loads of decorated houses.) I can only imagine on Thanksgiving how much I will have to resist the urge to dress the kids up in pilgrim outfits.

The best news of all is that Daniel arrived here a few days ago. Now, with the exception of Harriet, we are all together again, though briefly as he is off to Africa for a consulting project in two weeks. Still, we are actually enjoying living with my folks during this transition period. It feels very Victorian, all of us eating together every night (my older brother, Greg, is living here at the moment too), trading generational stories (loved the conversation between my Dad and Charles about going to their first dance). So for the moment, all is well. The kids love school, Daniel and I both have some work! and just when I think the leaves can’t get any prettier, they deepen another shade. 

 

 

Goodbye Middle East, Hello Midwest!

 
  
 If anyone had told me when the children and I left Egypt on June

24^th that we would not be returning there this autumn I would never have believed them. There was so much I still wanted to do there—camping in the Black and White desert; touring the Hanging Church; tracing the steps of Naguid Mahfouz’s characters, learning at least a bit of Arabic.

Of course, the list would have been long any time I had to leave such a fascinating place, but one year was not enough time in a city as culturally storied and layered as Cairo. My only solace is I knew from the day we arrived that our time there could be short, and so took advantage of living there each and every day. I only wish so much I had made it to Beirut and Damascus, to say nothing of Israel…but the priority was, appropriately, Egypt, and we saw quite a bit of that extraordinarly country.

    Not surprisingly, Daniel and I have become quite good at moving over the years-- we have moved cities seven times and houses eleven times in our relationship. But this move truly beat all our others for speed and efficiency—it is, by far, our personal best. Daniel resigned from his job on August 15^th, the dog flew back from Cairo the 20^th, I moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan to my parent’s beautiful house August 24^th, Florence started pre-season Field Hockey at Greenhills (my old private school) on the 27^th, and as of today, September 8^th, we have finished a complete overhaul of the wing my parents auspiciously built onto their home years ago from a lovely "old-fashioned" space for the grandchildren, to a "teen pad" for my young adults, with bedrooms for all of us.

      Desks were assembled, courtesy of Ikea (I only feel I have officially moved when I make a visit to Ikea), textbooks and binders were bought, and other than the hiccup of seven duffel bags sitting at Air Cargo in Detroit waiting for Homeland Security to release them for five days (all our warm clothes were in there and it was getting quite chilly here!) we were ready for school to begin last Tuesday!

The truth is, we always had in the back of our minds that Michigan would be our sanctuary if we ever needed it, so the plan was well formed. It is the place where Daniel and I met, where nearly my entire family lives, where academia abounds, and, most importantly, where College Football rules!

    By far our best moment since moving here (other than today's Rosh Hashanah service here with a lovely community thanks to an introduction by wonderful old friends),  happened last Saturday when my older brother and I took the kids to their first University of Michigan football game. It was the opening game of the season, the first game to be played in the brand new “Big House” (now the largest football stadium in America!), and we beat the University of Connecticut in such a solid win that it allowed all the spectators to concentrate more on singing, “Hail to the Victors” with the Michigan marching band, than worrying about fumbles.

    It was just what we all needed, a day of complete American fun with cheerleaders, Cracker Jacks, fight songs, and 113,090 silly Maze and Blue outfits to get our minds off this latest upheaval. As happy as we are to finally live in the States again, we miss Daniel horribly as he is still in Egypt finishing up his job for a couple of months and packing up our former home. It also cannot be overlooked that this is a very big cultural adjustment for all of us after a very intense experience in the Middle East and will take some time to readjust. 

     
  So many people say they are happy we won’t be living so far away in Egypt anymore but we don’t feel completely the same way. It was one of the most extraordinary years we have ever had, or will probably ever have again as a family. We grew to understand and appreciate so much about the culture and, of course, made friends we will hope to know for a lifetime. But the hardest thing for the children and me is that we did not know we were leaving and so we did not get to say a proper, “Goodbye” to the people and places we loved—our doorman, Samir, who greeted us twenty times a day with a warm smile and helping hand, the shopkeepers in Zamalek who grew to know us and our daily habits--particularly the children's after school lunch cravings-- our lovely neighbors and close colleagues.

