Bowling in Egypt is Alive and Well

There's always a feeling when embarking on a "luxury" experience here in Egypt of preparing to be delighted while bracing for disappointment.  I say this because so may things exceed expectations, yet so many things miss the mark completely, with little indications about which will be which.  A tex-mex restaurant run by a Texan Mexican-American should be the real deal right?  Wrong.  A bowling alley in a decrepit-looking building in a random part of Maadi will be a dissapointment, right?  Wrong.

I am glad to report that bowling at Bandar bowling alley in Maadi provides a completely satisfying bowling experience for a fun evening.  We went this weekend with a couple of friends and were very pleased with the setup and quality of lanes.  It is situated in Bandar mall along with Fuego, Chili's, and the movie theater.  From the outside I always find it hard to believe Bandar fits all these things, but they're all there and don't tend to disappoint.   The alley has about 15 lanes, darts, airhockey, and foosball.  The prices posted for this month (July 2010) are 15 LE before 6 and 20 LE/game/person after, with various buy 1 or 2 get 1 free deals before 6 on working days.  So, not cheap but about what you'd pay in most places around the world.  Good quality and mandatory shoes are included in that price.  The balls are in much better shape than most alleys I've been to, also, which is a nice bonus.  There were plenty of open lanes, but also many families enjoying a Thursday evening together.  We had a great time getting re-acquainted with the game, and will return soon!

Bandar Mall Maadi, 14 Palestine St, Egypt‎ - 02 25168378‎ - across from On the Run at 216 and Palestine Rd.

yeast we can!

Recently, Connor and I have been on a savory bread-baking kick. A couple of weeks ago, we made two batches of bagels. I found some packets of dry yeast at a local grocery store and bought 'pizza flour,' which I figured was bread flour. Pizza must be one of the main types of leavened bread that Egyptians eat, I'd imagine. Anyway, we made a half-batch of sesame seeders on the first go-round. They didn't quite have the rise we were hoping for, so we went on a quest for new and better yeast, which we found at Mariam Market, probably the 'poshest' of the small grocers around Maadi that carry a lot of imported goods. For our second try, Connor did a half batch of onion and sesame and I tried my hand at cinnamon raisin using 100% whole wheat flour. While mine were tasty but a little gummy and ended up in figure 8 shapes rather than circles, Connor's were spot on, and delicious, too.

A couple of days ago, I came across a recipe for caramelized onion and pear flatbread in The Denver Post Food section. Since we have mounds of quality yeast left in the freezer, I thought I'd give it a whirl. The recipe originally called for sliced pears, gently seared, and gorgonzola on top, but I didn't feel like tracking down a suitable blue cheese substitute and pears are out of season. I did, however, have a guava on hand from our stroll through the outdoor food market with Connor's parents. We, in fact, did not know what it was we were purchasing that day from the fruit vendor; our initial thoughts were of the eggplant variety! Nadia was quick to disabuse me of this notion, explaining that it was called a 'gawafa' in Arabic and considered good for 'working a poopoo.' Nice. Digestion aid aside, after a few days, the guavas were ripening up and giving off a distinctly, well, 'peary' aroma! So I figured what the heck, I'll grill that up instead. I had a wedge with lunch and actually spread some cream cheese on the corners of the bread that were toppings-less. Here was my thinking on that one: in Latin America, guava paste 'n' cream cheese sandwiches are the equivalent to America's peanut butter & jelly. Also, onions and any kind of cheese are a natural fit. It was pretty darn tasty. The guavas did a great job of standing in for their more subtle cousins, never tasting too tropical or overpowering. The flatbread itself has a springy, focaccia-like texture. And I had a fun morning of trying out a new recipe.

Tuna Fish and Whale Bones

Since Connor's parents were here for a week exploring Cairo, we thought we would top off the visit with a true desert excursion. And what an adventure, in both good and in less satisfactory ways, did it turn out to be! We chose as our destination Wadi el Hitan, which translates as 'Valley of the Whales,' a section of desert about 100 miles southwest of Cairo that once was a prehistoric sea. The area is renowned for its amazing showcase of 40 million year old fossils that dot the landscape, most notably those of ancient whales. So I found a travel company that could put together a one day, one night itinerary for us and away we went.

