We will come again - insh'Allah!

This afternoon we again ventured across the tracks from Road 9 in search of the fabled linen shop. We're still not convinced that we found it, but certainly found a fabric shop where we bought 440LE of stuff. The guys in the shop really did seem like we'd made their day. Three separate people were showing us towels, sheets, and bedding. They were reaching them out of bags to show us, cooing over their softness, raiding the back of cupboards for different colours.

One of them shook me firmly by the hand, wished us "welcome to Egypt" (comically always pronounced as "welcome t'Egypt" as if they've been watching a Peter Kay stand-up routine) and checked I was strong enough to carry all the bags home again. He also whispered to me that Alice was "very beautiful"...was she already my wife? Sadly for him, I showed my wedding ring. "Very beautiful," he repeated. "You must be strong for beautiful wife!"

The shop also had loads of shirts (a fraction of the price of elsewhere, assuming that these too are 100% cotton or linen mix) and sold hundreds of colours of suit fabric. When things are a bit cooler I may go back with some pigeon Arabic to see if I can find out if they know a seamstress who could make me a suit. I said that we'd just take what we had for the time being, but that we would come back. "Insh'Allah!" laughed the main chap who was serving us. Although strictly translated as "If God wills it," the phrase is most regularly used to mean simply "hopefully!" I'm sure we will go back sometime - the things they had really were quite lovely. We bought a couple of throws for the bed/seats in the back room, sheets for the bed, and some towels. We reckon it was all reasonably priced, too.

On our way back we called in at Metro (a Budgens-style supermarket) to pick up some of their renowned fruit juice. And, as if things couldn't get any better, we found a street kiosk that sold sachets of Nescafe 3-in-1.

It's coffee, creamer and sugar all in one! A true miracle of the modern age!