    Instead, we take Shea for walks now on the gorgeous, scenic country road that winds around my parent’s house and talk about what we miss about Egypt (Shea misses chasing feral cats, Charles and Florence miss the British School, I miss our view of the Nile, and Harriet misses swimming at the Gezira Club).

   And we talk about all that is suddenly so different. Unlike in Cairo, where we were a twelve-hour flight from the closest relative, lived in an apartment in a city of 20 million people, and initially knew little of the customs and language, we are now living in a house surrounded by woods, under the same roof as my extended family, in a city I have nown since birth. After twenty years away, it is in many ways the perfect place to introduce my children to American life..it is a place I know well and feel comfortable. 

    As for this blog…it will continue as now my European and Middle Eastern friends are wondering how I will adapt to life in America after being away for so long away.  Repatriation is often more challenging than moving I am told, and already I am making hilarious mistakes in my new daily life (more on that in my next blog). So I will continue to ramble on here…and, of course, will still be traveling for work and play…so the title of my blog is still relevant as I share my exploits!

Am in fact off to London in a few weeks to deliver Harriet to college!  Until then….GO BLUE and Happy New Year! 

 

The End of an Amazing Year

 

    I can hardly believe that in twelve hours we will leave Cairo for the summer, having made it through our first year here in Egypt. What is amazing to me, is that no matter how hard and lonely and discombobulating it can be to move to a new country, I always look back on even the worst times (for me day eight when I could not get out of bed) and see this growth in myself and our family, that I could never have anticipated. Humans adapt amazingly.

    As most of you know, Daniel moved here a year before the children and I finally followed him. There were many reasons we made that decision, wanting to make sure he liked his job, a reticence to give up coveted school places in London, Harriet’s hesitation to join us, but I have to say, in all honesty, the overall reason we stayed behind was because we were too scared to move here. 

    Cairo could not be more different than London. We were leaving one of the richest cities in the world for one of the poorest. And though we were in many ways too financially challenged to stay in London, we also felt too pampered to move to Cairo.

    London, with its manicured parks, preserved historic buildings, and sophisticated shops and restaurants is the opposite of Cairo, a city that struggles with pollution, unemployment, crumbling housing and ever-present poverty. On our visits last year, that disparity was so overwhelming we were not sure we could cope. But when it became obvious that our choice was to join Daniel or continue commuting and rarely see him, we all finally rose to the occasion—none more than the children, whom I could not be more proud of for the way they have handled themselves.

Harriet even decided to spend her last year of high school with us instead of staying behind in England. And though there was no “graduation” at her school in Cairo, we threw a black shawl around her shoulders, a black beret on her head, and put a rolled up piece of paper in her hand. We were making it up because it didn't exist, as we always have-- the same way we religiously cook a turkey on a late autumn Thursday no matter how insignificant the day is to our neighbors, or barbecue on the back terrace because its Labor Day, or Memorial Day or the 4th of July.  

As I took Harriet's picture on "graduation day," she looked as radiant as the Valedictorian of a huge high school. It was just the five of us, in our living room, but no one could have understood or appreciated her effort, growing up as she did in four different countries, any more than her immediate family.

    The experience of living here has changed all of us immeasurably; words truly cannot describe it, though I hate to write such a cliché. Our outlook on the world, and the Middle East—its people, customs, and religion—are now totally different to what they were when we arrived. The Call to Prayer, that once put a chill down our spine, is now a daily reminder of the deep spirituality of the Egyptian people. 

    For the children, particularly, being Jewish at a nearly all Arab school has not been easy, but they have more than risen to the occasion, like little diplomats, patiently trying to explain their religious upbringing to children who have never met anyone who was Jewish before, in a country feeling hostile toward a neighbor they have been at peace with for thirty years. 