The driver and our English-speaking guide (hereafter known simply as the 'Trusty Guide') picked us up from our house promptly on Friday morning. As we happily bounced our way towards the first stop, which was meant to be a sailboat ride on a huge lake near an oasis, Trusty Guide casually mentioned that the company had not given him our specific itinerary and therefore he would just choose the stops along the way to the wadi from past experience. Ohhhhkay, we thought, I guess we should defer to his (better?) judgment. Trusty insisted that the town of Fayyoum, which has an oasis nearby of the same name, was a place not to be missed. Our first point of interest (I use that term loosely) was a decrepit water wheel, sitting motionless in a stream of stagnant and trash-filled water. Apparently these water wheels occur throughout Fayyoum and are a distinguishing characteristic of the town. We all tumbled out of the 4x4 to inspect the wheel, carefully dodging the litter and mud that lined the bank. We then piled into the car and were off again. Our next destination was a local spring. The place was packed with Egyptian families out for their afternoon constitutional. The spring's water had a sign boasting of its medicinal properties, principal of which was its amazing ability to 'neutralize gastric acid.' Lovely. The fountain into which the underground spring bubbled was mossy and needed a good scrub to showcase its contents properly. We then were whisked into the home (sorry, but 'hovel' is more apt here) of a local family, who promptly put two microscopic mangoes into Lynn's hand and requested baksheesh. Sheesh is right. Kay braved the bathroom at their modest abode but the city slicker in me emerged and I started to feel my skin crawl. We ended up sitting on grubby chairs near a disused swimming pool for our guide-imposed 'short rest.' At this point, it was heading towards lunchtime and we had not hit any of our planned stops yet. With growing concern for the probability that we would actually reach the whales before dusk, we headed in the direction of the desert. We head, but not without having to dissuade Trusty Guide from showing us the delights of two former palaces. Perhaps they would have been nice to see, but we were ready for the 'eco' part of this tour to begin.

Before heading into the great outdoors, however, it was time for a flat tire. Our back right wheel was completely devoid of air by the time we pulled over to the side of the highway. To his credit, our driver swapped it for the spare in a flash and we were off again, but now our primary focus was on getting the flat fixed. Weaving our way through the alleys of a nearby village, we finally found a tire repair place, which we would have mistaken for a rural home if not for the abundance of tires artfully decorating the front yard. Kay had a nice intercultural exchange with the children there. She snapped numerous pictures of them and showed them back to the kids, who were shy at first but by the end were posing and preening for the camera and having a wonderful time. They were so tickled and ecstatic from her overtures towards them; it was truly a special moment. Twenty minutes later, we were finally leaving civilization behind. Or so we thought.

As we entered the national park of Wadi el Rayan, we noticed an ominous patch of sky on the horizon. Hoping it was just a passing rain shower, pushing aside the fact that we are in the desert, we pressed on towards what is billed as a true site to behold: the waterfalls that pour into the valley lake, a rare site within Egypt. While posing for pictures atop an intriguing rock formation, our driver motioned for us to get back into the vehicle--quickly. We looked and sure enough, the wall of sand indeed was coming steadily and speedily closer.



We were all losing quite a bit of faith in Trusty at this point and the last thing we wanted was to be stuck in a sandstorm with him. Lynn casually but assertively asked if these storms are common, to which there was the answer 'No.' Lynn then inquired as to how long sandstorms usually last, to which Trusty replied with alarming non-chalance, 'Oh, one or two days.' Oh my. As the wind continued to pick up and a substantial amount of particulates began to assail us, we briefly ran out to view the waterfall, which was, to be honest, no great shakes. Trusty tried to insist that we take off our shoes and socks and wade across the swiftly moving water to see some more subsections of the falls, but having some regard for our safety, we declined. Vociferously.

By this time we were flat out starving (it is after 2pm) and we took shelter behind a wooden shack that is the park cafeteria. Dozens of Egyptian extended families were tucking into their grub and we had high hopes that a tasty meal would help offset the sense of impending sandstorm doom. What was placed before us, though, were styrofoam plates of wilted tomatoes, stale pita bread, and gelatinous canned tuna. Feeling like Pharaoh's Revenge was certain to be lurking in these sad vittals, we choked down what bread and rice we could manage and left hungry and dissatisfied. The restrooms here were the third of the day that I could not muster the courage to enter, but I knew that this trend could not continue much longer and I really was banking on the Valley of the Whales having decent facilities. Inshallah.

