School's out....

We tend not to blog about work, but with this coming up in the international news it seems right to post it here. Egypt is really worried about Swine Flu and the government is trying lots of different things to prevent it breaking over here - the one that affects us, is that they have closed the schools.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8260475.stm

Egypt was hit really badly by Bird Flu, and cases are still occuring around the country. The concern seems to be that they don't want the same to happen with Swine Flu, especially with such a large population that lives in close quarters and ease of access to medical care.
As you can see from the news story, most schools were closed during September, but due to open on the 26th - after Eid. Now though the schools have been closed a further week, to allow for the incubation period to pass for those who have travelled abroad during the Eid holiday.
It's been quite strange to be at work, but rather than teaching, only planning and preparing online materials. We havent' really got into a routine. We were given an extended break but should be opening next week at the start of October - a welcomed change I think!?

Why (not) visit Sharm El Sheikh?

Update from Dahab

Petra

We were in Dahab for over a week. We really wanted to make the most of our time there and, as we don't know if we'll get another opportunity, decided to visit Petra in Jordan. It's a bit crazy - a day trip to an ancient city in another country - but it's a really common thing to do from Dahab and organised tours left almost every day. Four of us went as a group of friends which meant we got a small discount on the booking, but it still cost over $200 each (1150LE). It's a bit pricey for a day trip, but as the boat costs $85 return, and entry to Petra itself is over $30 it's not actually that bad.  As we suspected we were merged with other people who had booked to go, but in the end our group was still only a couple of dozen people which made it easy to get around.

We were picked up from Dahab at 5am and driven to Taba in a people carrier. At Taba we went through the rigmarole of Egyptian immigration to leave the country, and then boarded a rather nice looking yacht to the port of Aqaba. Well, strictly it wasn't to the port of Aqaba - it was to a very plush marina just outside Aqaba. Jordanian immigration even came to us in order to stamp us in and out.

From here we met our guide and boarded a coach that wound its way up to Petra via Wadi Rum. The day included about 3 hours in Petra, then lunch at a hotel (as with most of these deals drinks weren't included and they cost a fortune - £3 for a bottle of water!) before being driven back to the marina.

Re-entering Egypt was a bit of a hassle - a massive queue through security, and then we all had our temperatures measured with an ear thermometer as they're still panicking about swine flu.  The resident visas for Alice and I hadn't been processed before we went away, so we needed to get another tourist visa in order to enter the country.  The man at immigration was helpful, but a bit obtuse.  From the outset we said we'd need to buy new visas as we needed to get to Cairo, but he didn't really listen.  He opened our passports and started panicking that our visas weren't valid.  He then calmed down and said he could give us a stamp to let us into the country.  However, this was a Sinai-only stamp, so Alice again said that we wanted to buy a new visa so we could get to Cairo.  He started panicking again saying that the stamp would not let us into Cairo, and that we would have to buy a visa if we wanted to do that.  A bit frustrated, as we'd known this since the outset, we paid for our visa and everything was hunky dory.  Collected by people carrier again, we were back in Dahab around 10.30 that night and with a new Duty Free allowance courtesy of our new visa.  Yay!

Rock the Casbah - Live from Dahab!

Due to the extended Eid break as a result of the school closure, we headed for Dahab.  As we were there on a Sunday, and as Alice has a shiny new laptop, we decided to see if we could present our radio show from the beach!  Unfortunately the WiFi at the nearby beach cafe wasn't working properly, but our good friends Dave and Caroline came to the rescue and lent us their Vodaphone internet USB dongle.  Although we had to reduce the bitrate quite a lot from our normal broadcast, the stream generally held up okay and we were able to present a show from the roof of the Jasmine Restaurant on the seafront in Mashraba Dahab, oppostie the Diver's House hotel and dive centre where we were staying.  The video shows where we were, or if you want to listen to the whole show then you can download it from here or listen straight from the blog by using the player below.