    Though I now look at Cairo in a whole new light—no longer as a place where I must live, but rather where I am happy to live—we can’t wait to have a break this summer in Europe and America, which for the children and me will be an eight-week vacation, but for Daniel just two. But even though our mouths are watering for pork and our bodies are ready for a break from dust and heat (yesterday it was 112 degrees here) and the girls and I are ready to bare our shoulders and knees without glaring eyes, I also know we will be missing the view of the Nile from our flat, our new friends, favorite shop keepers, and our dog (sadly, he can’t join us just for the summer), and that we will be ready to return in the fall to new adventures.

    They say, “Whoever drinks from the Nile, will always return.” It is a lure I now truly understand.

Party Like an Egyptian!

  
  
   

So I have not written much about our social lives in Egypt, other than describing our two-week Cairo/Nile Christmas bacchanal, as that event took so much out of us we needed a few months of family board game and video nights to recover.

    The good news is we have been out on the town in high spirits ever since returning from our Sinai vacation, and so I have much more to blog about than books, as I did during my winter detox period. In fact, in the last few weeks alone, we have been to an engagement party, a boat launch gala, a diplomatic ball, an Embassy party, and even thrown a couple parties ourselves—including a Cinqo de Mayo/British election party (I’ll explain that combo later.)

    
   Party Number One: Two young Egyptian workers in Daniel’s bureau recently became engaged, which was very cute as they were too shy for ages to speak to one another. Then, it all happened and suddenly we were invited to their engagement party. I wrongly assumed it would be a casual office affair (no pun intended) at one of their young, poor apartments, having no idea that Egyptians live at home (both male and female) until they are married and once they are betrothed the bride’s parents throw an engagement party that rivals a Trump wedding. Who knew? Certainly not my husband….

    The huge Klieg light scanning the sky and enormous villa and dance floor covered in fairy lights (see photo to the left) were immediate clues that we had completely underestimated the scale of the event (it turned out the bride’s father is a big surgeon and her mother a former Ambassador). Walking into the house, I was mortified by my Hilary Clinton pant suit look of black trousers and a blazer when I saw all the women (I was the only Westerner) dressed in gorgeous full-length gowns and cocktail dresses. Worse still, I was unable to drink away my embarrassment as the party was unbelievably elegant, but totally dry (many Muslims do drink, but this family does not.)

    Having said that, I did get a couple of sips of something in the parking lot as one of Daniel’s colleagues grabbed us on the way into the party and shared his hip flask with us—I felt like I was back in high school sneaking a swig of Southern Comfort in a corn field, minus the Klieg light, husband and location, of course.   

    Luckily, I was able to quickly camouflage my boozy breath at the enormous buffet, which had everything from a shrimp bar to an ice cream stand. And though it was a bit of a shock to find ourselves at a party where we were closer in age to the parents than the kids, Daniel ended up being treated like a celebrity, not just for having given the bride her first job, but for putting her desk in such close proximity to her future husband. We felt very “local” at our first all Egyptian party, though we did not dance…that might have been a bit too Steve Carell (from The Office), for Dan we decided.

 
Party Number Two: Call it “Anchor’s Away”…though we never actually left the dock, despite it being a boat launch party. Instead, one-hundred cultured Egyptians and diplomats were invited to christen a new luxury sailboat for twelve guests that plans to cruise from Luxor to Aswan when it is completed (there were still workman toiling away as we toured the boat close to midnight.) The highlight of the evening was probably meeting the last King of Egypt, King Fuad II, who now lives in Switzerland, but was invited because the largest suite on the boat is dedicated to his family with old black and white photos of the ousted King and his relatives gracing the walls.

    His Royal Highness (as he was introduced to me) succeeded his father, King Farouk I, when he was overthrown in the 1952 Revolution. Though he was only a baby he ascended the throne, but only for a year as he was then deposed and sent away to join his family in exile. Though I can only imagine the stories he must know, he was quite shy, though he did appear moved by the room dedicated to his ancestors when almost every other sign of Egypt’s imperial/royal past has been erased from here.