As we climbed into the car again, the sandstorm mercifully began to subside. 35 km down a sandy but well-marked desert track later, we were finally at Wadi el Hitan. Trusty announced straight away that the bathrooms here were very 'chic,' and for once he was dead on, and it was a relief in more ways than one. Around 4pm we entered the trail to see the fossils. The desert itself was simply breathtaking, with lunar-like rocks in all sorts of shapes and sizes cropping up from nowhere. The scenery was truly outstanding.















Halfway through our walk amongst the fossils, the park rangers drove up and informed us that the site was closed for the night. What?! This was the whole reason why we arranged the trip in the first place! We grudgingly turned around and trudged out of the park, consoling ourselves with the fact that at least we would be feasting on a barbecued chicken dinner that night, the segment of the itinerary to which I felt surely we would still be sticking. Oh no. The meal that Trusty arranged for us was not fresh chicken grilled over an open fire, but the leftovers from this park's cafeteria, which had to be reopened to feed us. I think the picture below that Connor took speaks for itself:
Yep, that plate on the far right is canned tuna again. Lynn has a serious aversion to tuna that stems back to his bachelor days, having had it for dinner for about four months straight for a period of time, and so the sight of it again was particularly odious to him. I nearly teared up, I must admit. But we managed to get a bit of it down the hatch in the end. Curiously, Trusty gathered up all the leftover tuna, piled it on top of a grocery bag, and began to take it up to our camp site for use as 'desert fox food.' Below is a photo of said fox. Can you spot him?Now I am not exactly a seasoned camper, but I do know that one of the cardinal rules is not to invite critters near your tent by tempting them with meat. After several kindly insistences from both Kay and Lynn that this perhaps was not the best move, I shouted at Trusty that he better not bring that up to our site. Finally he acquiesced.
We saw an amazing amount of stars as we sat next to the crackling fire before turning in for an early night. The wadi still was a special place on earth and no amount of logistical snags could take that away from it.

The next morning, we went a bit rogue and, with no sign of the promised breakfast, we announced that we were going back into the park for a walk. Trusty came along, fairly congenially, and we managed to walk the whole length of the 3 km trail and see all the skeletons and petrified mangrove bushes we wanted before heading back to Cairo. In the end, we got to explore the park twice, once at twilight and once with early morning light, which was a treat. All in all, we would not trade all the annoyances away for the chance to see the spectacular Wadi el Hitan. Just chalk it up to a big fat learning experience. 'T.I.E.,' we kept reminding ourselves, 'This is Egypt.'

multi-lingual musings

I thought I'd write the latest update to the blog by giving you some local color. These are a few favorite sayings of Nadia, our very well-loved housekeeper, whom we are incredibly lucky speaks English as well as she does, which is an asset we will never take for granted, and in no particular order, here they are:

• ‘There are too many many dustings!” --regarding relative dirtiness of something

• ‘You know me?’ --i.e. ‘Do you understand what I’m saying?’ this phrase was a little off-putting when she used it the first couple of times I met her--my innate response was ‘not yet, lady’—until I figured what she meant

• ‘Miss Katie, I need you talk with me think’ translation: it is necessary that I ask you a question, the answer to which might require some mental effort on your part

• The substitution of the verb ‘sit down’ for ‘stay somewhere,’ e.g. in the sentence, ‘Jane’s family is going to go sit down in London/Sharm el Sheikh/ Mt. Everest/etc. for 5 days.’ In the Egyptian dialect, the same word is used for both meanings, so you can’t really blame her on that one

• ‘My father with me,’ my kitchen with me,’ ‘my clothes with me’…I’m not sure what is happening grammatically here, since she actually gets the English right but then adds something redundant on the end. Similarly, it’s not the way you make something possessive in Arabic, so…

• ‘That family has too many children’ or even ‘Mister Connor has too many holidays.’ Sounds like quite a strong opinion, but actually ‘too many’ and the morally neutral term ‘a lot’ are the same in her native tongue

• ‘People in Egypt crazy, baby.’ In response to any logistical snag

• ‘Sakkara, are you gonna work a poopoo [emphasis on the second poo], sweetie?’translation: the cat is about to take a dump.