Tummy Trouble

This post feels a long time in coming in a way - but at the same time I haven't really wanted to post because of not wanting to jinx things, or post without a resolution!
Since about mid-June I've had trouble with my tummy. Not a very pleasant thing to blog about - but we are trying to keep track of everything we do here!! I just felt that things "weren't right" but they weren't so bad that it looked like I should take a course of tablets. I was going once a day, pretty much at the same time of day, and I was just looser than "normal".
As this was in the last few weeks of being in Cairo, we put it down to having a poor diet and needing to get back to Britain for some good wholesome food. When we got to the UK things were better. I felt that they were better because I wasn't going quite so regularly and I was eating a better diet.
But then things started back to how they had been. I tried to analyse what food I had been eating, the times I had been eating, the times I wasn't eating - everything! I couldn't really see a pattern, but I was definitely back to "not quite normal" and this was persisting. Which was worrying.
About half-way through the summer I decided I should try and see a Doc to see what they could suggest. They were really nice about it - I think I definitely got my money's worth out of the NHS this summer!!! Over two weeks I had two stool sample tests and four blood tests. All of them came back negative though - no bad guys in there!
With nothing we could follow up from the tests, we could only deduce that it was some tablets I was taking for a toenail infection!! One of the side-effects of these Terbefine tablets was a runny tum, so the Doc advised that I finish my course as soon as possible and then see what happened. This wouldn't be until I was back in Egypt, and the nice Doc said I could call him if the problem persisted!
So a day after arriving back in Egypt I finish these tablets. That night we go out to dinner. The next day my tum is worse than ever! I give it 24-hours to see if it will pass (as most things do in Egypt) but it doesn't. So I decide to take a course of tablets! I take 5 days of Antinel - a stomach antiseptic alongside 7 days of Flagyl - a tablet so hardcore that you are violently ill if you drink alcohol less than 48-hours after finishing the course!!!
Anyway, my tum is much better now.
So I don't know if finishing the toe tablets (and getting rid of this tummy bug) that got rid of the problem, OR whether actually I did have a tummy bug all summer, but the toe tablets were controlling it most of the time.
Who knows. Anyway I am generally much better now and am trying to play it safe with what I am eating.

Horse riding at Giza pyramids

Every year one of the guys at work organises a trip to go riding horses at Giza for the new staff.  Last year you may recall we chose not to go - instead we went on the tour of Khan El Khalili.  However, due to the madness of the start of the new school year this year's trip was extended to any member of staff who wanted to go along and so, as we hadn't been before, we jumped at the chance.

The video is only a quick overview of the trip - generally plodding along outside the pyramid enclosure - and so doesn't quite get the jumpiness of the horse I was on.  He was clearly spooked by something, and so I was stuck with a small boy leading me all the way.  For somone who used to ride, and despite the last time I was on a horse being about 20 years ago on a trip where I got a suspected fractured collarbone, I felt a bit daft.  My horse was changed when we were near the pyramids for a gorgeous brown stallion, but as the boy leading me was clearly trying to get a good tip, he refused to stop leading and let me take him for the run he was so desperately hoping for.  Hey-ho!

Mattress!

Towards the end of last year we decided to stay in the same apartment for our second year out here. Our landlord is helpful, the location is good and although the decor isn't anything outstanding it's a pleasant place to live. Therefore, as part of continuing to make this "home" we decided that we would buy ourselves a new mattress - as the old one was really only a strip of increasingly deformed foam.

Fridge!

We arrived back to a hot Cairo only to discover that our fridge was on its way out - cool, but not cold...Our landlord responded really quickly to our call and within 15 minutes a technician/engineer was round. In diagnosing the problem, he managed to totally break the fridge. We were without a fridge for two days before the call came...

Scotty was having trouble sleeping that night and so got up about midnight and discovered this going on outside our door...

Like all good voyeristic films - this was filmed through the peep-hole