    We also met this cool actor, who is in the new movie, Fair Game, which was premiering last week at the Cannes film festival, about the CIA operative Valerie Plame. He is the guy who plays the younger version of Omar Sharif in the film though I forget his name both on screen and off—too many gin and tonics (this party, unlike the other, was as wet as the Nile we were floating on). The party was full of creative types…artists and filmmakers. Did you know Egypt used to have a thriving film industry in the thirties that rivaled Hollywood’s, complete with their own singing stars like Leila Mourad and Mohamad Abd el Wahab? I am on a mission to get my hands on some of these old movies with English subtitles, as they look amazing. 

    Party Number Three: We next went to a party at the Israeli Embassy to celebrate their independence day. There was quite a bit of security, as one can imagine at the Israeli Ambassador’s residence, but once we got through the check point, we enjoyed an amazing evening in the residence’s garden. Despite the current controversy over settlements in Israel, it was well-attended by diplomats and even many Egyptian businessmen who do work with Israelis (there are tax incentives to encourage them to do so). Most guests were there, however, to meet the new Ambassador, Yitzhak Levanon, who spoke at a podium, flanked by both an Israeli and Egyptian flag. Afterwards, tons of guests had their picture taken between the two flags as it is incredibly rare to see them waving side by side, despite thirty years of peace between the two countries. Once again, we felt incredibly lucky to be part of the very small Jewish Community of Cairo, which is why we get invited to these interesting events that many journalists are not allowed to attend.

    Party Number Four: Ten days ago, we decided to throw a British Election party as the election was on a Thursday night, which is like our Friday night here, as our weekend is Friday and Saturday. But seeing as the day before the election was May 5^th, we decided on a Cinqo de Mayo food theme for our British party, preferring Sangria and salsa to Shepard’s pie and beer in the Cairo heat (had we been able to score some Pimms at the duty free store the whole theme might have been different). Though we wished we could have made a Gordon Brown Piñata, we instead made a poster with all three candidate’s talking points and made sure all our guests (sixty of them!) voted (see top photo). Over here in Egypt Nick Clegg was a sure winner but I did have a lot of idealistic college students in my house, thanks to our third cousin introducing us to her crowd at the American University of Cairo.

    Last weekend was the most spectacular party of them all…the Diplomats Ball at the British Ambassador’s residence here. It was completed in 1894 by Lord Cromer who built it on a plot of land that used to run all the way down to the Nile (now it is separated by a major road known as the Corniche.) The building houses both the residence and the embassy offices but was all ours for the night. Round tables lit with blue lights were set up throughout the enormous garden with a huge dance floor in the center. Each table was for a different Ambassador, who was then free to invite whomever they wanted, though because it was for charity we all paid to attend. I really should have had Shea there as the entire reason we are friends with the Austrian Ambassador is because Shea and the Ambassador’s dog, Calvin, are best mates.  There was lots of eighties music played by a DJ (the British Ambassador and his wife are in their late forties/ early fifties), and amazing food. But it was the setting that made the event. I felt like Kirsten Scott Thomas in The English Patient---not when she dies in the cave, of course, but during her glamorous dinner dress period in Cairo flirting with Ralph Fiennes.

    This past Thursday I threw yet another party, this one for a distinguished journalist, Charles Eisendrath, who was in town and is the head of the Knight Wallace Fellows at U of Michigan. I invited about ten working journalists in Cairo, who were eager to hear his good news from across the pond about our industry, which we fear is dying (He assured us it is still alive and kicking, though in new directions). Finally, we went to a barbecue at another friend’s house two nights ago, which was fun though the lack of any pork products on a sizzling grill is always a depressing sight here in the Middle East.

    This week we will stay home in mourning, as Harriet leaves us Tuesday to head to Greece for a graduation trip with friends, and then carries on to London, where she will work as an au pair for a month and get used to living in England without us, as she will next year. We will, of course, be here trying to get used to living without her—something I know I have been in complete de NILE about, as we like to say here in Egypt. Might have to throw another party just to cheer myself up!