[Kate's] Letter [about] the Thessalonians

Last week, Kay kindly humored my offbeat idea of heading to Thessaloniki, in the Macedonian region of northern Greece, for a four day city break. I have been intrigued by Greece's second largest city ever since travelling to Athens a few years ago, when I saw a lot of references to it in the media and culture during the trip. I felt like it might offer a more eastern European flavor (it's only 60 miles from the Bulgarian border) than the more popular Peloponnese and Greek islands. And we certainly were not disappointed. Thessaloniki is a lush, prosperous, and bustling mini-city in which it is incredibly easy and delightful to spend time. There are so many historic buildings to explore: a vast amount of ancient Greek ruins, breathtaking mosaics housed in early Byzantine churches dotted around town, a beautifully-revamped waterfront area, lively outdoor markets, and much more. Here were some of our/my highlights:

archaeological ruins: just strolling around the downtown area, you suddenly encounter a triumphal arch from the era of the emperor Galerius; a Roman forum; a bathhouse, and not to mention that several of the neighboring towns have extensive ruins and gorgeous tomb artifacts from the era of Alexander the Great (his family hails from Pella, a town we visited about 40 minutes from Thessaloniki). I felt that apart from Delphi, the ruins we saw in Macedonia and certainly the quality of the museums were higher than anything I saw on the typical 'ancient Greece itinerary' I did with the school back in 2007.


bougatsa: a cream or cheese-based filo dough pastry, typically eaten for breakfast--I swear there were about 3 bakeries per every citizen in Thessaloniki and hey, you know me, I wasn't complaining! Any town that is that much into baked goods goes down well in my book for sure.

pork and quite quaffable carafes of local white wine: I partook in both of these treats several times. I had to take advantage of being outside of Egypt! Kay amiably shared with me.

churches: several of the churches in Thessaloniki still in use date back to the 400s AD (one church even took over an old Roman bath complex) and have been carefully restored from the years in which they were converted into mosques. As I mentioned before, the golden mosaics, often depicting lush vegetation or saints in heroic poses, were stunning.


ease of transport: it is so user-friendly to navigate around Thessaloniki. All the bus stops have digitalized signs showing the order and frequency of the next 5 bus arrivals; once on the bus, there is a digitalized sign telling you what the next stop is, in both Greek and English, as well as announcements in both languages; a way above average bus terminal; the grid pattern of streets makes navigation a synch; and the presence of several parks and streets with little traffic. If I'd encountered all this in Athens, I would have guessed that it had been installed for the Olympics, but why Thessaloniki has so many modern creature comforts I don't know. I was certainly grateful for it!

kindness of strangers: Kay and I discovered that it's best to explore the attractions of Pella, which has the excavations of the ancient (300 BC era) city on one side of town and the amazingly well-designed and upscale archaeological museum on the other side of town, by rental car. Seeing as we arrived by public bus, hoofing it around the not insignificant distances was mandatory. But how did the folks at both the museum and ancient site help us out? They immediately offered to give us a lift in between places.

views of Mt. Olympus: even though it was hazy each day, Mt. Olympus stood out as a snow-capped behemoth across the bay, its uppermost peak shrowded in whispy clouds. I could see why folks in antiquity would assume this had to be the place where the gods lived.

an exhibit and the unexpected

Recently I read about a showing of contemporary art at a local gallery called Darb 1718 and decided to check it out. The theme of the exhibition was bread, in particular the wholewheat pita that is literally the staff of life here in Egypt, called 'aish baladi.' The gallery was showcasing the work, in mixed media, of 13 different artists. A further bonus was that this gallery was located 'just behind the hanging church', as the web site casually proclaimed, near Coptic Cairo, the historic Christian area only four convenient metro stops away from Maadi. So Connor and I hopped on the subway and were whisked to the walled city-within-a-city that is Coptic Cairo.