 

 

     

Harriet's Exodus Vacation

 
  
“Next year in… Egypt!” we joked at our Seder last year in New York, and true to our word, before setting off on holiday, we ironically celebrated the Jews’ exodus from Egypt in our Cairo apartment! On our guest list were people from at least 8 different nationalities, including both Israeli and Palestinian, and quite a few who had never been to a Seder before (including one Egyptian friend who couldn’t help but laugh every time we mentioned how we were “freed from the land of Egypt!”). It was a lovely meal shared with old friends from my parents’ DC days, new friends from our past nine months here and even newer friends who we met the night before at a Seder in one of Cairo’s synagogues. After our very unique Seder, we set off on a bit of an “exodus” of our own despite the slight headaches from our four glasses of red…  

  
    
Our first stop was the Red Sea, though when we got in the water, to my dismay, it didn’t part. To get there, we drove for seven hours through the Sinai Desert—not quite the same as wandering for forty years, particularly given the many military checkpoints—and ended up in Dahab, a Red Sea-side tourist town famous for its stunning beaches and excellent diving. We shared our blissful pool-side week in the sun with some friends from London who were visiting us in Egypt for the third time this year! In between our tanning sessions, we managed to schedule some field trips; the first was a day of snorkelling. The breathtaking reefs kept us occupied but in between our stints in the water, we hung out in a Bedouin-style tent on the beach, looking like beached whales in our wetsuits!    

 

 

To continue following our ancestors’ footsteps, we journeyed out to Mount Sinai. We opted for the sunset hike as opposed to the one at sunrise, as the prospect of staying up all night did not appeal much to the seven-year-old or the forty-somethings in our group. Unfortunately, because it was Easter Sunday, we were unable to visit St. Catherine’s, and so headed straight up the mountain in the late afternoon heat. The very wise men with camels followed us, despite our insisting on walking the whole way up, and sure enough, three of us ended up speeding ahead atop George, Simba and Mohammed. I tried to make the journey a spiritual one, taking in the beauty of the landscape surrounding me, as well as the history of the ground beneath me, thanking the universe for bringing me to that moment in time.  The hike was challenging in parts, especially the steps leading to the summit, but we all made it to the top still able to force smiles through our panting breathing. The sun went down accompanied by Florence, Charles, my dad and my timid rendition of the Shema in Hebrew so quiet as to not be heard by our Egyptian guide. 

 

Once back in Cairo, my mom and I had to quickly prepare for the second half of our vacation to be spent in London! Our week was jam-packed with university visits, meals out and parties—my ever-hospitable mother even hosted a cocktail party in someone else’s house! I enjoyed taking advantage of the freedom of the city (as well as the 18-year-old drinking age!) which I really miss in Cairo. For me, it was a successful week in more than one respect; not only did I get to attend the 18^th birthday parties of two great friends and the Bar Mitzvah of one of my favourite 14-year-olds, but I also found the school of my dreams. Using my dad’s words about how he felt about Michigan when he first visited Ann Arbor; I fell in love with UCL. The end of our trip was unexpectedly postponed for another three days thanks to my friend Eyjafjallajokull up in Iceland, but of all the places in the world, we were happy to be stranded in London, among friends.  

 

 

Now, we’re all home safe and sound and getting back into our routine. The three of us are studying hard-- Florence for some of her GCSEs, me for my IB exams (which start next week—Ah!) and Charles for his Bar Mitzvah in just under two months’ time—and thanks to our lovely holidays, we are now well-rested and ready to tackle the challenges ahead.

Florence of Arabia!

Around two months ago my school and I went desert camping for the bronze Duke of Edinborough award. This was initially a big shock considering the past three years I have pictured the bronze award to be me hiking in England through forests on a cold, rainy mountain, instead of hiking up sand dunes in Egypt, trying to find a tree. I had been on two expeditions, the practice and the real one. I was extremely unsure of the trip, as I did not know these girls well at all, and had no clue as to what to expect. I arrived oblivious at 7 am on Friday (our Saturday), to find everyone being herded onto a bus,  screaming.

Surprisingly, twenty-five out of the twenty-nine Egyptian girls were just as discombobulated as me, because although living in Egypt their whole lives, they had never been to the desert.  Not to be mean, but these are priviledged Egyptian girls who have barely been out of their five star lives, and would never dream of going on a trip without their driver, maid and cook. This is normal for them and they did not think twice about asking for everything.  One Egyptian friend of mine even asked the school if her maid could accompany her, and one of the girls had her bodyguard come on the trip. As the bus began to move once more they started shouting, “We will never see civilisation again!” and one girl started tearing up as we passed the Costa Coffee.