I insisted that we didn't need to print the map from the gallery website, as the directions looked so easy and surely we would spot it the second we got off the train. Well we started wandering (it turns out, in the correct area) and once we left the immediate vicinity with its historic churches and excellent museum filled with loads of tourists--literally 15 seconds after we left this very popular site--we were in a different universe altogether. Life for the Cairenes who live just outside the carefully-manicured courtyards and abbeys of the Coptic neighborhood is hardscrabble. As we continued to explore/look for the gallery, we walked by men tinkering with cars so worn out and worked over that I couldn't imagine they would ever carry a passenger again, but yet admired their perseverance nonetheless. Even though we were in the middle of the city, there were herds of goats and sheep milling about. Children ran through the streets giddily and shouted 'Welcome to Egypt!', a popular and charming phrase that locals use frequently here. A maze of precarious apartment buildings with laundry hanging out to dry between windows was a scene that has remained unchanged for centuries. While I catch glimpses of neighborhoods like this while in transit, it's rare so far that I have found myself immersed in one, and it really was fascinating and an honor to be present. We felt safe, even looked after, within this urban village. Finally we bumped into the gallery in question, which was at the end of the one very polished street around, and took in the paintings, short films, and interactive exhibits within. While some of the pieces were engaging, I couldn't help but think the real learning experience, and the images I will take away with me from that day, were actually from our accidental stroll through the backalleys of this neighborhood. In a matter of minutes, we were whisked away from the bustling metropolis and into a culture that operates on a completely different sense of time, space, and necessity. It's a glimpse into an alternate lifestyle that most of the tourists who had been bussed in to see the orthodox architecture and ancient icons, then quickly bussed out to continue their whistlestop tour of Cairo, had no idea they were within mere meters of. It is that Egypt, however, that I think people will gain the most from experiencing.

a day at the beach

Yesterday we hopped in the car and made the 90 minute trip along the highway (and I mean THE highway; there's only one road that goes there) to the closest resort area on the Red Sea, called Ain Sokhna. A little Arabic for you: literally 'ain sokhna' translates to 'hot eye' but in reference to the place it means 'hot spring.' Ain Sokhna is a very new beach area, having sprung up just south of the industrial area of the Suez Canal to accommodate the burgeoning well-heeled population of Cairo. Many well-to-do Egyptians have condos here that they frequent during the winter and expats see it as a quick getaway from the city. Connor and I were even joking that we should snap up one of the $30,000 apartments available in some of the lesser-developed neighborhoods.

We arrived at our hotel, which wasn't one we had heard of before but it was the most reasonably-priced one I spotted online, in the late morning and checked in. The place is new and I think desperately wanting to be 4 star digs but seems solidly in the lower-mid-range hotel class to me. We quickly headed to the beachfront. I was hoping for a long walk in the sand, but the coastline allocated to our hotel did not stretch too far and was bordered on one side by a shipping container area and on the other by a brick wall that enclosed a fancier resort immediately to the north. Ahh well, I was looking forward to my first dip in the Red Sea anyway. Well...the second I stepped into the water, a clay squidginess thrust itself between my toes and with each progressive step, I nearly lost my footing and toppled in! Both Connor and I found the sea floor too off-putting to go much beyond our ankles. We knew that Ain Sokhna's waters have nothing on its more established neighbors to the south, the international resorts of Hurghada and Sharm el Sheikh, with their crystal clear waters and world-class scuba areas. However we didn't expect to be, well, grossed out! Hmm.

After a couple of hours reading under a beach umbrella, we were antsy and decided to explore the rest of the greater Ain Sokhna area, partially in hopes of finding a better meal than the pricey buffet our hotel was offering later. Since Ain Sokhna is comprised solely of resort hotels and condos, we only spotted a combo Pizza Hut/KFC, which we were planning to go for in a desire for non-all-inclusive normality. We ended up choosing to do some reconnaissance work at another hotel we'd heard good things about, called the Movenpick, which I thought maybe was as Swiss as Haagen Dazs but does have genuine European roots. We strolled along their beach (acting natural, assuming a confident air of actual Movenpickers), took note of their watersport options and the fact that the bottom of the sea here was covered in stones, not mud, and had a light meal in the waterfront cafe. We both agreed that that is probably the hotel we will choose whenever we do head back for a weekend.

Back at our hotel, in which we were the only Westerners staying, we were kept up by a live folk music show occurring by the pool directly below our window, although it finished mercifully at 11pm. We headed back to Cairo this morning and were back in our own flat watching the latest episode of 'The Office' well before noon, which was great. It was definitely good to see what Ain Sokhna is all about, but I think we'll more often than not save our shekels, and our time off, for beach trips further afield.