The bus ride was rather intimidating, as we started seeing less and less cars, and more and more sand. Then it happened. Complete pandemonium occurred. Their Black berry service ended, and they had no connection. Two girls started crying and another begged the teacher for the bus to go back and let her get off! I was laughing along with my British friend and British teacher, which resulted in countless dirty looks in our direction. When the bus began to off rode into a never ending mass of sand, the girls finally started to ask logical, or some not too logical questions, like, “Where are we going to go to the bathroom, I thought there would be a porta potties?”, and my favourite , “Where are the hotels?” One girl  thought there would be hotels near by, where we could go if there was an emergency or if we ran out of food/water etc.  When the realisation hit them like a bucket of cold water, the second uproar began. It was like watching a movie. I had never expected this.

I tried to ignore them with my iPod and take in the breath-taking scenery. There were sand mountains, sand ditches, sand rocks, sand dunes, soft sand, hard sand and I think I even saw an igloo type hut made from sand. Overall, there was A LOT of sand.  It was picturesque, and I was finally starting to enjoy myself. The girls screams actually reassured me, as it let me know I was MUCH more prepared than them in every way. I have been to camp, after all.

The campsite was in a valley, with one hill behind the tents designated as our ‘bathroom’ (putting most girls in a state of denial), and the other to be our test camp. Our first activity was to put up our tents and unpack our few belongings. This is where being in a school of wealthy Egyptians becomes very useful. My group had quite a bit of trouble in pitching the tents (the cover had flown away in the wind, and we did not have enough strength to hammer the poles in). This is when my  friend decided to get her friend's bodyguard to come and help us pitch the tent. He did not as much help, as just do it all himself, along with some of the other workers that travelled with us. Soon everyone in our campsite had called over the guys to help pitch their tents up for them, and in no time we had twenty perfectly pitched tents in place.

We had a rest after all of the hard work we had not done, and this was the most enjoyable time for me. Although there were more tears from one of the girls (her glass jar of tomato sauce had spilt all over her clothes and other food), I was talking to my friends, sun bathing, listening to music, and taking in the attractive and scenic view.

Then the real work began, and this time we couldn’t ask the bodyguard to do it for us. We had to use a compass to find a tree. There were no specifications of the tree, but because of the few amount of vegetation, the word tree is all we needed. We embarked on our first hike, which later proved to be the most challenging one for us. No one in my group listened to the teacher when he explained how to use the compass except for me and my friend Emily. We were in charge, which was probably not the best idea. Emily and I decided that we should take the shorter and less steep way to the tree, and ignore the fifth bearing. This was because the fifth bearing meant hiking up an extremely steep area on the mountain. We thought that going around it would save us from MORE tears, and would conserve our energy. This was completely and utterly wrong. We got absolutely lost and in the end had to travel up something steeper (that probably wasn’t meant to be walked on) where the sand just fell apart under our feet. We soon arrived at the top of the mountain, and saw the long-awaited tree.

As we were on the half hour descent to the tree, we came across some desert bedouins. These are people that live in the desert full time. Now I was expecting to come across bedoiuns, but I was expecting them to be dressed in the typical galabeas (robe), with camels (which is what we had seen early on our drive), but instead these bedouins were much different. They were driving huge Harley Davison motorcycles around and had iPhones. They were wearing leather jackets and jeans. They started taking pictures of us so the Arabic speakers in my group soon ushered them away. When we got back to the campsite, after a long four-hour walk (that was initially meant to be two hours) we only found one group back, out of the five groups. Obviously we were not the only group to get lost.

That night I made pot noodles, and we roasted marshmallows. It was a peaceful night for me, but once again not so easy for the other Egyptians. They all had brought completely the wrong food, and the people that did bring the right food, eg: pasta, had no clue how to cook, as they had never done so in their lives. This concluded with more tears, and four packets of pasta left in the fire, burned.

The actually sleeping was the worst part of the trip for me. It was FREEZING, like New York in winter freezing. I was not well equipped for this, because although I was expecting it to be cold, I could not fit nearly enough sweaters as I needed in my small backpack. I shivered my way through the night and then was back in shorts for the next day. Breakfast was short and simple. We were given free time to pack up our tents and clean the dishes, our good old friend the bodyguard came back, and cleaned it all up for us, along with everyone else’s. He made it extremely clean, although we did have to go on bathroom duty, where you had to pick up any toilet paper that was not taken to the bin or had been burned.  Proceeding the ‘big clean up,’we had to go hiking again, but this time it was mostly flat, except it was much longer. We had to hike for six hours, and lucky for us we did not get lost this time.

After this hike we finally got back on the bus, home to civilisation. I slept until around forty minutes after we left, and awoke to screams of joy. All of their blackberries had service and they started calling everyone they knew. It was a great experience, and also an exciting bonding experience for all of us, including the first-time Egyptian campers, and I am so happy I did it. We all passed the award, and are looking forward to the next trip. My family and I are off to Dahab today, for tanning, diving and touring. When we hike to the top of Mount Sinai, I will truly feel like Florence of Arabia.  

Our Jewish Life in Cairo

 

    As many of you know, I have never converted to Judaism. Being raised in a large Irish Catholic family I have always felt conflicted about casting off my roots and my own religious upbringing for my husband’s. Yet I have fully embraced Daniel’s religion and been extremely involved in my children’s Jewish upbringing. That journey, in itself, has led me to experience a relationship with Judaism that is one of the most rewarding in my life. I don’t feel any need for the moment to make it official because it spiritually lives in my soul.  

    Moving to Egypt as an American family with Jewish children six months ago-- where we now know there are less than a few dozen native Jews in the entire country-- has not always been easy for us. We were part of a loving, and accepting, interfaith community in a reformed synagogue in London, where for a while I even served on the hospitality committee.

    The children attend a school here that is nearly 90 percent Egyptian and have had to be very discreet about their background, as the diplomatic ties with Israel are very tense right now, despite thirty-years of peace. We are nearly certain our children are the only Jewish children in their school. When one friend of Harriet's found out, she said to her, "You know you are probably the only Jew in the whole school." (There are 700 kids there.) Harriet answered, "Actually, there are two more," meaning her siblings. 

    Certain good friends at their school now know they are Jewish and are very curious about their religious background and open in discussing their views with them as they have never met a Jew before. To that end, the children have had their own small diplomatic role here, letting a select group of Egypt’s next generation get to know some Jews personally. Some of their new friends even attended our holiday party, complete with lit Menorahs.

    Since moving here, we have also become involved with the Jewish Community of Cairo, which is a very small group indeed, and where we seem to be one of the few, if not only, Western families involved. As I posted earlier, when we attended Rosh Hashana services in a suburb of Cairo, there were initially not enough attendants to form a “minyan,” a group of ten adult male Jews necessary to have a service, requiring them to pull some security men from the Israeli Embassy nearby.

 

 Similarly, when we went to Simcha Torah services at the Shaar Hashamain synagogue  in downtown Cairo (to your left), a group visiting from Israel was there, providing the numbers needed for the service to take place. When we attended a candle lighting at the Israeli Embassy in December, our kids were just three of a handful of non-embassy kids there.

    However, this week, a lovely event took place here, which brought a lot of Jews to Cairo. The Egyptian government recently finished a two-year restoration of the Maimonides Synagogue in the old Jewish Quarter of Cairo—a very appreciated gesture in these difficult times diplomatically. To celebrate, a delegation of Rabbis from Israel (and one from America), as well as some of the last remaining Jews in Egypt and a group of Egyptian Jews now living in other parts of the world, all traveled to Cairo for the three-day celebration. The delegation was probably fifty strong, and included the wife of the first Israeli Ambassador who was posted here after peace was first established by Anwar Sadat and Manachem Begin in 1978.

    I have included a picture of the new synagogue on the top of this post. It is beautiful. There were tears in many guests’ eyes as they roamed the synagogue before the festivities began, which included singing and dancing. In attendance was the new Ambassador to Egypt from Israel, Yitzhak Levanon, as well as the U.S. Ambassador, Margaret Scobey.     

   
   

The 19^th century synagogue was named after a 12^th century Jewish scholar, physician and philosopher, who fled persecution in Spain for Egypt and was briefly buried here when he died in 1204. The synagogue was built over the site of his grave before his remains were moved to what is now Israel. Even before this renovation, when there was no roof and only collapsing walls, Jews would travel here from all over the world to sleep in its basement, as the site is known to have healing powers.

    There were dinners and lectures and many festivities, which meant there were numerous occasions to hear these old Jewish stories of Cairo. Then yesterday, we had another synagogue visit, this time to a Karaite Synagogue here, which is set to be restored but has not been opened for decades, I believe. The Karaites were, and continue to be, a sect of Judaism which closely follows the Torah and rejects the post-biblical traditions of the Talmud and latter Rabinic works. They were quite a  large sect in Cairo—14,000 strong in 1947 (though there were many more than ten times that number of what I will refer to as traditional Jews here and in Alexandria at the same time.) Both Jewish sects worked closely together though they practiced separately.

    In that synagogue, which is still dusty and decrepit, there was a wall of wooden lockers (see pictures just above). It was their tradition to remove all shoes before entering. They would then worship on their knees on rugs laid out in the sanctuary, much like the Muslims. In the lockers, I saw there were still old Kippahs and prayer books, though no services have taken place there in nearly forty years. One woman stood up and said she was the last Karaite Jew in Egypt. She recounted coming there with her family as a child, but was too overcome to speak to the group.

    I also had the honor to speak to a few of the remaining Jews in Alexandria, women in their seventies and late sixties, who remained there and help maintain the synagogue in Alexandria and the Jewish cemeteries there. They invited us to come and visit, which we surely will.  In addition, I met a woman who fled Alexandria at 17 with her husband of two days in 1956. Their parents married them in a synagogue with no electricity just before they departed Egypt following the Suez Crisis. This way the young couple could end up in the same place for their new life, which in their case was England, where she still lives. Though she had been back to visit often, her friend had not been back to Egypt in 55-years and cried as she thanked Carmen Weinstein, the head of the Jewish Community in Cairo, for working with the Egyptian government to make this happen and for organizing all the events surrounding the Maimonides Synagogue opening. It made me wish I had encouraged the wife of our Rabbi in London, Renee, to come for the events, as she was born in Egypt and had to flee with her family at a very young age.

   

 For me, as an enormous fan of the book, “The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit,” by Lucette Lagnado, a Wall Street Journal reporter, who wrote a moving memoir about her family’s exodus from Cairo, I was quite overcome when I learned she was in the synagogue and I could actually meet her. (She is incredibly nice!) She came to Cairo for the opening event, as well as for the launch of her book in Arabic, her father’s native language, which was particularly moving for her as was the synagogue’s restoration since when she was a child and very ill, her mother brought her there and spent the night with her in the synagogue in hopes of a cure.  We attended her book signing last night, and Harriet, who wrote her college essay about her book, was able to get a copy of her essay to Lucette. I hope she will find it inspiring to see how a young Jewish woman is living in Cairo now, fifty years after she left.  

    To say security was tight would be an understatement. At both synagogue events there were sharp shooters on the tops of buildings as far as the eye could see, streets blocked off, and a phalanx of Egyptian police guarding the buildings. Their extreme effort to protect everyone was greatly appreciated by our group, though one could not help but feel disturbed that such a large security force was deemed necessary. The new synagogue has no plans to hold services, there are not enough Jews in Egypt to attend, but will hopefully be enjoyed by many visitors of different faiths. We almost felt tempted to move Charles’s Bar Mitzvah from London to Cairo, just so a service could take place there and the community would have their first Bar Mitzvah in years (apparently years ago the Canadian Ambassador had his son's celebration here.)

    A separate opening is taking place later this month for the Egyptian authorities. They chose not to be in attendance at the Jewish event, saying it was a religious ceremony.

     

 

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